One night not too long ago, my housemate said to me,

"So are you ready to be mad at me?"

"What do you mean?" I asked him. "Why would I be mad at you?"

"Well, often I get mad when people tell me the truth," he said.

"So what's the truth? Tell me."

He proceeded gingerly. "Well, I think you're thinking pretty negative thoughts."

And I didn't disagree. It was hardly like I had failed to notice. I was stuck in a pattern of looking at everything around me in the saddest light possible; this had been going on for weeks, and for my daughter and my housemate it surely had to be getting old. And yet, at the same time, I had valid reasons for sadness. He and I talked about the balance between allowing ourselves to grieve a sad situation, and the self-discipline of deciding not to give credence to what from a spiritual perspective isn't real anyway.

In the realm of the real (love), I'm so blessed it's ridiculous. And even in the realm of the unreal (the illusions of the world), what I call problems are so small compared to what many others endure with considerably more grace. My sadness wasn't really about any of the things my mind was telling me I was sad about. My sadness is simply at times an emotional habit. And I can break it.

After a long conversation, during which Casey was certainly straight with me but with compassion and no blame, I went upstairs and had an epiphany. The phrase I kept hearing in my head had something to do with "pulling yourself up by your bootstraps." I realized that I have done that countless times on a material level. Yet now I had to pull myself up by my bootstraps emotionally, and temperamentally that is harder for me to do. But the principle is the same. There are times when you simply have to make a decision to rise above the pain of the world. And when you do, the world has a way of changing with you. It is absolutely nothing but a reflection of your mind.

When I was younger, I had an interesting pattern of depression. For years, like clockwork, I was inconsolable for one full day exactly thirty-six hours prior to the onset of my menstrual period. From the first moment when I would be struck by an overwhelming sense of sadness, until exactly twenty-four hours later, there was absolutely nothing that I or anyone else could do to relieve my grief. But at the same time, because I knew that it was this monthly "thing" (with predictive qualities, no less!), I simply accepted it and knew it wouldn't last.

I know, therefore, that there are times and situations where depression is chemical and cannot be treated by something as simple as pulling yourself up by your bootstraps. But that is not the kind of depression that plagues most of us. For millions of us, we're depressed ... but if we're honest with ourselves, we don't have to be.

It's not a mystery to me what it takes to get me out of my depression; doing A Course in Miracles religiously, every morning; spending enough time on prayer and meditation and forgiveness; and physical exercise. If I do those things, I'm in a pretty good mood most of the time. But what's interesting to me, given that they are clearly a ticket out of my pain, is how often I resist at least one of them. So doesn't that mean that I'm as attracted to the pain as I'm desirous of avoiding it? Isn't there something in all of us that makes us coddle our bad feelings? And isn't the adage in the Course absolutely true that we think we have many different problems but we really only have one? My real problem isn't one thing or another that I might think that I'm depressed about. My real problem is my strange propensity for being depressed.

I see that propensity as almost like an addiction. Just as some haven't picked up a drink for twenty years but do not kid themselves that the urge to do so couldn't crop up at any time, so I realize that no matter how happy I ever get, my depressive tendency is like a sleeping snake at the base of my spine. I have it in me, like some ancient and ancestral emotional undertow.

But I'm okay now, because I did what I need to do today. Happiness truly is one of those "one day at a time" type of things. Do what you have to do today, to be happy. Give. Love. Pray. Meditate. Be kind. Read serious spiritual literature. Exercise. Do something constructive. Contribute to someone's life. Atone. Show up for your life. Show up for the people who love you. Show up for your work. Practice being who you want to be.

And when you do that, something amazing happens. You start to live the life you want, simply because that's the life you showed up for.

What I think is this: Be sad when you have to be, but never ever put your suitcases down and decide to move in. You don't have to; it's a choice. Life is simply a series of choices. And God has created the universe to support our choices, because that is how we learn to make better ones.

Depression might have chosen you, but you don't have to choose it back. Sometimes happiness comes with bootstraps, but so what? Pull 'em up. Choose joy.

Claim your life....

-- Marianne Williamson