TSHP121: Depression and how to help folks that don’t want to be helped

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What’s Coming This Episode?

We’ve all been in the position where we know someone we care about needs help but we just can’t find the words to help them, be it health, addiction or state of mind. Sean and Ed are here to help…

Enjoy the show, it’s The Self Help Podcast!

Show Notes and Links

Resource of the Week

  • Sean thinks you should simply head to your smart phone app store and search for ‘depression’. Lots of great apps out there
  • Ed thinks you should subscribe to (another) YouTube channel – the RSA

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Depression

Dealing with Depression

People tell me about being stressed, when they are not, they are busy. People tell about having the flu when they haven’t, that have a cold. People tell me that they are depressed when they are not, they are a little bit down. The natural flow of human emotion is to be high and to be low. This flow is normal and may happen minute by minute, hour by hour, day by day, week by week, month by month. It may flow throughout the year so that people feel high in the summer and low in the winter. To feel a bit down from time to time is normal.

What is depression?

Try and visualise a flat line that starts in the present moment and goes on into eternity. The line represent the normal, normal feeling and normal actions, you might see the line as flatness neither happy or sad, positive or negative. Anything above the line is positive, happiness, joy and as it gets higher euphoria, ecstasy and mania. Below the line is dullness, lack of motivation, inertia, unhappiness, misery, sadness, and depression.

Those described as manic depressive have fluctuating emotions between the highs of mania, through normality of the middle line to the lows of depression. There are many types of manic depression. Some are mainly high with a little bit of low, some mainly low with a little high and all other combinations between these two. Then there are the issues of if these changes are rapid cycling or slow cycling.

Depression describes an emotional state that exists below the normal line. As we all have up days and down days we all feel high and lows. Both mania and depression are the extremes of these normal emotional states.

The mind brain
The mind is the emotional and conceptual part of the system or the software of the system. The brain is the meat, or hardware of the system. Feelings are in the software and, the chemistry or endorphins of the brain, are in the hardware. Both effect each other. If we change the way that we think or feel we will change our brain chemistry. On the other hand if we change our brain chemistry we change the way that we think and feel.

Changing Your Brain

Medication
Anti-Depressants change the brain chemistry that in turn changes the way that we think and feel.

Psychotherapy
This changes the way that we think and feel that in turn changes the brain chemistry.

Both medication and psychotherapy are relevant and will affect depression. In most cases of deep depression they will only work effectively when used together.

Clinical depression
This is when depression is the sole result of deficient brain chemistry. This requires medication, which may need to be used forever; just as if you have an insulin deficiency because you are diabetic you will need medication for life.

Reactive depression
This is when an event or experience affects our thinking and feeling and subsequently effects our brain chemistry. Included in reactive depression are bereavement, loss, hurt, separation and so on. Also there may be trauma and post traumatic stress. Both medication and talking therapies will be useful for reactive depression.

Repressed anger
This type of depression is not always accepted by some professionals, though I often experience it in my consulting room. Perhaps a manager or partner acts in way that creates anger within you that you are unable to respond to. The situation requires that you keep quiet and repress your feelings. Over time, as the anger accumulates, the negative feelings that are unexpressed, eventually turn against you and are eventually excreted as depression. Therapy is an absolute must in this case. Also running, jumping, screaming and shouting to let go of all negative energy will be really useful.

Generally there are many issues of feeling down in life. Post natal depression, the baby blues, midlife crisis, bereavement, loss, being continuously let down, and so on. In most cases when the situation remains unaddressed it will eventually become depression.

Dealing With Depression
The first step is to be clear about what type of depression you have then you can proceed to treatment. We all need to be aware of our emotional health. The self help tip here has to be that if you begin to feel bad, down or depressed do something about it. The more aware you become of your self the more you will be able to attend to your own needs and not get lost in the depth of depression.

Whatever your type, you are least likely to experience depression by practising mindfulness, and those that are depressed and begin to practice mindfulness will not only solve their problems quicker but may also reduce the levels of medication required to solve their issues.

Finally you do not need to suffer from depression. When you feel really down and you can’t shift it get some help.

Be happy and be mindful

Take care

Sean x

TSHP120: Do You Feel Like an Outsider With Your Stepchildren?

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What’s Coming This Episode?

