5 Simple Ways to Get Rid of Depression

1) Wake up in the morning
2) Get Passionate
3) Identify your Depression Triggers
4) Update your Mental Associations
5) Learn to breathe slow and deep

1) Wake Up in the Morning

There are 2 reasons why waking up in the morning - the earlier the better - helps get rid of depression;

1) Between 3am and around noon the human endocrine system is in 'waking mode'. This means your hormones are guiding your body to be active and alert rather than rested or sleeping. If you wake up during this time, you will have access to more than double the amount of vital energy you would if you woke up in the afternoon, evening or night. It is extremely depressing to wake up low on energy.

2) Because all people have more energy in the morning, and most have rested in the night, people are more optimistic, kinder perhaps, and more cheerful in the morning. Your idea of the world will be a happier one if you woke up at this time. In the afternoons and evenings most people are tired, stressed or burdened. You will be waking up to harder more difficult world - whether you can see this or not - and this can take its toll on you.

Our idea of the world goes a long way in causing depression or getting rid of it. No matter what you feel of life in general, either way its just half the picture. By waking up in the morning you choose to enjoy the lighter side during your waking hours. It makes a BIG difference. Try it!

2) Get Passionate

I know I might owe your visit here to searching the net for relief from depression, but we really need to stop focussing on Depression so much. The fact is, no matter what our reasons for being down, we are not going to move on from here till we get involved in something else. The more we think about depression, the higher our chances get of experiencing it.

Its now time to get passionate. Almost 90% of people with depression say they find relief when they are doing something they are passionate about. I do believe that one of the quickest ways to get relief from depression is to actually get involved in something passionately and whole-heartedly. You just have to take the first step towards your passion, nature and God will do the rest.

3) Identify your Depression Triggers

Your 'Depression Triggers' are those little incidents or places or people that trigger depression in you. They might be something totally unrelated or insignificant to your life in general. For example, the first time I adopted a pup, she pooped and peed all over the place for months and months. I just didn't know how to toilet train her, and then she was in the habit of eating things that upset her stomach. I cleaned up after her night and day using Lizol (disinfectant). My work was affected because of the time I spent just keeping the place clean, I hardly had time to rest, and I was constantly embarrassed and tense when people came to visit - it was a very difficult time for me.

A year on however and long after the nightmare was over, I found myself getting depressed every time I saw a Lizol bottle or smelled Lizol. For no reason I would go from being perfectly happy to feeling really low on energy and even hopeless - the same hopelessness and sense of failure I used to feel whenever I realized I hadn't been able to toilet train my dog.

I realized then that the smell of Lizol was triggering Depression in me, and lo and behold the second I became aware of it, it stopped depressing me! I even find it sort of funny now that a bottle of disinfectant could affect me that way.

We need to be aware of the little triggers that depress us. Then, we either remove them from our lives or face them and work it out or laugh it off. We need to resolve the issue in our hearts so we can face life in the moment and not be so affected by incidents of the past.

When we get depressed because of these triggers from the past, we are essentially carrying umbrellas long after it has stopped raining. Now isn't that a waste of energy?

4) Update your mental associations

From the moment we are born our brains start compiling a database of information on related things. For example, we associate church with God, sunshine with a happy day, hospitals with illness or pain, and so on. These associations lie beneath most of our sub-conscious reactions to life long after our childhood. Sometimes though, they can become irrelevant and be more of a pain than a help.

Many of these associations are also inherited from our parents and ancestors. For example, until a few decades ago most households made fresh bread every day right in the home. The lovely smell of fresh bread made people feel secure and well. The generations that followed began to buy bread from the market, but we all still associate the smell of fresh bread with well-being and peace. It is an inherited association. Real estate agents report that houses that smell of fresh bread sell much faster than other houses.

Similarly we have mental associations that can trigger depression in us. The scent of the cologne that someone we had an unpleasant experience with wore, a bus or train station where we said a final goodbye to a loved one, or even things like pencils, books, furniture, certain foods etc.

I had a terrible experience as a teenager when a friend I loved and cherished stopped talking to me without explanation. I made repeated phone calls but there was no answer - I know it was just my home number that was being left unanswered. It left such a terrible hurt in me that for years later I got stressed out and upset around phones.

The day I became aware of how I had associated phones with pain and trauma, it all stopped. Phones don't depress me anymore. I can't believe I was once so affected by a little electronic instrument!

Get yourself a pen and paper or open a blank document on your computer. Make a list of all the little things that deeply upset you. Then find out why they affect you so. You'll find yourself so relieved and laughing when you see how little insignificant things were troubling you so deeply all along.

5) Learn to breathe slow and deep

When we breathe fast and shallow, our body assumes we are in stress because that's what we naturally do in moments of stress. When we breathe slow and deep, our body assumes we are resting now.

If we have made a habit of breathing fast and shallow, we have made a habit of keeping our body in stress mode. Naturally we are depressed. How can we expect our nervous system to rest and feel well if it has to constantly be on the alert? How can we expect to fall asleep peacefully if our body still thinks we are on the battlefield?

Its just a simple little thing, and the No.1 cause of real clinical depression that is a long term hormone imbalance. Just breathe deep and slow. Do it every time you're watching TV (especially if you're watching a news channel!), do it while you are walking or working, or cooking, and please do it in bed. There's almost no stress related condition that cannot be healed by beginning to breathe deep and slow.

It really is a return to childhood because that's how we breathed as children. We took in air in huge trusting doses and felt it right till our tummies. We slept well, ate well, and were able to learn, play, grow and enjoy life.