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# Cope

{ Love you :-) Write me an email if u need to talk to someone <3 ~drummyfish }

This is a list of things that may help you cope with depression, anxiety and similar bad stuff, or even just with feeling a little down. Please read this first: apart from risky/destructive ways AKA hard drugs there is probably no universal single trick to force oneself to feel happy: everyone feels shitty in his own unique way and for different reasons, what you experience may be anxiety, depression, psychosis, mood swings and many other things and/or various mixtures thereof. How to cope depends on WHAT it is and WHY it is, so understanding your mental state is crucial for fixing it and this is where doctors/psychologists can help, i.e. it's very recommended to consider at least some kind of consultation, even if you don't trust their cure methods, they may at least give you a diagnosis and explain what's going on, which alone can help a lot. Coping yourself can be difficult because what helps someone else may not work for you, and it may even end up having the OPPOSITE effect on you, so don't force anything if it doesn't help -- in severe cases of bad mental state literally NOTHING helps and that alone makes it feel yet so much more desperate, and this is again where you most likely SHOULD see someone because you'll need at least someone looking after you until the worst is over. Nothing lasts forever and even the worst depression will at least ease up a little in some time, but you have to survive through the most difficult times and this will require someone helping you. So really just consider speaking to someone if it's REAL bad, even at least a family member or a friend if nothing else. Thankfully even for people with chronic mental illnesses it's possible to cope on their own at least to some degree, and this list is here to help learn it, to offer hopefully at least a small support and share experience about how to make the difficult times feel slightly less shitty.

- If (you feel like) nobody loves you, then know that at least drummyfish does.
- Now if it's real serious, like suicidal thoughts serious, then rather seek help, there's no shame in it. You're not weak, even the strongest have their limits and you were probably unlucky enough to find yours. You can refuse drugs or hospitalization, just talk to someone, that alone helps a lot. There's always some kind of anonymous hotline at least, it won't hurt to give it a try, no one has to know.
- Talking and sharing your trouble is almost guaranteed to help at least a little, even if you get no advice or resolution, simply getting it off your chest is literally such a huge relief. Talk to someone, to your friends or parents, it will be a little better. However it must be someone who understands and is willing to listen without judging you etc., of course. { If you have no one else to talk to, you can send me an email, I will listen. ~drummyfish }
- Meditation and various relaxation techniques help some a lot (sadly not everyone though). It doesn't have to be anything religious, just learning special breathing techniques (e.g. "box breathing": repeat breathing in, holding breath and breathing out, each phase lasting 4 counts) is known to relieve anxiety. { This sadly never worked for me very well, but I know many people who love meditation, I think there are certain kinds of people for whom it works, maybe you're one of them. ~drummyfish }
- Physical comfort has a high chance for improving the state of mind and calming you down: the idea is simply that it's difficult to feel shitty when your body is experiencing directly pleasant sensations such as warmth, sunshine, coziness, someone's touch, pleasant sounds, tastes and smell and so on, the body is programmed on very low level to directly translate such sensations to "feeling good" which can kickstart overall mood improvement, i.e. getting out of the spiraling, self feeding anxiety/depression. Of course, this isn't an advice for "destructive" methods of quick pleasure AKA drugs, sex and alcohol, which may work but you'll pay disproportionately later.
- Going out to the nature always helps, or at least it can never hurt. Walking, nature, sun and fresh air help the body and healthy body leads to healthy mind, it's been known for thousands of years that pilgrimages heal the mind. Animals are best companions, go outside and observe them, play with them, talk to them. Do simple tasks, try to create something out of wood, collect rocks, draw something in the sand. If you're alone, singing is therapeutic as well, try it. Someone likes sports and getting tired physically to clear the mind. Definitely get off the Internet for a while, grab a physical book if you feel like reading something.
- Get the feelings out (but not by hurting someone else, of course). If you feel sad, then cry, swear, run outside, tell someone how you feel, do whatever you have to to let it out. Some like to write down their thoughts, some like to listen to music, go through old photos, just don't suppress your feelings -- if not dealt with, they stay and become harder to get rid of.