Families. Can’t live with them, can’t [insert witty line here]. But what about when we inherit a whole new family when we meet a new partner, with children that have grown up without us? It’s a situation that many folks find themselves in so let’s dive in…

Enjoy the show, it’s The Self Help Podcast!

Show Notes and Links

Resource of the Week

Stay in Touch

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Leave us an Honest Review on iTunes

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Help with ‘Blended Families’

The Blended Family

“Blended Family” I love that phrase and the concept behind it. I am not sure where the phrase “step family” comes from but blended certainly sounds a whole lot better.

This week on the podcast Ed and I have been talking about what to do when we inherit an extended family. We live in a world where couples no longer stay together as they once did. There has been a drop in the divorce rate of 50% from a few years ago to the latest figure from the office of national statistics of 42%. We probably all know someone who is divorced, living as a single parent, or are part of a blended family.

The issue that was raised by the listener who requested this podcast was about having step children some of whom got on with her very well and one who was positively negative and ‘hated’ her. Sometimes these situations are based in “I love him but not his kids”.

Being a step parent is not an easy job. The best blended family’s work when the old family and the new family all talk together in a civil manner. This will always be dependent on the nature of the split and who blames who for what, who has been able to forgive whom for whatever went on.

The wicked step mother, in all fairy stories is a popular myth. Many step mothers do their very best to accommodate and care for the step children while they are in loco parentis. The problem can be when the other parent is using the child to wage a war on their ex’s new partner. This phenomenon called conflict by proxy and can be very destructive for all involved.

There is also an issue of ethos. The ethos of the two homes may vary greatly so that the children have problems adapting to the different regime when visiting the step home. Perhaps in their main home there are few boundaries and the children do what they want, go to bed when they want and so on. In the step family there are boundaries and routine. This can create conflict.

Often there is limited time with the kids. Access arrangements in Britain are usually every other weekend and a visit during the week if geography allows. So the impact that the step home can have on the child’s life will be limited.

Many young and adult step children will feel that in liking a step mother or father that they are betraying their mother or father. They may also feel possessive to their parent wanting to reject the new partner.

Are there answers? Well the net is full of ideas and blogs, sites and apps many of which are helpful. Most times it comes down to communication and when communication is impossible you need to refer to the Live In the present book chapter on the law of allowing. You can’t push water up hill and you can’t make a guinea pig bark. There is a time when as a step parent, you would be best to step back and leave it to the natal parents to sort it out.

I guess that as the level of blended families grows we will get better at living with them.

Take care and be happy

Sean x

TSHP119: How to Get Motivated

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What’s Coming This Episode?

Want to do something in life? ANYTHING in life? You’ll need some energy. Some of us find it naturally but most will need a metaphorical shot in the arm every now and then (daily in many cases). But Why? It’s time for Ed & Sean to discuss…

Enjoy the show, it’s The Self Help Podcast!

Show Notes and Links

Resource of the Week

Stay in Touch

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Leave us an Honest Review on iTunes

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Get (and Stay) Motivated

Motivation – is about having fun

In this weeks podcast Ed and I have been talking about motivation and how you keep going when you feel like you are running out of energy. The trick is that you need to be living your dream and not other people’s. Motivation is about the life energy that either comes from within you not from without you.

Why do you do what you do?

Many of us do what we do because our parents, friends, teachers, religion, culture, and so on, demand it of us. I work with so many people that get to the point of retirement and question why on earth they did all the things that that have done with their life. They are left with the feeling that they have wasted time; they have wasted their life. From here they often fall into retirement in a state of depression.

Mindfulness is about living in the present, in awareness of what you are doing and why you are doing it. Mindfulness is about being responsible for who you are and what you do. This should not be confused with blame. Fault and blame are not to do with responsibility. Responsibility implies the ability or need to respond.

There is a trick in getting motivated in doing what you want to do with your life. If you wake up feeling the energy to jump out of bed and get on with what you enjoy doing you are living a happy and mindful life. If you wake up feeling like you don’t want to get out of bed and do what you have to do then you are living the mindless life.

This is not a criticism of anyone living an unfulfilling life. But if you are unhappy with your lot this is your chance to change. Wherever you are is your starting point and we are all starting from different places. It is not where you start but where you will finish and more importantly life is about enjoying the journey from start to finish.

To be positively motivated you need to be engaged and connected in your life and living your own dream. To be negatively motivated you will be living someone else’s dream and feeling obliged to.

