Spiritual Health vs. Depression:

   "Depression?.." Satan said to his minions, "Spread sadness and turmoil throughout the land that my seeds take root and sap the souls of mortal men..

What is depression? Psychologists say depression is a dejected state of mind with feelings of sadness, discouragement, and hopelessness, often accompanied by reduced activity and ability to function, unresponsiveness, apathy, and sleep disturbances.

Depression will affect one third of adults in the United States sometime during their lives. At any given time, 5% of adults are depressed, with women being three times likely as men to suffer depression. Although the median age of onset of depression is 25 years, the initial episode can occur at any age.

Most persons who experience depressive symptoms have a minor depression. Fortunately, almost all sufferers recover completely from a single episode of depression. Major depression is a recurrent disorder, and the risk of further episodes increases with each subsequent episode. Depression is a significant risk factor for suicide among men and women, young and old.

Psychologists believe that depression is due to a deficiency in one or more of three chemicals (neurotransmittors) in the brain called mono amines: serotonin, norepinephrine, and dopamine. (What they don't believe is that the depression creates the chemical condition-more on this later.)

Most cases of depression are treated with a combination of medication and psychological counseling or psychotherapy. Pharmacological approaches attempt to correct the chemical imbalance that is causing the depression. Treatment usually consists of medications and psychotherapy. Severe cases may warrant electroconvulsive therapy. (Shock Therapy for any reason belongs in the dark ages. 'Would you like some leeches with your electrodes?')

To most people depression is a 'fact of life.' How many people in this 'modern,' 'civilized' world are taught about depression? How many of us know know all of its manifestations? How many of us care about it until it manifests itself as suicide or homicide by loved ones and high school kids? Do you know that depression weakens the body's immune system and makes it more susceptible to disease? Before that, did you know that depression weakens the mind and convictions leaving the person open to evil temptations? How many people know-or even care-about prophylaxis against depression versus the number of people who have it on this planet?

First, let's talk about yours. (Even if a loved one has it, it's still yours because YOU have to live with it.) How did it happen? Social stress? Work related stress? (e.g. Australia is big on economic/work related depression.) Personal stress? 'Chemical imbalance?' Or is there a bigger source of stress - a fact that is so huge, yet so simple that it exists like the world beneath our feet? How do we cope with depression of the soul? That's what it is: Oppression of the spirit depresses the soul.

We should recognize depression. We should see it coming like a dreaded ghost ship coming off the misty horizon. Most of us don't see it coming. Most of us don't want to see it coming; it grows and spreads not much different than a malignant cancer. Once depression is rooted and takes hold it has, in it's own way, replaced the person that we knew. Depression is strong enough to take on a life of its own. The person that depression controls is different from the original. At its onset depression is unrecognizable. We usually call them idiosyncrasies, but the signs are evident:

The "nicest person in the world" lies on a continuous basis to the people who are closest to him, at first, to protect his relationships with them, but later for the main reason of feeding the cancer known as depression. He may even lie to protect depression by denying that he has it, but the most ostensible ones are those who not only admit to depression; they empower it. A depressed person will actually believe that depression provides insight; this is a positive hallucination or a trance state that is meant to protect the emotional securities of the depressed personality.

By denoting one or more life-positive aspects to a condition which is obviously nothing more than life-negative, the person being subjugated justifies, therefore, protects depression. The cancer personality enjoys his anonymity, so he will not speak out loud to people or make public knowledge of himself or his ideas. In essence, he avoids emotional outbursts that may cause personal confrontation from others.

The more he sinks away from people and physical reality, the more of an ally his depression becomes. The original person slowly shrinks away as the cancer personality slowly takes over. The cancer personality also develops logic and reasoning for his condition to further justify it. He might try to seek help for himself and enjoys talking about his condition, but he will probably do this as anonymously and as impersonally as possible. The cancer personality only accepts those ideas which are convenient and please him; he rejects all others.

