Question: Is there a spiritual explanation for depression?
Yes.
But first: If you are experiencing life-threatening circumstances and don’t want to die, you should seek professional advice.
Understanding the explanation requires having further background in spirituality. But we’re going to skip that because this answer may already go long.
Depression is a signal the depressed person is sending themselves. Most people don’t understand this, so instead of listening to the signal and doing something about it, they instead “cover up the signal.”
Let’s say you’re coming up to a railroad crossing. A train is coming. The lights on your side of the tracks are flashing red.
Would you ignore the signal and cross the track? Of course not. You’d get killed.
Depression is like the flashing light. It is telling the depressed person something. The depressed person should stop and take action based on what the signal is saying.
Most depressed people receive the signal and don’t know what it’s saying. So they keep doing what they’re doing instead of doing what the signal is telling them to do (in this case, changing the thoughts the person is thinking. More on that in a bit).
What depression tells people
Most depressed people will disagree with this, but it doesn’t make it less accurate: Depression is not that serious. It’s just a really strong signal.
It just so happens that as signals go, it’s one of the most intense. Usually, a person who experiences depression was oblivious to earlier, less intense signals received on the way to “depression”.
In other words, they didn’t listen to the less intense signals, so now they’re getting one of the most intense.
Had they heeded the less intense ones, they wouldn’t have ended up depressed. And, it would have been easier to do something about the signal.
So what is this signal telling the depressed person? It’s telling them they have beliefs and thoughts that are at odds with the “what-is-ness” of life. That’s all it is.
By “what-is-ness” we mean the dominant state of All That Is which includes the spiritual realm and the physical realm. BTW, everything is spiritual. But since people don’t acknowledge that, it’s important to mention both the “physical world” (which is all spiritual) and the “spiritual world”. Sometimes redundancy is needed.
Beauty, positivity and joy available everywhere
The dominant state of All That Is is positive expansion, eagerness, enthusiasm, joy, ecstasy, etc. It knows everything is always working out towards positive expansion, fulfillment, expression, awareness, etc. This is not theoretical or just “spiritual”. It is the actual state of things.
Humans create their reality. They can create any reality they want. When they are creating a reality consistent with what they are as physical embodiments of All That Is, they resonate or feel in tune with All That Is.
How does that feel? Positive, expansionary, eager, enthusiastic, joyful, ecstatic, fulfilled, etc.
But when a person creates a reality inconsistent with all the above, they feel consistent with that creation. Anger, frustration, annoyance….all the way down to depression.
Feelings are important. Many people don’t understand their function as signals. They help a person know what they are creating.
Feelings help keep us on track
So a person who feels depressed has chronically created a reality inconsistent with what they are. Reality creation occurs first in vibration, then in thought form, then in a received thought before the creation becomes physical reality. In each of those stages, an emotion/feeling is received by the person doing the creating. This helps the person catch their creation early on, before it springs into physical reality.
If a person keeps creating along lines inconsistent with All That Is, eventually they will get harsher or more and more intense signals…until they get the message.
So depression is not anything mysterious or serious. It is only a signal a person is receiving.
This example may be illustrative.
Let’s say as a child, a young woman was sexually abused by her father. The first time it happened, the child may have felt out of sorts. By the fifth or so time it happened, her internal awareness that something is not right is already in high gear.
Now, she has an opportunity to act. She knows what to do, even though she’s a little girl. But she doesn’t because she’s unclear.
That’s the first signal: unclear or confusion.
Uncertainty momentum creates more momentum
Now, let’s say the father threatens her. Let’s say he says “you tell your mom and I’m going to kill you.” Or something less extreme “honey, keep this a secret between you and me. Don’t tell your mom.”
The young girl knows intuitively she should say something. But now she’s confused because her dad is telling her to keep this secret.
So the situation continues. She starts feeling more uncertainty. That’s a signal.
Note that this little girl’s mood will change. She’ll gradually lose the joy, freedom, happiness and enthusiasm for life. These emotions go away because of her thoughts are turning to beliefs – “conclusions about her world” and about what she has experienced:
- “this should not be happening”
- “I don’t understand”
- “I don’t want this to happen any more”
- “I feel out of control”
- “I feel like this is wrong”
Eventually, this clarity will turn on itself and she will begin thinking different thoughts:
- “I’m angry at my dad”
- “I hate my dad”
Then she will turn her thoughts on herself:
- “This is my fault”
- “I must have done something to deserve this”
- “I’m a bad person for letting this happen”
The positive, constructive anger expressed at her dad is now turned inward on herself. Action she could have taken to express her anger, or even earlier, her lack of understanding (which is a very light signal), now is not available.
Less intense signals ignored become more intense signals
Self blame, turns to discouragement about life. Discouragement turns to anger (at herself), anger turns to rage (at herself and her dad and perhaps her mom for not noticing and stopping him) which extends to life in general. Rage at life in general turns to insecurity/guilt/unworthiness.
Now, in this “vibration” where signals being received are insecurity/guilt/unworthiness, the young woman, who may be in high school by now, is long into creating a reality matching these signals. The momentum of that reality is so strong by now, it’s pretty much running the show.
As a result, they may experience increasingly “negative” life experiences. But these are just signals too. She may start doing poorly in school. She might show behavior problems. She may start taking drugs. She may dress a particular way, or hang out with people who resonate with this reality she creates.
These life experiences, which she is creating, also generate a feedback loop. The more she remains in this state and does not do anything about the signals, the more of these kinds of experiences she will have.
Vulnerability and insecurity will become physical manifestations
This state of vulnerability might even create situations where she is further sexually abused. She may be raped. She may turn to prostitution. Or she may develop other signals we call “illnesses” such as Fibromyalgia, PTSD, “anxiety disorder” or other “traumas”. All of these are signals, not to others, to herself. Spiritually, emotions are the first level of signal. The other level is “life experiences”.
If she tries to treat the signals, that’s like trying to turn off the lights at the railroad crossing. She doesn’t get to the foundation of all her life troubles: underlying thoughts and beliefs that are being pointed to by the signals both in her physical reality and in her emotions.
If she is oblivious to the connection between her signals and her experiences, she will think the experiences are independent of her and the signals. She’ll compound her problematic beliefs, thinking:
- “Men are scum”
- “The world is scary”
- “I’m afraid”
And create more thoughts consistent with her experience:
- “I’m a loser”
- “These are the only friends I can get”
- “Sex is my only value”
- “I’ll disappear by eating”
Reversal: omnipresent and available
At any time in this process the young woman can turn all this around. But it’s easier to do it in the early stages than it is after reality begins matching the signals.
By the time one reaches the depression signal, it’s much harder. But it’s not impossible.
BTW, all this is subtle. This is why counseling can help because it uncovers many of the original beliefs and experiences that generated the early stage signals. But a person doesn’t need counseling. They can turn this around themselves by focusing on how they’re thinking and change that while paying attention to the signals they’re getting – their feelings and their physical life experiences.
So hopefully you can see, depression has a spiritual origin, just like everything else in life. It acts as an indicator, helping the creator create life experiences consistent with what they are wanting.
And when they change their beliefs about life experience, life experience becomes the Charmed Life I write about. A text from a client who once was on the verge of suicide shows this:
The interesting thing is, the intensity of negative emotion indicates the equal opposite intensity of desire. In other words, those most depressed possess the potential for some of the greatest joys.
And that’s why “depression”, the signal, can produce great good. For when a person knows what you just read, and takes action based on it, great good will follow. That’s guaranteed because that’s how the Universe works.
Want to learn more? I got your back!