- If you've been hurt, try to forgive and move on, "turn the other cheek", be the better man, don't seek revenge and fights even if you'd be "in the right". Go on and swear and break something if you must, but don't hurt others. To forgive is not a weakness -- on the contrary, it's the more difficult thing to do, a sign of maturity and also a much healthier thing from long time perspective because you'll feel better about yourself, and even the "enemy" may eventually come with an apology, seeing you didn't hurt him back. Revenge on the other hand leads to obsession and never ending cycle of violence -- when achieved it feels great, but only for a moment, one then starts to feel bad about it as he ages. Forgiveness brings peace and allows you to move on, in the long run it's much better to live having been hurt than having hurt someone.
- Charity, altruism and helping others is therapeutic, it gives you a sense of meaning and makes you feel better. There are dogs in animal shelters who need someone to take them for a walk, there are homeless who need food, old people who have no one to talk to. Just try it and see.
- Have small regular moments of joy to look forward to, these will form small island of stability and happiness to get you through tough times in between, something that will always shine a visible beacon of light even in the darkest days. Make for example every Saturday your movie day, get a glass of wine and good cheese and watch some great kino, even if you're on a diet, this must be your "feel good" day. Do whatever you love, be it a hot bath, video games or buying a small toy in the store. Part of this is of course not doing this every day but once or twice a week, else it won't have the effect.
- Escapism (and avoidance) is an option, but indeed must be applied sparingly. Escaping into a video game, a book or just a place in one's head means taking a break from the real world and all its trouble, but it would be bad to never return back. { I remember that The Elder Scrolls games helped me many years ago get through a long depression, think it was thanks to the depth of "immersion" these games offer. I wouldn't even play the game as intended, I only walked through the cities as if I was someone else in a different world, and very slowly I was able to start forgetting my IRL trouble for very short moments, then a bit longer, until it got to a somewhat bearable stage. ~drummyfish }
- For anxiety that comes from fear of the future it helps to make a main plan and backup plans in case the main plan fails, and even one for the absolute worst case scenario so as to have everything "covered". This helps the feeling of "being prepared" and having dealt with the intrusive fears by systematically analyzing them and finding the best solutions to each, even if they're not perfect -- what else can you do? Of course, rationality often doesn't chase anxiety away, but it's often a small step in the right direction.
- Daily routine is key to stabilizing and improving the mood, i.e. try to sleep and eat at the same time every day, go for a short walk every day, make the day predictable and have something small to look forward to, like coffee in the morning or a movie in the evening.
- Similarly: it's obvious that our environment affects our mood, but we tend to underestimate its long term effect -- environment is a silent but constant force dragging you somewhere, it can be resisted momentarily but not for a long time, i.e. changing your environment will most likely change how you generally feel and even alter your personality a little, and you can consciously do it so that the change is for the better. It's known that in the northern countries suicide rates are higher because there are fewer hours of daylight for example and again, you may think two hours of daylight don't matter because you rarely go out anyway, but over a long time they will, subconsciously and even indirectly (through the effect on other people etc.), and there are many more factors including weather and physical things such as colors and sounds you're surrounded with, but most important may be the PEOPLE and the culture around you, because moods are contagious and cultural forces are those we feel the most. So the advice here is: as a part of long time solution think of your environment and the possibility of changing it (either moving or literally changing the place you live in).
- Set very small goals and make sure you achieve them rather than being overly ambitious and failing. Rather than cleaning the whole house just clean one room, leave other rooms as their separate "projects" for later. Rather than making a full commercial 3D MMORPG game make a minigame and share it with friends. Finishing a project makes you feel great, and it doesn't even matter much how big the project was, the joy is comparable. On the other hand failing to finish a project hurts self esteem and leaves one devastated and tired, the more the bigger the failure and lose resources were. It is immensely important to aim for FINISHING the thing rather than for it to be big or successful. Also do not rely on others to appropriately appreciate your project, they most likely won't -- do it because you enjoy doing it AND because YOU will be satisfied seeing the finished thing.