A cancerous mind pattern is truly sub-human; he does not really seek methods of healing - only pieces of concepts that feed his system of logic. Ideas are only accepted if they fit into that tiny "box" known by the cancer personality as his own "special" code of ethics. Unfortunately, he only becomes a product of a very large society on this planet, depressed human culture, which isn't special or individual at all. Eventually, the original person is just a puppet and the cancer known as depression is the puppeteer; this puppeteer is satan.

A cancerous biopathy from other sources is not much different. Depression and cancer can go hand in hand since this mental state tends to depress the autonomic and immune systems in the body. Remember, it is the immune system that fights cancer. Any type of stress that leads to cancerous biopathy is devastating to our immune systems. This may be the most difficult area of managing our lives in order to get well - especially in a life-negative, industrial society where toxic industries think nothing of polluting and killing life on this planet while the public at large is either too complacent or fearful to do anything about it.

We can be loyal to our business relationships, our politics, and a government corrupt at the highest levels at the expense of our health. The emotional vacuum caused by the biopathy known as depression has deleterious health effects that are just as real. ("As A Man Thinketh In His Heart, So He Is" [Proverbs 27:19]).

New Suicide-Depression Warning Issued

More than a year ago, I posted news of a warning label added to antidepressants -- as mandated by the FDA -- cautioning physicians to pay close attention to patients taking these drugs for the first time (over the first few weeks) or changing their dosages for suicidal tendencies. The FDA issued its second warning for antidepressants in some 16 months -- and a much stronger one at that -- last Friday, again urging the monitoring of adults who use these potentially toxic drugs for warning signs of suicide.

The new warning -- applicable to adults and children -- was a response to recent studies that linked suicidal behavior in adults to their use of antidepressants. The FDA also announced a review of antidepressant drugs -- unfortunately based on data provided by manufacturers -- to determine the extent of the risk of suicide that should take more than a year to complete.

The drugs affected by the new labeling:

• Bupropion (Wellbutrin)
• Citalopram (Celexa)
• Fluoxetine (Prozac)
• Fluvoxamine (Luvox)
• Mirtazapine (Remeron)
• Nefazodone (Serzone)
• Paroxetine (Paxil)
• Sertraline (Zoloft)
• Escitalopram (Lexapro)
• Venlafaxine (Effexor)

In an interesting aside as to how the FDA may be leaning, the agency also updated its Web site about a far higher-than-expected number of suicide attempts in studies analyzing the effectiveness of Cymbalta for incontinence, a non-label use of the drug (another study I posted last year measured Cymbalta's effectiveness with "curing" fibromyalgia).

All the more reason you should be running as fast as you can from anyone recommending antidepressants, as they are never a safe or appropriate treatment. Some helpful ways you can treat your depression effectively and safely:

• Reduce, with the goal of eliminating, sugars and grains from your diet.
• Optimize the ratio of omega-3 fats in your diet by eating foods high in omega-3 fats and taking a high-quality fish or cod liver oil every day.
• Start moving today on an exercise program.
• Learn the Emotional Freedom Technique for Depression, an effective, energy psychology tool I find very useful in the treatment of depression and other emotional, as well as physical, issues, with the help of my free online manual.

Those of you who have come this far know the existence of depression. You also know there is even greater truth than what has been presented to you at school, television, the newspaper or your family doctor. As far as you, my dear reader, you will find out how to deal with depression and its servants. You will discover how weak depression really is since it is a tool of Satan. You will find out how to rise above depression and its weak-willed servants. Most of all you will learn to recognize the seeds of depression and keep the evil from taking root.

Please realize that this author cannot lay claim to perfection. I have battled depression enough times in my life because I have had so many downs. Outside of my GPA, I have to say that I had so many downs because I had set myself up for so much disappointment. (Did you see my index page?) The reader might ask why I am not concentrating my efforts in any of those fields I mention on this page. You can read part of my story, 'The Website Owner's Preface' at "Billions for Bankers, Debts for the People" on how I tried to play the prodigal citizen to a prodigal society.

Somehow, I developed morals and ethics in my own search for the truth. Of course, I would prefer to be devoting my life to the sciences. Instead, I'm stuck here as a webmaster telling you this. Unless human society on this planet becomes more spiritually advanced my work in the spiritual sciences means nothing. Have I set myself up for disappointment again? Will I be battling depression again because I have too many expectations from YOU, my dear reader? I think not.

