The Depressive Perspective

Changing your perspective or way of thinking might be of great help in your fight against the depressive disorder.

Studies show that depressed people have a different way of thinking than nondepressed people.


The depressed individual projects his own image as a distorted one, often seeing himself as a failure, as a broken human machine which makes him unfit to experience joy or happiness. In his own mental chatter he would often say: "I'm a failure", "I'm no good" or "I'm stupid" and so on.

This erroneous way of thinking usually leads to a deformed perspective lens, the depressed individual's attention focuses only on the negative aspects of the environment, frequently failing to see the positive, the beauty and uniqueness of his life experience. Even if the depressed individual receives positive feedback regarding his looks, skills or general way of life, a single negative statement can throw him right back into his depressive pit, cycling thru the same damaging thought patterns and not being able to remember at least one positive aspect of his life.

Via this distorted lens, a grim future is projected for the depressed person, further deepening his already fragile mental state. He can only expect pain and misery from his approaching nearby future.
The depressed way of thinking is usually an automated one. Due to some negative past associations, the depressive fails to notice his robotlike responses, thus his negative mental attitude seems perfectly logical, even if from an outsider`s point of view it seems rather irrational.

It can be very difficult to bring about depression self help by changing your negative way of thinking into a more positive way of thinking. It will require a lot of work.

It can be quite a challenge for the individual to fight depression. It usually requires a lot of patience, perseverance and ultimately a lot of work on the depressive's side.