“The more things change the more they stay the same.”
Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr
Everybody experiences depression differently. I know this. I don’t know how many others experience what I am about to talk about. But if they do then perhaps it may provide some sort of temporary comfort.
I feel as though time has simply just forgot about me. Either that or it no longer holds any relevance. One day just blurs into another. Even with my schedule of work, study, work, train, work etc. I try to make the most of my day. I try to be productive and make my day mean something. But to no avail.
I recently had my 28th birthday. I was even looking forward to it in the weeks leading up. “Things will be different” I thought to myself. “I will feel different.”
But waking up on the morning of my birthday I had a sudden and oppressive realisation. That I was in the exact same place that I was 10 years ago. In this past decade my life had gone nowhere. Many things where different than they were when I was 18. Friends had come and gone. I could now drive. I’ve learned things. But I am still trapped in the same circle that I was stuck in back then. My life still lacks any real meaning. Any direction. I go through the motions day after day out of habit. Trying to find some meaning in what I do. Like a drowning person desperately trying to stay afloat, clutching at a rope that isn’t there.
I remember when I was a child I used to always fantasize about my future. I had dreamt of doing at least a dozen different things throughout those years. Time meant something to me back then. I was ever changing. No two days were alike. I long for that feeling. That excitement. But I can no longer distinguish one year from another.
Perhaps this is what my life was meant to be. Maybe I am bound to be a spiritual drifter. I man of all places yet none. There is the old saying “Not all who wonder are lost”. Whilst this saying provides me with a passing comfort I find myself wondering if I am, indeed, lost. I don’t feel comfortable is my state of uncertainty. Not knowing if I will find the direction that I am looking for.
ॐ
hsphaven 
October 10, 2018 at 9:59 am
Great post and very fitting quote! I once read about existential depression in gifted people and that sounds like the kind of depression you’re experiencing. It also sounds very much like an existential crisis. I am so familiar with the feeling you describe where years become indistinguishable. Round and round we go on this lifeless merry-go-round. The only trace of time passing, for me, are my parent’s aged faces which I never really “saw” until a few days ago, or how my psychology peers who were once years below me are now almost qualified psychologists while I remain stuck in the empty pit of depression. I don’t care to return to psychology as I found it meaningless. I don’t care for much at all. Check out this comic if you haven’t seen it already: http://hyperboleandahalf.blogspot.com/2013/05/depression-part-two.html
I don’t know if it’s the depression that’s making just about everything feel meaningless, or whether it’s the lack of meaning that’s making me depressed, if you get what I mean haha.
Viktor Frankl always said our biggest motivating force as humans is meaning. He called it “The Will to Meaning”. Have you heard of his book “Man’s Search For Meaning”? Right now I have another book sitting in front of me called “An Authentic Life” by Caroline Jones which I feel drawn to read, even though I find it hard to read when I am depressed.
When you were a child what was the future you fantasised?
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October 10, 2018 at 10:19 am
Thanks for your response 🙂
I remember your post “The merry go round of life” very clearly. In fact I had it in mind when writing this post. I didn’t think you would return to psychology. It seemed far too “clinical” for you. I couldn’t do it myself.
I have read that comic! I really loved it. It explained things so clearly in an easy-to-read way. I read it on this blog
But I believe you hit the nail on the head. I feel like my life has no meaning at all. Just one pointless day after another. I’m not happy in anything I do. I often fear thag my existence will become circular. Only living for the point of living. How do you keep going? I’m wish I was strong like you are.
I haven’t read either of those books. But I find it hard to read when I’m so depressed too. Far too much effort.
As for my childhood fantasy… I had often fantasized that I would be a wanderer hehe. Just ambling from place to place until I found a place to live in the forest. Away from life.
How did you imagine your future as a child?
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October 10, 2018 at 10:45 am
Haha that is so much more out-of-the-box than the future I imagined! My primary school teacher once got us to write down what we wanted to be when we grew up. The look on her face would have been priceless if you were in our class! Maybe you have gypsy blood. The Aboriginal people were nomadic too… they had no need for houses as the entire land was one large home. Anyways, my answer to my teacher’s question was that I wanted to be a professional table tennis player, an actress or a teacher like her.
Yeah I honestly don’t know how (and sometimes why) I keep on going. I think this existence would drive anyone crazy.
Yep reading is wayyyy too much effort. That’s why I like zines
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October 10, 2018 at 11:00 am
My year nine homeroom teacher actually described me as an enigma. I have no doubt that you caused many of your teachers some grey hairs trying to figure you out 😋 hehe
I hate this idea that people are expected to know what they want to do. That it has to conform with every one else’s idea.
But I bet you’d be a great table tennis player 🏓
I don’t know how much longer I can keep this up. I’m exhausted. Mentally and physically. Nor can I see why. If this is what life is going to be. Just one stress after another.
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October 10, 2018 at 11:05 am
I don’t know whether I’ve told you, but I think you would make a good psych nurse. You wouldn’t be happy working at a place like the one you visited me in, but I think you’d like it in a private hospital where the patients want to be there and the atmosphere is so much nicer
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October 10, 2018 at 11:13 am
I actually visited a hospital a few days ago. Whilst driving back home on Monday I stopped by in Wagga Wagga. My ex-girlfriend was staying in a mental health unit there so I went to visit. The staff were friendly and the interior was nice (for a hospital).
But I must confess. As silly as it sounds I’m always scared that if I enter they won’t let me out
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