I don't put you on a pedastel - just like I don't put our government 'leaders,' health 'authorities,' and our 'all-knowing' media on a pedastel. I have learned to think of all of you as my EQUAL. If anything you have to say sounds suspect, I will research it myself to find the truth. I do have expectations from myself, but not from any of you. You are my equals, individuals who live by your own code. You are made in God's image, with your own free will. The only one I put on that almighty pedastel is God. I have put my faith in God - and God always provides a back up plan, just like the fantastic science and discoveries He provides.

I do not look down on you, my dear reader, but I do need you to know your place before we begin. If you let depression take hold of you, then you have somehow excluded God from your life. At this point, I will have to ask the atheists to leave because the only thing you have placed your faith in is death and the scientific cretinism of the dark ages. GO!

{No, I'm not going to force anyone to go. The problem with atheists is that they have taken so many decadent concepts to heart that they have trouble digesting this paper with an objective mind. In general, atheists are too quick to stereotype others - especially people like me when talking about God and spiritualism - and they tend to question the critical thinking of everyone except themselves (read "Constructs of Belief"). If you are an atheist - or worse, a depressed atheist, then there is nothing I can offer to you. You just shouldn't be here.}

Like any problem if there are not enough facts to solve depression, we have to do more research to gather more facts. Since we are talking about you - not a laboratory or a math equation - we factor in the human element: You must WANT to be better. I know it sounds simple, even non-sensical to ask since you are here, but: Do You Want to Get Better? Depression doesn't just gain a life of its own, it gains a mind of its own. Like cancer it will lie, cheat, and steal to stay alive.

Depression serves only one master, Satan. There is the possibility that depression has brought you here to learn about its enemy. Remember Sun Tzu's 'Art of War', "Know thine enemy as well as you know thyself." Depression knows everything that you know. It will try to protect itself by blocking your attempts at getting well. You may Learn how to cope with depression here, but later, when you least expect it, a small voice inside you may say, "It's a fact of life... Life is too difficult... I can't do it... I want to be alone..." That's depression talking to you. Depression is a demon whispering to you programming you to fail from the inside. You have to expect how this demon may counter what you have learned here. Know thine Enemy.

Your Breath is Spiritual: Breath out the Negative, Breath in the Positive

We start with a basic autonomic function: the breath. "In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters" (Genesis 1:1-2). The word for "spirit" for the ancient Hebrews (also pneuma or anemos for the Greeks and animus or anima for the Romans) was the same for "breath."

What is meant by the words "And the spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters" is that the breath of God caused visible ripples upon the dark mirror surface of the waters of chaos creating form from formlessness. "And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul" (Genesis 2:7).

The Shape of our souls was determined by the expressed Word in the vital Breath of God when he inspired life into Adam. Your spiritual awakening is directly proportional to your inner most true desire to overcome this reality. Your Breath, the flow of God's divine spark, is directly proportional to your spiritual awakening: The weaker the breath the weaker the divine spark.

The human nervous system is directly related to the world around it. Proper breathing can be trained out of us at an unconscious level. Human nervous systems are structurally similar, but are never exactly the same. Any human nervous system is affected by events verbal or non-verbal. Any event can affect the body and mind as a whole. For the sake of sanity, remember, first is the event, the initial stimulus; second is the nervous impact of the event via the senses; third is the emotional reaction, based upon past experience of the individual, and fourth comes the verbal reaction.

Most individuals identify the first and the fourth steps and are not aware that the second and third exist. Because children and childlike grown ups are incapable of refined discrimination many experiences shock their nervous systems so violently that psychiatrists have evolved a special word for the result - "Trauma." Carried over into later years these traumas can so entangle an individual that neurosis, psychosis, and depression can result.

Almost every individual has had several traumatic experiences. The functions which sustain us such as our vision, speech, clarity of thought, breathing, circulatory system, and the sexual function are the casualties of stress.