- Now old folk wisdom says that "work heals" and it's probably true, however with a CAVEAT: it must be explained what "work" means in this context, because the word nowadays stands for something else than it used to. Work in sense of slavery (oftentimes employment), i.e. that which is forced on you, that's stressful, unpleasant, frustrating, responsible, difficult, competitive, ambitious and too difficult is BAD for mental health and will HURT YOU -- avoid this! What helps is plain, SIMPLE, non-demanding, non-frustrating activity that doesn't require too much energy or focus and which is IMMEDIATELY REWARDING: this may be for example a simple manual work such as crocheting or knitting socks, watering plants, feeding animals, sorting books in your library, chopping wood, folding laundry or maybe filling out a table of some data if you're a computer autist, whatever works for you, just make sure it's something you can handle physically and mentally and that makes you feel at least a tiny, tiny bit better about having achieved something, even if very small. This helps you not just sit in a corner and think about how doomed you are, but actually distracts you a little, makes you move physically, pumps some blood and makes you breathe, potentially even go outside get some fresh air and also be rewarded with the tiny doses of joy from "being useful". Later on it helps you think "at least I've done this good thing, maybe I'm not as doomed if I can still do something". Mental hospitals usually employ this as a form of therapy.
- It's generally advised not to make big life decisions when you're depressed, so try to avoid them, postpone them if you can, allow yourself to not think about future now because your perception is very much distorted by your state of mind -- almost anything can be left for later. If you're faced with a decision you have to make and cannot avoid, go with your gut feeling and then move on, do whatever you genuinely judge the best and don't blame yourself if later on it turns out to have been a wrong decision, you couldn't possibly have known back then, it was just bad luck, and in the end any decision that looks like a mistake oftentimes turns out to be good for something else, just let it flow because it's beyond your control, it is simply life. When you're feeling bad, your only goal before anything else must be to make yourself feel better again, you cannot possibly function normally when you have no will to do anything and can't see any motivation, so only focus on this one thing: survive and try to get better, all else will wait.
- Pills/meds/antidepressants/drugs (doctor prescribed): of course these are not ideal, they are poison in sense and many people rightfully avoid them, they have side effect and may cause addiction etcetera. But sometimes they may be the "least evil", it may be better to take a pill once if it means preventing suicide, so maybe don't rule them out completely -- consult with doctor and maybe have the meds around "just in case". The fact alone that you KNOW there is this sort of "last resort relief" may help you feel better without actually ever taking the pill. After all alcohol and weed are drugs as well and when applied responsibly, they do help deal with hardships, one just must be very careful.
- The question of religion is somewhat "controversial" but it probably deserves at least a brief mention that a lot of people get cured of depression by finding faith in something "supernatural", and if it works, why should we judge? However there is the caveat that there exist abusive cults and generally harmful religious group etc., of course, but it's like with everything: anything that can ever be abused will be abused by someone.
- things to realize and possibly find comfort in:
  - We will all die: It may seem sad at first, but it's also positive in many ways. No matter how big, all your mistakes will be erased and will seize any significance in the grand scheme of things, whatever fuck up you wish you could take back WILL be taken back, it will become absolutely unimportant. Death also means that your suffering is guaranteed to not be infinite, regardless of what happens you cannot suffer for more than, say, 150 years. Death is the only certainty and that can be comforting. You will die, your family will, the richest guy on the planet will die too, and you will maybe have lived a much happier life than him, considering he spent his time here on mindless hunting little green pieces of paper. No matter what power anyone holds, no one can ever threaten you with endless suffering, the worst anyone can ever hurt you with is a brief moment of pain and then he must leave you forever in peace. Dying may be scary but death is not nearly the worst fate at all, it is simply an infinite rest and peace, no more trouble or stress, just becoming one with the nature again, just like before birth. Although it's not recommended, there is always the last resort of suicide that provides an escape door from the worst imaginable situations, and this knowledge alone can provide some comfort. And please also ponder on the fact that fear of death is very much a bad aspect of our western culture, most other (much healthier) cultures aren't afraid of death and even welcome it as a transition to a new world -- the truth is we can never know what happens after death, things such as consciousness can never be explained withing our universe and so if nothing else, then at least the curiosity of what will come can make death a little less scary, maybe there really is a happier afterlife, no one knows. Some theorize that space may be pulsating, it expands and collapses again and everything will run over again, maybe your life will repeat. We simply don't know and that may be something to enjoy.
  - Time heals everything, every pain we experience we slowly get used to and learn to bear more easily as time goes on, even the worst experience like losing a child is something that, given enough time (sometimes more than a lifetime), a human somehow learns to make peace with. Even the worst wounds will hurt slightly less over time, unless we keep intentionally opening them perhaps, but even then it becomes a repeated routine and our brains are simply programmed to react to change; anything constant tends to get ignored and filtered out over time, even repeated torture. This is to say that no matter how great and hopeless your suffering, it can and probably will decrease at least slightly, and this may be something to hold on at least rationally, even if one cannot feel it in heart, it's always been like this, experience repeatedly proves this right again and again.
