Appendix (4): Good Mood: The New Psychology of Overcoming Depression

Good Mood

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Good Mood:
The New Psychology
of Overcoming Depression

Chapter 10

cont.

Self-comparisons Analysis points a depression sufferer toward whichever is the most promising tactic to banish the depression. It focuses on understanding why you make negative self-comparisons, and then develops ways of preventing the neg- comps, rather than focusing on merely understanding and reliving the past, or on simply changing contemporary habits. With this understanding you can choose how best to fight your own depression and achieve happiness.

In a capsule: Your thoughts about yourself cause your depression, though of course your thoughts may be prompted by conditions outside you. To overcome your depression, you must think about yourself in ways different than your habitual patterns. Self-comparisons Analysis systematically suggests many possible kinds of change.

There are also some unsystematic tactics that sometimes effectively change your thinking about yourself. One of these is humor -- jokes about your situation, as well as humorous songs. (Albert Ellis is big on these).(11) The switch in perspective that is the heart of much humor causes you to view your situation less seriously, and in that fashion takes the sting out of the negative self-comparisons that the humor makes fun of.

Viktor Frankl uses a method he calls "paradoxical intention" which radically switches a person's perspective in a fashion akin to humor. Often this is akin to the Values Treatment discussed in Chapter 18. Consider this case of Frankl's:

A young physician consulted me because of his fear of perspiring. Whenever he expected an outbreak of perspiration, this anticipatory anxiety was enough to precipitate excessive sweating. In order to cut this circle formation I advised the patient, in the event that sweating should recur, to resolve deliberately to show people how much he could sweat. A week later he returned to report that whenever he met anyone who triggered his anticipatory anxiety, he said to himself, "I only sweated out a quart before, but now I'm going to pour at least ten quarts!" The result was that, after suffering from his phobia for four years, he was able, after a single session, to free himself permanently of it within one week.(12) Frankl's procedure can be understood in terms of altering negative self-comparisons. Frankl asks the patient (who must have some power of imagination for the method to work) to imagine that his actual state of affairs is different than what it is. Then he leads the person to compare the actual with that imagined state, and to see that the actual state is preferable to the imagined state. This produces a positive self-comparison in place of the former negative self-comparison, and hence removes sadness and depression.

Are the Best Things In Life Free?

"The best things in life are free," says the song. In money terms, that may be true. But the real best things in life--such as true happiness, and the end to prolonged sadness--are not free in terms of effort. Not to recognize this can be disastrous.

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The failure of all popular remedies for depression arises from their unwillingness to recognize that every anti-depression tactic has its cost. As with a farmer, giving up the struggle to plant and raise a crop means not having a harvest and not making a living. To avoid going to parties or business meetings that lead to negative self-comparisons is to forego the pleasures or profits that may also be present there. Another misleading example is the popular recommendation to "accept yourself as you are."

Accepting yourself certainly can have its benefits. But there is also a drawback with simply accepting--either "accepting yourself," in the popular sense, or making no comparisons, as in Eastern meditative practices. If one wants to change one's habits or personality in order to improve or remedy a difficulty, one cannot avoid making comparisons. You cannot conduct any program of self-improvement without comparing and evaluating various modes of behavior.

An example: Wanda L. did not get much affection or respect from people in her work or personal life, other than from her husband and children. There were no obvious objective facts to explain this; she is a productive and talented worker, a very decent person, and not personally unpleasant. But a wide variety of aspects of her personality and behavior apparently combine to lead others to distrust her or not seek her out or to choose her for positions of responsibility.

Wanda can accept the situation as it is, not dwell on it in her thinking, and hence reduce the amounts of negative self- comparisons and sadness. But if she does that, she will not be able to study and analyze herself to change her behavior so as to improve her relationships.

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