We practice a form of triage here and work on the breathing first since it sustains us. I don't just mean that it keeps us alive. God created us in His image, therefore, we create ourselves everyday through our own thoughts, beliefs, and actions. In turn, the form and functions of the body follow the mind pattern of the soul personality. Wilhelm Reich discovered in his clinical practice that an autonomic function can be objectified through practice which can make it subject to conscious control.

In fact, he 'discovered' a very old principle known by the ancients who practiced Chi Kung, Transcendental Meditation, the Kabbalah, and other such disciplines: The way we breathe sustains who we are. Any function in the body, from parasympathetic to sympathetic, can be objectified or controlled through meditative practice which includes certain breathing patterns. The breathing pattern can provide the necessary blood chemistry so, that other 65 to 70% percent of our brains can work and do the most fantastic things that humans are meant to do. Unfortunately, a depressed breathing pattern takes you in the other direction.

A depressed breathing pattern is a secondary autonomic function. A depressed person tends to hypo ventilate or have shortness of breath. Hypoventilation acidifies the blood creating a constant imbalance in the blood chemistry. The body will try to make up for this imbalance by 'sighing' or taking a deep breath, thereby taking in more oxygen. Maybe you have seen this in old people at rest homes or young people at school try to get through the day. They are 'sighing' because they are being depressed by their environment; They are being depressed by their peers; They are being depressed because they feel that things could be better - and they're right. By the same token depression is self induced by their own reaction to this bland stimulus. By establishing a correct breathing pattern you create a hostile environment for depression.

'Cleansing Breathes' are the best way to begin. Breathing by this type of deliberation not only objectifies the breathing function it really does cleanse the 'light' within each cell of our bodies. Your 'light' energy creates YOU. Energy creates Matter. Your mind pattern programs this energy to create you. (I'm not talking about eating; that only sustains you. I'm not talking about your parents; they only established a DNA pattern.) I'm talking about your mind pattern which programs the 'light' within your own body, the collective consciousness of each cell in your body which is your soul-personality. Remember, "I Am Who I Am" (Exodus 3:14). God created you as "I Am," perfection in creation, in His Image. That means you have the ability to create yourself. You are your own microcosm. You program the energy in your body and your energy creates You. Revelation!

For example, blood represents the joy of life as it flows throughout your body. Blood loss indicates a loss of joy in your life. A female with a heavy menstrual flow indicates that she feels a loss of joy in her womanhood, and needs to look at her love relationships. High blood pressure shows stress in the avenues of life chosen to express joy. Fat is literally a barrier that you erect to protect yourself from experiences. Often, extremely obese people are victims of sexual abuse. They amass the weight to make themselves undesirable to others, thereby precluding any further sexual encounters. If you have a mind-pattern for insulation, regardless of what you eat, you will stay insulated. Diets do not ever work.

After you have practiced 'Cleansing Breathes' for a few days you can also incorporate the next set of breathing exercises (click on Intro to Chi Kung Exercises). The next set is slightly more advanced. They are designed to purify the mind, body, and soul-personality. Don't worry if you can't do all the exercises. Just do what ever you can. The premise for working on these breathing exercises here is to 'push' the superconducting traits of your cellular matter to fire up your soul personality. You don't have to be of the physical stamina to hold your breath or need the endurance to do yogic breathing to have correct breathing.

On the other hand, if you ask God to help you, you probably can. (Whenever I have a trouble with an exercise or lifting weights that's what I usually do: "Hey God, how 'bout a little help here?")

For those of you who have spent at least a week at the 'Prelude to Chi Kung: Breathing Exercises' probably have some questions regarding their relationship to our purpose here. I like to follow a treatise in karate for breaking boards: Focus slightly beyond the target. That is exactly what we are doing here. Depression is the object we must break, so, at the moment, we are focusing slightly beyond it into different realms of personal achievement such as cleansing breaths, relaxation, and psychic dowsing.

I also hope you found the special existence of microtubules to be uplifting as opposed to the 'dust to dust' attitude presented in school or the spiritually bereft presentation of humanity given by mainstream science. I promise to deliver a written work on how we are capable of so much more than mainstream school, media, or science are telling us at this point.

