Sometimes our brains are our enemy.

I have battled depression on and off during my life, and until recently wasn’t terribly good at managing it.

Being someone who’s not necessarily anti-drug, but definitely wary about piling on prescription meds to manage my day-to-day life, I’ve managed to be mostly successful treating my depression with something surprising: Gratitude.

Yes, gratitude. It’s kind of ridiculous how much just taking stock of your day in a positive way can change the way you relate to your depression.

I’m sure some of you might be reading this and thinking, “What? Bullshit.” And for some people, yes, this won’t work right. But I’m going by how it’s helped me.

You see, every night, when I brush my teeth and floss them, I take those five minutes or so to think about how I am thankful for my life. Focusing first on all the ways I’ve learned from the bad or mundane things, and then closing with all the ways I appreciate the good things.

My wife (hilariously) coined a term for it: She calls this a “Gratitude Adjustment”. I laughed for days at how simultaneously cheesy and perfect that phrase is to describe it.

Spending the time each day to acknowledge life for all its pain and gifts allows you to accept life for what it is – a gumbo of good and bad things, that ultimately is very tasty if you can get past how it burns you.

I know a lot of my fellow musical travelers, with our sensitive souls, have had a hard time with all the lost gigs and missed opportunities to ply our craft in front of adoring throngs since this Coronavirus pandemic started.

Finding ways to shift that “performance” energy to live streams and creative pursuits has been helpful, but it hasn’t gone all the way for a lot of us. That’s why I’m sharing this sort of “hack” that’s worked for me.

Whatever your evening routine, take five minutes of it, and focus your thoughts on all the things that make life life. Acknowledge that they are all real, and be thankful for the life you have, even if it isn’t perfect. Keep yourself humbled and gracious, and appreciate the fact that you are still here, and eventually you’ll get to go see your friends again, whether they be the aforementioned adoring throngs, or just your buddy who loves to shoot the shit about music, sports, politics, or whatever.

Practice gratitude. Give yourself a gratitude adjustment. 😉

And if you are unsure whether this can work for you, it never hurts to try. And honestly, science is on the side of this as a way to keep that dark cloud from blocking all the sun. Kurzgesagt made an amazing video about dissatisfaction (which I call “dark cloud fuel”) you can see here:


I hope you enjoy your life, and realize how precious it truly is. And I also hope you know that you are loved, even if you feel worthless, hopeless, and completely dissatisfied with your life.

Peace be the journey!

Love,
TMS