If you are at a point in life when you need to get focussed and motivated I suggest you get on Amazon and get your self a copy of ‘The Attractor Factor’ by Joe Vitale. Joe takes you through a series of questions that enable you to connect with your inner feelings and discard bits of your life that are de-motivating and create a life goal that will begin your journey.

What ever you do choose to do with your life, live it mindfully and enjoy your journey and you might just get to the end of your life with a smile on your face.

Take care

Sean x

TSHP118: You Really Should Be Happy

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What’s Coming This Episode?

Everything is amazing and nobody’s happy. That’s what Louis C K said. Is he right? In part, certainly. If you’re listening to this episode, odds are that you have a better, richer, more comfortable life that kings and queens of just 100 years ago. So where are we going wrong?

Enjoy the show, it’s The Self Help Podcast!

Show Notes and Links

Resource of the Week

Stay in Touch

We’re all over the web, so feel free to stay in touch:

Leave us an Honest Review on iTunes

We’d be amazingly grateful if you could leave us a review on iTunes. It will really help us to build our audience. So, if your like what you hear (and would like to hear more great free content) then visit our iTunes page and leave us an honest review (all feedback gratefully received!).

Does what we own make us happy?

Over the last few weeks Ed and I have been looking at issues from migration to happiness. It seems to me that the movements of people that we see as populations from the war torn middle east moving north are people seeking happiness. We have been talking about whether or not the things that we have, our possession can make us happy.

Is what you have now enough? Is what you have to be shared? Are others allowed to have the same that you have?

Topically does where you live make you happy? People have always moved around the world seeking happiness and fulfilment.

Do we own the countries in which we live?
Having just returned from Italy through the Channel Tunnel led me to think about the idea of ownership of land and the idea of who owns the world. Who are we Brits? Where do we come from? Do we own the land that is described as Britain or the United Kingdom?

“Imagine there’s no countries it isn’t hard to do”
(John Lennon)

When humans moved out from the Eden of the African plains to populate the world we took possession of territories, which in turn became tribal domains, kingdoms and countries. As we did this we created a sense of belonging. We began to own our territory that belongs to “us” and no one else.

When we identify with a group of human beings we see them as ‘us’. Those people that we do not identify as ‘Us’ who exist outside of our group we identify as ‘them’. ‘Us’ equals inclusion acceptance and support. ‘Them’, equals denial and rejection. When ‘They’ seek to take what ‘We’ have or what we feel that we own we fight to defend it.

And so in 2015 the ‘Us’ that is the UK has an army of migrants massing on the borders attempting entry. The ‘Us’ that is the UK says you cannot come in becomes you are not ‘Us’ so they are ‘Them’ and you do not belong here.

And yet Britain is, and always has been, a melting pot of many people that has been mixed for thousands of years by people from all over the world.

1968, Kenyan Asians flee to Britain
1951, people from the colonies mainly the West Indians were encouraged to work here
1881, Jews flee to Britain from the Russian pogroms
1066, it was the French and William the Conqueror who populated the UK.
793, it was the Vikings
410, it was the Angles and the Saxons.
43, it was the Romans
500 BC, the Celts invaded Britain

I am only picking out a few of the events that I am aware of. I am sure that there are many, many more as people, that have, for a variety of reasons moved around the world, and will continue to do so. On the basis of what I have written above should we concede the domain of the UK to the Celts? That would be the people of Scotland, Ireland, Wales and Cornwall.

I do not know anyone who is pure British or who could even claim to be Celt. With the wonders of the Internet we can now do amazing research and discover all sorts about our own ancestry. In my own case on my mother’s side there is Irish, Negro and Chinese and on my father’s eastern European Jew and Viking. Yet I would say that we are as British as you can get. My lot all fought in the last two World Wars and I guess we all fight again if we feel threatened.

Human beings are all one people. We choose the divisions of colour, race, religion and ethnicity. What would solve the world’s problems, our problems, would be inclusion, tolerance and the law of allowing.

Perhaps we should be asking ourselves why are these migrants wanting to be here with us and not staying where they come from? Perhaps our energy should be focussed around helping heal and develop their places of origin and in so doing, help to expand the concept of humanity rather than developing our bunker mentality and reinforcing that sense of “Us” and “Them” because in the end surely we are all one.

The big question is do we own the territories that we deny other people?

The coming years will test our concepts of who owns what.

Take care and be happy

Sean x