  - Your mind is a shelter no one can take away from you. Focus on cultivating the place, fill it with knowledge and fun activities, you can play games just in your head, even if your body is paralyzed, if they lock you up in the prison, even if you go blind and deaf and lose your limbs, you will always have a place where you can do whatever you want and the only way they can take it away from you is to kill you, in which case you will no longer care. Create virtual spaces in your head, places to resort to in time of need, keep building them every time you visit, make them cozy, they will provide a safe haven to escape to at any time.
  - Don't compare yourself to others, but if you must, compare your life to the less fortunate. It may paradoxically help to even watch drastic, gory videos, for example of accidents or executions, so as to realize how fortunate you are to be where you currently happen to stand (a reader suggested an alternative, less drastic methods of just reading about unfortunate fates, disasters, illnesses etc. Yet another idea is to make a list of famous/successful people who died younger than you, it's kind of like "in this sense you're gotten further in life"). Many people wish for nothing more than to not be in agony, or to have something to eat, to have water to drink, someone to talk to, you always have something that someone else would considers a treasure. Although our current times are dystopian and it's hard to not get depressed about it, the future will be yet worse, and so try to see what little we still have left: small islands of quiet nature, no nuclear winter, sun still shines, free software is not illegal yet, air is still free, brain chips are not yet mandatory.
  - "If a problem has solution, there's no need to worry, and if it doesn't have one, worrying won't help." Do not worry about that which is beyond your control, you can't blame yourself for what you didn't do intentionally and there's no use in trying to solve something that can't be solved, it is just wasted time and an added unnecessary suffering, it's like spending life by being worried about eventual death. If you caused harm to someone and it wasn't intentional, you can't blame yourself, an accident simply happen through you, a train driver cannot blame himself for someone having fallen under his train. If you harmed someone intentionally and feel guilty, then learn the lesson and move on, past is already gone, focus on the future, promise yourself to do better next time and don't torture yourself. Sometimes we're lucky and sometimes not, some are dealt worse cards than others, just try to make the best out of what you've got.
  - If you feel all alone in the midst of all the evil of the world, perhaps it's because the system WANTS people like you to feel alone. There are so many humans in the world that it's highly improbably you are the only one, you just haven't met the right people, many are shy, scared and hiding. Consider how deep various Internet rabbitholes go, you can follow them infinitely, keep finding communities around weirdest things, thousands upon thousands and it never ends, what you see is just the tip of the iceberg. Your soulmate is out there somewhere.
  - You will change with age. You think you won't but you will, the trouble you have now will either disappear or you will literally stop caring -- they will be replaced by new trouble, but whatever you think is the worst problem in the world right now will most likely turn out to be something you hardly remember 10 years later, your brain and perception of the world physically changes as you age, as does your environment. There was probably something like this 10 years ago, you now only laugh about it. Even if you don't solve the problem and it gets worse, you will simply not care about it that much -- to a young guy losing a leg or becoming blind is a tragedy, but an old man takes it much better, he rather cares about his family, a child only cares about latest video games but an adult hardly gives a shit. May you're poor but will get rich, maybe you'll get sick, find a new religion, have children, move to another country, everything will change. Just hold on and observe what the fate has for you.
  - If you're depressed about the future, simply focus on the present, live day to day and go step by step, things will probably turn out much different than what you imagined anyway and many problems often just solve themselves (even if new, unforeseen ones emerge as well). In retrospect you will probably find you didn't even have any power over what would eventually happen, so don't worry too much. Having plans and being ready certainly helps, but don't obsess over worrying too much if you can. If you don't know what to do, do what you know and then you'll see.
  - As much as we'd like to pretend otherwise at times, we are never absolutely certain about the future, and it has shown time and time again that many predictions turn out completely off. And while yes, this may scare us, it also means there is always at least a little bit of hope. There are for example many cases of doctors giving disastrous prognoses that went unfulfilled, people who were told they wouldn't live for a year who ended up living decades, ones miraculously cured from deadly diseases, women who were told they were infertile who ended up having children etc. So even if everything seems fucked, one can always choose to hold on and hope, it's another form of freedom that can't be taken away.
