Title: DEPRESSION BECOMES YOU Author: Dave Turo-Shields, ACSW, LCSW E-mail: mailto:editor@overcoming-depression.com Copyright: by Dave Turo-Shields, ACSW, LCSW Web Address: http://www.Overcoming-Depression.com Word Count: 673 Category: Mental Health

DEPRESSION BECOMES YOU

Have you ever overheard people talking about couples that have been married for a very long time? One of things often said is how a couple will begin to look alike over time. How and why do you think this occurs?

This phenomenon parallels a tea bag being steeped in clear water. After a while water takes on color and characteristics of contents of tea bag.

This is what happens with couples. They are both, at same time, "clear water" AND tea bag -- Each saturating other with ideas, attitudes, beliefs, behaviors, food choices and so forth. After a while there is a melting pot effect where they each more resemble other, and this is so powerful that couples eventually begin to look alike. Powerful, eh?

Now, having a relationship with depression can be scarily same. The depression tea bag will steep itself deeply in your life at least one time. Normally you will be able to take out depression tea bag by adding new coping skills and continually diluting mixture back to its original quality. "Clear water" is who you really are at your core. You have a base set of qualities that make up both your personality and what is most important in your life. It's your essence!

We all know that some teas are stronger than others. The depression tea bag is a strong, biggie-sized tea bag! It can powerfully impact your life, saturating you completely until you forget who you are. Depression becomes you!

Generally, tunnel vision is a physical dysfunction of eye. If one can imagine viewing world around him or herself through a narrow tube, that is tunnel vision. Now, positive outcome of any physical discrepancy is that other senses tend to "kick in" and make up for disability. For example, if a person is deaf, eyesight becomes keener. If a person cannot see, hearing is more concentrated. Thus, with tunnel vision, a person can either accentuate positive or negative -- choice, however, is up to individual entirely. An equivelent thought would be to either see glass half full or half empty.

Hypothetically speaking, one could apply "tunnel-vision thinking" in both positive and negative ways. Tunnel-vision thinking is when persons act or think in either one of two ways. Primarily, positive ideal of tunnel-vision thinking would be for an individual to narrow his goals to a single, harmonic pattern and leave shady and non-essential areas to wayside. The negative form of tunnel-vision thinking is when a person becomes obcessively drawn to self-destructive and delusional behavioral patterns.

Positive tunnel-vision thinking can encourage excelling in one's career, family life, social life and an overall healthier and happier physical, mental and emotional constitution. Using mental thought process of visualization, a person may view his or her life as a long passage. As individual views this pathway, there are shady areas to left and right of himself -- but when he gazes further, there's a brilliant, beckoning light at far end. This light mimics priorities, goals and ideals of our lives. When we concentrate on positive energy of tunnel-vision light, we find enlightenment, encouragement and ultimately -- we discover our inner-psyche that demonstrates force of human and spiritual willpower.

If we utilize power of positive tunnel-vision thinking, we can set goals, find resolve and create a harmonic environment. Positive tunnel-vision thinking reinforces creative thought processes and extinguishes destructive behavior. In other words, practicing tunnel-vision visualization with combined psychological conditioning of life being viewed through a metaphorical "tunnel," we allow ourselves to remain focused in a positive light.