http://www.articletrader.com/ Articles at ArticleTrader en-us http://www.articletrader.com/health/depression/the-gift-of-depression-getting-your-life-back-on-track.html http://www.articletrader.com/health/depression/the-gift-of-depression-getting-your-life-back-on-track.html Sat, 20 Jan 2007 00:00:00 -0600
Two reasons your life may get off track is because of conformity and the need for security:

Conformity

One of the main reasons you might make a bad choice that is out of line with your own real interests and desires is to conform to the expectations of others. Many times, parents’ expectations set a person on a life course. Conformity may also come from friends, peers, media or other larger cultural forces.

Need for Security

Another reason you might ignore your own internal signals is that the need for security can overpower your own sense of what is essentially meaningful. The need for security can take other forms such as staying in relationships that are familiar or safe. Or you may fail to take necessary risks to make your dreams come true. Sometimes depression occurs and makes you so miserable in your current lifestyle, to make it clear to you that the comfort of familiarity also comes with a price. Depression can serve as an inducement for taking risks. You begin to realize that though there are costs to moving away from security, the cost of depression for not taking any risks is already a high price to pay. Depression reminds you that you are losing your life while you are not risking.


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Lara Honos-Webb, Ph.D., is a licensed clinical psychologist. She is author of The Gift of ADHD: How to Transform Your Child's Problems into Strengths,the forthcoming Listening to Depression: How Understanding Your Pain Can Heal Your Life and more than twenty-five scholarly articles. Her work has been featured in Newsweek, The Wall Street Journal, and Publisher's Weekly as well as newspapers across the country and local and national radio and television. She specializes in the treatment of ADHD and depression and the psychology of pregnancy and motherhood; she speaks regularly on her areas of expertise. Honos-Webb completed a two-year postdoctoral research fellowship at University of California, San Francisco, and has been an assistant professor teaching graduate students. Visit her website at www.visionarysoul.com.

Lara's blog:
Listening to Depression


Source: http://www.articletrader.com ]]> http://www.articletrader.com/health/depression/depression-treatment-how-to-heal-your-life.html http://www.articletrader.com/health/depression/depression-treatment-how-to-heal-your-life.html Sat, 20 Jan 2007 00:00:00 -0600
In the first stage, the withdrawal that characterizes depression is reframed as necessary to effect a reorientation. When you realize something has to change, you need to figure out where to go. The retreat from the real world allows for this process of changing directions. The dread and existential angst of depression is reframed as an important search for meaning that will provide a direction for you to follow.

As you try to move forward you will confront obstacles within yourself. Depression forces you to let go of parts of yourself and your trivial pursuits. As you let go of central aspects of your identity, you move into reclaiming your grief, and as you grieve, these new losses evoke earlier losses. As the grief washes away rigid patterns of defense that may have become your habitual way of being in the world, you must learn to embrace emptiness to clear the way for something new to enter.

As you move into a new way of being, the feeling of not caring what other people think permits you to expand your sense of what is allowable. Not caring allows you to experiment with new ways of being in the world without regard for others’ expectations. Thus, the feeling of being indifferent to other people’s evaluations of you marks the turning of the work of depression from an internal shift to making changes in the outer world.

The inevitable failures and rejections that follow as a person’s comfortable world responds to changes are endured through the humility of depression which frees the person from the need to have approval from the environment. As the person’s life is rebuilt and old plans fall away, he gains a sense of the mysterious and appreciation for not-knowing or controlling the future.

You can learn more about listening to your depression symptoms in Dr. Lara Honos-Webb’s book, Listening to Depression: How Understanding Your Pain Can Heal Your Life.


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Lara Honos-Webb, Ph.D., is a licensed clinical psychologist. She is author of The Gift of ADHD: How to Transform Your Child's Problems into Strengths,the forthcoming Listening to Depression: How Understanding Your Pain Can Heal Your Life and more than twenty-five scholarly articles. Her work has been featured in Newsweek, The Wall Street Journal, and Publisher's Weekly as well as newspapers across the country and local and national radio and television. She specializes in the treatment of ADHD and depression and the psychology of pregnancy and motherhood; she speaks regularly on her areas of expertise. Honos-Webb completed a two-year postdoctoral research fellowship at University of California, San Francisco, and has been an assistant professor teaching graduate students. Visit her website at www.visionarysoul.com.

Lara's blog:
Listening to Depression


Source: http://www.articletrader.com ]]> http://www.articletrader.com/health/depression/depression-treatment-metaphors-for-seeing-depression-as-a-gift.html http://www.articletrader.com/health/depression/depression-treatment-metaphors-for-seeing-depression-as-a-gift.html Sat, 20 Jan 2007 00:00:00 -0600
Fly Metaphor

One time I saw a fly inside a car banging its head over and over again against a car window. It seemed as if it would injure itself as it repeatedly tried to escape the car by flying into the window, bouncing back and trying again. The irony was that the window on the other side of the car was open, and all it had to do was stop trying to move forward, turn around, and fly out the other side. Similarly, there are times when if you force yourself to try to move forward and overcome obstacles by sheer force of will you may cause yourself great injury, to no avail. There are times when the most effective strategy is to stop in your tracks and to contemplate your situation rather than bulldozing ahead. For example, if the fly had stopped and turned around, it might have noticed the other window offered an easy escape into freedom.

