Thoughts.com Blogs - Eat the whole plate of soul food

Another aspect of the book that I am reading is a thought that hit home.
We look at try not to experience all our emotions, and we try to just fix them.
Many people, me included, get depressed. I am not talking about just being sad I mean true full out and out depression. And when that happens what do we all do? We scarmble as hard as possible to pull ourselves out of it.
I mean the world is happy, so we need to be happy, right?
What if instead of trying to pull out of the depression we stayed in there, looked around and learned from it.  Emily Dickinson and Edgar Allen Poe were depressed most of their lives and they produced great works of literature from it. Depression inspires many artists.
Now I am not saying sit bed all day, day after day, and just cut yourself off.
What I am saying is maybe we do what people did in days gone by when in certain gardens there was a place that was set aside for you to go, be depressed, feel the feeling, experience them and maybe learn from them.

I constantly tell my wife that no book she buys or reads will give her the answers, but it may ask the questions that she answers that lead to the bigger answers that lead to understanding how to be a better version of you and be happy.

The author of the book brings up that too many people come to him not to reflect on their soul, look at it and understand it, but the come to be "fixed" as if there is an owners manual to you.

I am usually a pretty upbeat guy, but events do get me depressed. I am learning to try to maybe stop running from that depression and learn from it. How did I get here? Should I be depressed about what it is I am depressed about? How do I avoid the mistakes that got me here?
It also humbles me in that I am a real "buck up" and "pull yourself up by your own bootstraps" guy most of the time. When these episodes hit they show me that sometimes that is not possible and I need to see that I need to ride this out and more importantly I need to let others in my life that I love ride theirs out too.

Along with the wine and good food and music, maybe sometimes the soul needs castor oil. It is not pleasant , but it keeps it healthy.