One of the great sages once said, the evil inclination within is more interested in the depression we get after we do something bad than the bad we did. Depression is one of the grand tactics of the evil force within, to steer us in a bad direction. Everyone is prone to making bad choices every so often, and to fail is to be human. Machines can be incredibly accurate however, they don’t realize when they make a mistake. Realizing we made a mistake is a sign of our humanity, and it signifies we know bad from good which is a good thing.
Despair after having done something foolish or wrong is a tactic of the evil within to bring us down and stand in the way of any self-improvement. Despair, melancholy and depression suck the life out of us and are the opposite extreme of joy and happiness that opens the gates of our soul to inundate and flood us with life and energy.
There is no reason for people to feel shame and humiliation when they are depressed because just like every so often people catch a cold. In the same way, the blues is a built-in challenge that we can overcome, no different than the feeling to push the snooze button in the morning. This is true for the overwhelming population who suffer from the blues and/or worse yet, depression.
Depression is a result of a person’s arrogance and selfishness, traits of the animalistic human nature when left unrestrained. Someone who is self-centered and thinks how he can get more out of the world for his selfish pleasures, is arrogant and haughty and thinks everyone owes him something. This is a most important cause for depression. Arrogance can sometimes be very crude and other times it can be subtle. People of this sort are into themselves and eventually this attitude puts a person into a very small and unstable world. They become psychologically lonely, isolated and separated.
A great Rabbi once said depression is a cheap excuse for avoiding one’s purpose in life and having a purpose in life is the best remedy for depression. Having a purpose in life means thinking about giving of one’s self to help someone else, be it a family member or anyone else in the world. It means sacrificing of one’s own time and money and appreciating the value it presents the world and as a result grants them.
Unfortunately, being surrounded constantly by marketers of products and consumerism, we are constantly being fed messages that compare us to others, trying to make us feel inadequate and needing to buy more things as a source to find happiness. But more things are not the answer. As a matter of fact, the focus on more things is what makes us increasingly less happy. It is a superficial cream -- an immediate shallow treatment -- that feeds further unhappiness.
Happiness and love aren’t things you can ever acquire by thinking more of how you can serve yourself. Gladness of the heart and contentment are the direct by-products of doing the right things.
Three of the right things are: to practice humility; think of others; and think of why G-d made you and gives you the miracle of life every time you take a breadth. Guaranteed, if you make a habit of the above, you will become a much happier person.