Start With Yourself...

Author's note: I know that a lot of my previous posts have been about human relations and before that, I started this blog with a post about depression. This one too, is close by. If this post manages to change the outlook towards the entire topic, even for one reader of mine, I'm going to count that as a plus score in my favor. Do read and review. :)

          A few months ago, two of well-known Indian actresses, revealed about their depression phase that they had in the past and it set the media on fire. I am a believer. So I am not going to label what these two women did as a 'cheap publicity stunt' (which people do a lot), in fact, I think it was a pretty good decision, and a good way for them to raise awareness about something like depression. Everyone, everywhere, for a while gave immense attention to this, just like they do every time, everyone was talking about how they were sympathetic towards the people who were going through depression, and how they would do anything to help the people going through it and all. But truth to be spoken, I read a quote some time ago which I would like to mention here, "The worst thing about Human Relations is that we can never know what someone is going through. We could be standing next to someone completely broken and still not know..." to do anything when it comes to 'help' people with depression, you first have to know. It was really strong of those two women to talk about it so openly. But sometimes, things backfire, and that too in the least expected way. And I choose not to hold those women responsible for it. Maybe it was just a poor choice of words.

          What I am talking about is, a few days ago, I read a post, on a very popular social networking site, "10 signs that you might have depression. Just like *insert actress's name here*!!" I read it, and for a few seconds went, "Wait what?!!" I mean, there are some crazy fans of her out there. What if, to be 'just like her' they push themselves into this terrible and terrifying thing?? And secondly, how could you explain people things like depression in 10 points! Okay, so you put down 10 symptoms of depression, and expect people to understand? Not always do people read more into it, and they just can't grip one simple point that the writer of this post forgot to mention in these 10 points, depression is much more than the mere symptoms. It's a two way traffic, the symptoms of depression and sadness are so similar that most of the time, one of them is misunderstood for the other. And because of absurd posts like these, people have started looking at depression like a trend, not like a real problem. Most of the times people who actually suffer from depression have to listen to things like, "Get over it", "We all have problems in life, you are not the only one" or even "People who are living a life even in worse conditions are living happily, look at them, and think yourself as lucky enough" and the worse one is, "there is no such thing as depression, you are just an attention seeker". Let me do my best at cancelling these things out one by one, People with depression cannot 'just get over it', depression is nothing like a breakup from a long lasting relationship, you cannot 'just get over' depression;  Sometimes, people with depression are not even going through the problems that life serves you on a platter, depression has nothing to do with our usual problems in life, depression can choose you even if  you have a well settled life, job, and all. Depression can choose you regardless of how life has been treating you; Talking to people with depression about the 'less-fortunate' ones will not help them, it will just make them feel even worse about themselves; And last, but not the least, depression is not an attention seeking problem, the ones that really go through depression most of the time want to disappear and be invisible, they do everything that can help you not see them.
          Depression is not an attention seeking problem, but people who actually don't go through it, and pretend about it, have managed to turn it into a trend, a joke, and they always manage to get the 'attention'. Do you understand what I am hinting towards here? Some attention-seeking freaks use depression as a way to have things the way they want, and the 'society' shuns the entire concept, problem, and issue regarding depression. Depression does not ask for attention or even sympathies, just knowing, that someone is there for you is helpful, Depression does not ask you to stop living your life and keep fussing over the person suffering it, all it asks for is when the person is feeling lonely and worthless, just knowing that he/she is not alone. Depression does not always end with death, people fight against it and stand up again, but you can never know what will the person rise as; people either deal with depression and give into the darkness and manage to be an symbol of light, or they keep looking for light and achieve it one day.
          There are two kinds of attitudes that are very necessary to make up this world, one is, "If I can do it alone, anyone can." and the other one is, "I know how doing it alone felt like, I'm going to be one call away if you need me." Without both of these attitudes, the worlds is not a good place to live in. All I want to state at the end of this article is, "You might not even know if someone close to you might be going through tough things like depression, Be kind to everyone... start with yourself."

-Nidhi Paralikar