aberkok

This is a perfect example of why there is such a strong reaction to your thread, Jinnkai. The time you spend on your posts ought to be spent addressing why people might disagree with your line of reasoning, and perhaps listening to what they have to say. In a similar situation, some might even stand corrected!

Instead you've decided to explain why those who disagree aren't following your logic. Anyone who dissents feels like they are being corrected. I understand what you are trying to say, but you need to take a different approach and alter your tone.

I'm grateful that most of my life has been happy. I had great parents and I have a great life. Last year when I went to Hong Kong I believe I was depressed. I would love to have gotten a professional or experienced opinion, but everyone I've described my feelings at the time to said "you were depressed." The thing is, no matter what I tried to tell myself...and believe me...I'm the master of mind games, nothing would change. That's the thing about depression - you can't win against yourself!

I tried to explain to myself that in the midst of a 5 star hotel and for many musicians, a dream gig, I was supposed to appreciate it and I was being an ungrateful moron. I really got angry with myself on a daily basis. Half the time it was for agreeing to do the gig in the first place...the other half was for not appreciating what I had which was basically luxury. That didn't work. The only thing that finally worked was returning home at the end of the contract and erasing the real source of my depression, which was the extreme loneliness I felt being in a foreign country with essentially zero friends (my biggest mistake which I also hit myself over the head with constantly was not making more friends as soon as I got there).

I believe this relates to the thread title and your aims. It's an example of how realizing you're a failure in no way helps one pull out of depression. To be clear, I realized that my depression was a failure to eke happiness out of my situation, which a trained warrior clearly could have.

Applying the label of failure to myself never occurred to me, because it's essentially meaningless. To fail at "life" is to be dead. What exactly was I failing at? I made almost no friends so I was failing socially, but my piano playing almost never suffered so I was excelling at music. Humans are complex and nobody could ever be %100 failure. To use the term "failure" merely to delude oneself into bouncing back from the abyss (which I don't believe works anyway) would be to ignore the truth. I didn't know that warriors did that.

__________________
!check out my new blog! http://arkanamusic.wordpress.com

Warden Gentiles: "It? Perfectly innocent. But I can see how, if our roles were reversed, I might have you beaten with a pillowcase full of batteries."