Depression, which often leads to a withdrawal of life energy from current life situations, may be a gift in reorienting you to finding an alternative strategy for your life’s problems. Unlike the fly, you can turn around and re-evaluate your situation.

Navigation Metaphor

When a plane flies across the country it is given a navigation system to help it stay on its flight path so it will get where it is supposed to go and so it will not interfere with other airplanes in flight. If the plane deviates even slightly off of its trajectory, the navigation system alerts the pilot and the corrective changes are made so that airplane stays on course. Similarly, depression can be a signal alerting you to the fact that you have gone off course.


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Lara Honos-Webb, Ph.D., is a licensed clinical psychologist. She is author of The Gift of ADHD: How to Transform Your Child's Problems into Strengths,the forthcoming Listening to Depression: How Understanding Your Pain Can Heal Your Life and more than twenty-five scholarly articles. Her work has been featured in Newsweek, The Wall Street Journal, and Publisher's Weekly as well as newspapers across the country and local and national radio and television. She specializes in the treatment of ADHD and depression and the psychology of pregnancy and motherhood; she speaks regularly on her areas of expertise. Honos-Webb completed a two-year postdoctoral research fellowship at University of California, San Francisco, and has been an assistant professor teaching graduate students. Visit her website at www.visionarysoul.com.

Lara's blog:
Listening to Depression


Source: http://www.articletrader.com ]]> http://www.articletrader.com/home-and-family/parenting/top-ten-tips-for-parenting-adhd-and-spirited-kids-from-the-gift-of-adhd.html http://www.articletrader.com/home-and-family/parenting/top-ten-tips-for-parenting-adhd-and-spirited-kids-from-the-gift-of-adhd.html Fri, 04 Aug 2006 00:00:00 -0500
2. Coach your child to name and feel ok with all their emotions. Kids act bad when they are mad, sad or ”scared”. When you coach your child to tell you what she feels, her bad behavior will heal.

3. Look inside yourself. Sometimes kids act out unexpressed conflicts of their parents. Are you struggling with depression, anxiety, rage? Get help for yourself and your kids will shape up.

4. Think of yourself as a coach. Your job is to coach your child to success in social, emotional and educational settings. Sometimes the answer is practice, practice, practice. Don’t get discouraged if you have to repeat yourself over and over again.

5. Ask yourself: “If my child’s most frustrating behavior was meant to teach me something, what would it be?” Many parents find themselves half distressed and half impressed at their child’s indifference to people pleasing. Sometimes this is just the lesson parents need to learn in their own lives -- many parents have become imbalanced in attending too much to seeking approval from others.

6. Forget about the competition. Your child can still strive to be outstanding without it being about comparisons to other children. ADHD and spirited children are sensitive to tension produced by parents’ competitiveness and the fear based motivation inhibits them.

7. Keep Yourself Alive! It takes a lot of energy to keep up with ADHD and spirited kids. You need to become your own energy source. Feed your own passions. If you are married, work to increase your intimacy with your partner. If you are single, keep your own love life alive.

8. Honor the kernel of self-reliance in all acts of defiance. Every time your child doesn’t do what you asked them to do, ask them for an explanation. Honor their independent thinking and consider what part of it you may want to incorporate into your discipline. Continue to insist that your child respect your rules while demonstrating respect for their own rhythm and logic.

9. Practice preventative medicine. Many times children’s bad behavior is a misguided attempt to get some precious attention. Fuel your child up with the highest octane energy you can early in the day. Spend a few minutes being entirely present with your child. Look them in the eyes, touch them lovingly and listen closely to your child. This intense presence will give them what they need and head off desperate pleas for attention. Sometimes just a few minutes will prevent large energy draining hassles.

10. Connect with your child’s teacher. Research has shown over many decades that your child’s educational outcomes are very closely linked with how much the teacher likes your child and how much they expect from your child. This is why you need to advocate for your child at the same time as you connect with your child’s teacher. Show enormous respect for your child’s teachers and try to forge a close alliance with him or her. They will go the extra mile for your child.


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Lara Honos-Webb, Ph.D., is a licensed clinical psychologist. She is author of The Gift of ADHD: How to Transform Your Child's Problems into Strengths, the forthcoming Gift of Depression: How Listening to Your Pain Can Heal Your Life and more than twenty-five scholarly articles. Her work has been featured in Newsweek, The Wall Street Journal, and Publisher's Weekly as well as newspapers across the country and local and national radio and television. She specializes in the treatment of ADHD and depression and the psychology of pregnancy and motherhood; she speaks regularly on her areas of expertise. Honos-Webb completed a two-year postdoctoral research fellowship at University of California, San Francisco, and has been an assistant professor teaching graduate students. She offers telephone psychotherapy and coaching. Visit her website at www.visionarysoul.com

Source: http://www.articletrader.com ]]>