  - You are constantly peaking at something. It is called the "mid life crisis", the depression over the fact that one has passed his "peak". Biologically this peak comes around the age of mid 20s. And it's true that pure mental and physical condition reaches its top around that age, but these two variables simply aren't all that makes up a human. A human is much more than strength of his arms and time needed to solve a puzzle. For example the peak of your wisdom may come at 60, your expertise in a subject may be best around 50, as well as your self confidence and personal charm and your freedom may reach its highest the moment you retire from work, and your happiness -- who knows? There are many more variables, to name a few: patience, psychological resilience, social skills, popularity, general knowledge, emotional intelligence, credibility, peace of mind, ... It is also guaranteed that any new skill you decide to learn in the future, such as chess or crocheting or painting, you still haven't reached your peak at. There are many variables, so don't get depressed about just one or two of them.
  - Grass looks greener on the other side -- yes, everyone knows the saying but it's always difficult to admit it might be the case when feeling you REALLY want something you just can't have right now. Let's just repeat it then: whatever it is you wish for, it would likely make you happy to reach, but only for a short time. You'd slowly start to realize the negative sides you aren't seeing now and you might quite likely wish to go back soon. People living in cold northern countries long to live in hot, sunny climates, and vice versa, and a poor peasant wishes for nothing else than the riches of the factory owner, unable to see the rich guy's family is falling apart because his gold digging wife is cold, cheating, and sucking dry his credit cards, and that the rich guy would trade his money for having a good family like the peasant has. Of course life isn't always this fair, some are happier and some more miserable, but generally it is true more often than we're willing to admit that we long for that which we can't have only for that fact alone, and so try to ask what you have that others don't, what you're thankful for. In this it may also be helpful to willingly give up something you have for a while, for example go sleep in a forest for a few days and you'll suddenly not only know, but FEEL how lucky you are to have a warm bed at home, food, people to talk to, or whatever else you now take for granted.
  - You are human, you already won the most improbable lottery, you already have and are experiencing the most extraordinary thing we can think of: not only being a living organism, which is already incredibly rare among all the space rock and emptiness, but being a multicellular organism, a mammal, a primate -- in fact being the most advanced organism, one capable of comprehending the world like no one else. On top of this you've already lived longer than most animals can dream of and probably have most of life still before you. You can see better than most animals, see more sharply and perceive more colors. Among all animals you are among the best distance runners and you have highly precise and useful hands with fingers that you take for granted but which other animals would kill for. You can enjoy music, books, math and so many joys inaccessible to anyone else. If you feel like you're not good enough or that you're stupid or unlucky to live in a bad place, it may help to realize that's just a small amount of bad luck, you are in fact the genius among living organisms even if you're considered stupid among humans, only by being able to read this text you prove an incredible mental capacity.
  - You will die but "in a sense" you will never disappear, even after your death the matter that composes you will stay, by the very laws of physics it cannot ever disappear, it will only transform and you'll become part of nature, trees, oceans and dust, and the things you've done will forever leave a trace. It's a cliche saying but you WILL remain living at least in the art you left behind and the information recorded in the state of the Universe that you have affected -- even if you had no children for example, you probably gave good advice and example at least to someone, and that someone will continue to spread it further, and in this way you will forever remain a key, unerasable part of the world. Having children is evolutionarily our "main purpose" but realize this: main purpose doesn't mean only purpose (helping care for your relative's children, for example, may be similarly helpful for your genes), evolution is not the only thing in the world and even if you have kids, several generations down the descendants will be genetically hardly even related to you anyway as each parent only passes on half of his genes, so your genetic legacy is constantly mixed and watered down until the descendant is genetically no closer to you than some random stranger today. And people who did have kids, who you may be jealous of, still don't have it certain their bloodline will continue for long either. So much for spreading genes -- nowadays, when the gene pool is actually extremely "oversaturated", it may be even more promising to try to spread good memes (in the "serious" academic sense), i.e. ideas, because you're pretty unlikely to have a miraculous new gene in you that needs spreading, but it's not so crazy to think you might come up with a sort of miraculous idea, a revolutionary invention or great work of art that will be surviving much longer than anything "genetic".
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TO BE CONTINUED

## See Also

- dog
- island

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