I am including God's Word in this work and in this entire web site because God's Word provides the power in the human equation. God's Word provides hope far beyond the drugs and spiritually bereft funk of mainstream society. Spiritual science empowers humanity far beyond the imagination of mainstream thinkers.

Spiritual Concept: You

For those of you who have come this far I should hope that your frame of mind has been focused from "poor little you.." to a greater possibility of you. There is more to this reality than is being offered to you by mainstream thinkers. By the same token there is much more to you.

By the same token, if you have attracted the demon, 'depression,' into your life, then you must also be playing the prodigal son or daughter to a spiritually bereft society. Are your values balanced? 'Nostril Breathing' indicated if your breathing isn't balanced, then your mind patterns are not balanced. An unbalanced mind pattern, in turn, leads to an unbalanced soul personality. An unbalanced soul-personality, in turn leads to a malfunctioning person: Whether you're depressed, whether you're psychotic or neurotic or diseased; IT DOESN'T MATTER!! What matters is your value system.

God gave us a left and right brain that oppose each other for a reason. They are symbols. They represent the link between the physical world, or the original fall from grace and the spiritual world, the original time line. Below please examine left brain versus right brain behavior and emotions. See for yourself which attitudes you follow:

Left Brain Behavior/Emotion Root Word: Fear

Right Brain Behavior/Emotion Root Word: Love

Each of us can have any of these qualities listed, left and right brain depending on where we root our emotions. The point is, which qualities do you celebrate? Which qualities do you lament, gossip, or dwell upon every waking moment? Which qualities haunt you during your sleeping moments? I'm willing to bet that the first behaviors and emotions that you want to talk about everyday are from the left brain. Why? They are the first qualities that people want to talk about on the television, on the radio, in the newspapers, in the magazines, mainstream fiction, at work, in school, ad infinitum... We are constantly deluged by emotions rooted in fear.

Of course, all of us aspire, exclusively, to right brain thinking. The problem is we have to deal with left brain thinkers again in the physical world in the form of our co-workers, our friends, our family, and, yes, even you and me. What does all of this have to do with depression? If you have studied the left brain's negative characteristics, then you see that a personality rooted in fear is devoid of spirituality.

If you dwell on nothing but this void, then that's the source of your depression. Who teaches us spiritual thinking-to root our emotions in love? Our parents? Our teachers? Our Ministry? Is there anyone outside of ourselves who can create this balanced mind pattern between left and right brain? There is only one. The one person, besides God, who we live with twenty four hours a day is the only one who can solve the depression. God's guidance helps us solve the problem to any lesson, but we bring the lessons into our lives. Depression is one of the biggest lessons of all.

You create yourself every day through your mind-patterns: your beliefs, your expressions, your obsessions, your reason to live - and your mind patterns reflect your reality. ( "As A Man Thinketh In His Heart, So He Is" - Proverbs 27:19). You should know that prayer is no different from lamentation when God gave us our power: "So I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours" (Mark 11:24). Because your lamentation like prayer is incensed with emotion you give power to sadness and turmoil and bring it into your life. Your experiences reflect your thinking, thoughts reflect action, action reflects reality:

"7. Be not deceived; God is not mocked: 
for whatsoever a man soweth, 
that shall he also reap. 
8. For he that soweth to his flesh 
shall of the flesh reap corruption; 
but he that soweth to the Spirit 
shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting. 
{As Ye Sow, so shall Ye Reap}" [Galatians 6:7-8].

You create your own thoughts-no one else. Your thinking influences your actions and reactions as you create what you see. Depression takes advantage of the ego (left brain). Depression hides behind the ego and the ego distorts thoughts since fear of anything is rooted within the ego. In fact, fear rooted in the ego-centric person evolves into a form of trance logic; this creates a person with a lot of conviction about their distorted sense of reality.

