Depression as a message that your spiritual life needs an upgrade
This is our final blog in the series "What is your depression trying to tell you?” and today we look at the ramifications that our spiritual beliefs have on our everyday emotions, behaviors, and relationships. Spirituality will probably not be part of the equation for what is causing every person’s depression symptoms, but for some it may be a contributing factor. It was in my case.
Spiritual author AW Tozer said, “What comes into your mind when you think about God [insert: the Universe, Your Higher Power, etc] is the most important thing about you.”
For me, I realized in my twenties that what came into my mind when I thought about God was a picture of a disappointed boss. I had the feeling of being graded harshly, like someone getting a performance review, and like I just wasn’t measuring up. I could never do enough. After all, I thought, if God is perfect, how could I ever please him? I felt like I was on a never-ending treadmill of perfectionism and performance—and not just in my spiritual life, but this mindset had bled over into my work, my relationships, and the way I saw myself.
This led to a feeling of defeat and futility in my everyday life. I felt like a disappointment to God and a disappointment to myself and others. For me, this was a major source of my depression. My spirituality was in desperate need for an upgrade.
The way we see the Universe and relate to our Higher Power is massively connected to how we feel about ourselves, how we perceive others see us, how we decide how to spend our time, what career we go into, etc. If we believe that God is harsh, we will feel the constant weight of divine disapproval. We can develop a lens that God is like this if we grow up with harsh parents, comes from a religious system that emphasizes performance or earning God’s love through religious transactions, or many other reasons.
If we believe that God doesn’t care about us, or there is no Higher Power or source of Divine Love in the Universe to help us, protect us, or guide us, we may experience fear, anxiety, or the feeling that we have to fend for ourselves. Internally there may be a pressure because we truly believe we are totally on our own, having to be the one to make sure that everything works out, never able to take a break, having to always be on guard. Perhaps we came to see God like this because maybe we really were on our own in our childhood, had absent parents (emotionally or literally), or developed a worldview where God either doesn’t exist, or even worse—just isn’t that interested in us.
Many people have the belief that God is angry at them. They think they are bad, dirty, sinful, or just plain wrong at the core of their being somehow. If we believe that deep down we are bad and God despises us for being who we are, this can absolutely lead to feelings of depression. Where do we get this message? Perhaps as children we were abused or hurt by those who should have protected and nurtured us. Perhaps we come from a religious system that spewed messages of hate instead of Unconditional Love. Perhaps there was an unhealthy emphasis on sin to the neglect of the truth that in fact we are all children of God, worthy of love and infinitely valuable.
For me, counseling helped me to uncover the filter I had developed that warped how I saw God and in turn how that was contributing to my depression. With my counselor, we sorted out what I believed about God and myself deep down, where these beliefs had come from, and we examined them to see what the fruit of those beliefs was. From that vantage point, I was able to see areas I had been confused and where things got distorted I was then able to start shedding those things and embracing Truth and Love. And man, did that feel good!!
My feelings of depression, as painful as they were at the time, were giving me a much needed message that I had outgrown my old view of God and it was time for an upgrade. It was time to break up with old lies about God that kept me feeling small, exhausted, and never good enough. Through this healing process I got to trade all that in for an upgrade in knowing God as the source of Unconditional Love. Everything in my life got so much easier to handle when I realized that my Higher Power is actually full of kindness, is easy to please, is extremely encouraging towards me, and is near to me to bring help and comfort 24/7. I came into awareness that there is so much Hope available in the Universe and there’s something bigger than me out there taking me lovingly by the hand and walking me into healing and freedom.
It is my deep conviction that every single person is made in the image of Divine Love. We are all children of God. We are all insanely, crazily, off the charts loved and valued by a good God. We are not alone in a cold Universe.—we are being helped. Hope is real. Goodness is real. Love is out there helping you. Guiding you. Providing for you. Working things out for good for you. And you don’t have to earn it. And it’s not about religion or “being good.” This is for everyone.
To me, this is absolutely foundational in my work with clients even if we never directly address spirituality, and in many cases we don’t. But my core belief for every person i work with is that Unconditional Love is real and active in this person’s life, and helping each of us find healing, freedom, peace and joy. And so I have full permission to hope for all the goodness and breakthrough and healing in the world with every person i work with, and my goal is help them realize that they have this permission to hope for these things too.
If you’d like to upgrade your spirituality, to explore how this may be a part of what you are experiencing emotionally, in your relationships, in your job, or your self-image, give me a call. I’d love to work together and see if counseling can help you connect Love and Peace in a deeper way.