The Ego does not acknowledge its own tremendous negativity; it uses cloaking, self-deception, and finds whomever or whatever to convince itself that the problem is not within. The Ego actually imposes its thinking onto other people. You end up perceiving others as imposing their beliefs. You end up perceiving the rest of the world as depressed, therefore, you are depressed. (The ego is directly attached to physical reality since it represents Lucifer's original fall from grace: "Look what I have created.") In essence, you have set limitations on yourself and all of reality and there is nothing more devoid of God than a limited view of reality - especially when rooted in fear.

Our bodies are the limiting factor. The body is an egotistical, physical, limited object; it is the physical symbol of the separation from the Mind of God. People view each other as separate entities of different sex, color, age, height, beliefs, etc., instead of viewing these bodies as different aspects of the One Soul-Personality, God.

We are all aspects of the same Soul-Personality, given freedom of will because God is All That Is. There is only One Creator. (To imply more than one creator is insane, therefore, Satan does not have the power denoted to him. He is only the negative aspect of God, Who allows evil to exist as part of our lesson-so we know the difference.) Since we are all different aspects of God and the power that God gives us is our eternal salvation then we must also use our power in this physical plane - in the form of forgiveness.

In the physical plain we are given the lessons by God which lead to our personal salvation. We draw experiences to ourselves according to our mind-patterns. If a negative experience is drawn to us, this means we must correct an imbalance in our mind-patterns. This world being full of negative experiences can easily be dealt with if we stop dwelling on negative experiences of the past.

The past is an illusion. Dwelling on negative experience only brings more negative experience. Forgiving the negative experience as a lesson to be learned and a cause for change invokes our salvation and clears the way for a better world. Any person, place, or thing that provides a negative experience must be forgiven. We must let go of memories that only cause negative emotions. Forgive the past and let it go. {Sample Forgiveness Exercise}

Since you are the only one who can rid yourself of depression you must ask yourself, "Do I contribute positive or negative energy to the healing of myself?" You can see any number of doctors, specialists, and priests for an inordinate amount of time. If your attitude does not contribute to your healing, then you cannot heal. You must learn to forgive yourself, not only for your life to continue, for Your Salvation. You must learn to forgive every aspect of your life because this is all you have encountered; this includes your sex life, your social life, your family life, and your working life. Do not misinterpret forgiveness. Forgiveness is not just turning the other cheek. (Christ was just showing what He was made of-no fear.) Forgiveness is the epiphany of letting go and moving on. (Case History)

If you are in a situation where you are being hurt right now, then you must forgive the person who is hurting you by letting go and moving on. Only the ego fights to stay in a destructive situation. If you are in a situation where you cannot get away from the person who is hurting you, then you must show this person the path to forgiveness. Do not be afraid to show what you are really made of. You must have the courage to speak up and say what is hurting you. You must also have the courage to say that you want things to be better.

That's what this web site is for. I've done all this and more. I guess the only thing keeping me in a prodigal society is my ego - telling me that I can somehow make things better by turning the people around.

Call me a dreamer. I have learned to forgive. I see people in a different light since I look beyond physical appearances: The person may not be aware of the Christ within, so he projects incorrect mind-patterns. I always try to see the Christ within everyone, so this empowers the Christ. Remember, the actions of anyone who is ego influenced is separate from the Christ, who is truly within that person. By accepting and understanding who is within yourself and the people you attract, you view others in a more Christic fashion. Ask yourself, "Why would Christ argue with Christ?" Seeing yourself the same way prevents arguments, fights, and disagreements of all kinds. Be like Christ: Offer your personal salvation through forgiveness.

Most of all you must forgive yourself for having the depression. You have it because you have reached a turning point in your life. It's time to let go of those memories that hurt you. It's time to let go of a life that is hurting you. In order for you to continue with your life and your salvation, you must forgive, let go, and change for the better. You are a living aspect of God. You already know how you must change and what direction you must go. Peace be with You.

Reality Changing, Self-Improvement Courses are Yours for the Asking...

Related Article:

• Case History, Depression: Depression case history, weekend treatments with Wilhelm Reich's Character Analytic Vegetotherapy: Walter Frank, 'Vegetotherapy,' This Journal, March 1942, pp 65-78.