Humor, Patience And Common Sense Reduce Depression

Many folks constantly marvel at the way Charles M. Schulz, the creator of "Peanuts," brings so much human insight into his daily comic strips.

In one sequence, Lucy is addressing Charlie Brown: "Well, you certainly look cheerful today, Charlie Brown." He responds, "Oh yes, I'm not always depressed, you know. Every now and then I have a good day." Then, in the last frame, his face reflects the darkest gloom as he says, "It's between the nows and thens where I have all my trouble."

We relate to this, for we all have blue days. But we are "not always depressed, you know." Some depression is normal. However, if the distance between the nows and thens widens too greatly, we worry about it - and rightly so.

Moods of depression can move in over our lives like a heavy fog, and we often do not understand where they came from or why. The words of the spiritual - "Sometimes I'm up, sometimes I'm down, Oh yes, Lord" - offer another apt description of the way we often feel.

Some despondency is traceable to glandular irregularities that poison the system and induce moods of melancholy. We can do our friends a disservice if, in the role of amateur psychiatrists, we tell them to "buck up" or "try harder." When body ills or chronic fatigue bring depression, competent physicians, psychiatrists and counselors can guide us.

But, happily, common-sense responses open to us all can forestall depression and lift us out of blue moods. The first

precaution is to pay careful attention to all that goes into healthful living.

-- Begin each day with the Psalmist's affirmation: "This is the day which the Lord has made. I will rejoice and be glad in it." See the good that lies near at hand and perhaps even sing each day the words of the old hymn: "Count your many blessings, name them one by one; and it will surprise you what the Lord has done."

-- Don't push your worries behind you, out of sight, where they can heckle you. Bring them out front, line them up and look them over. Decide which ones you can do something about and which ones you just have to live with.

-- Don't try to do too much. Learn to pause, or nothing worthwhile will ever catch up with you. Pause to nurture friendships and deepen family ties. Read good books and think positive thoughts.

-- Use leisure time wisely. James Fisher, in an autobiography titled "A Few Buttons Missing," says, "There is more healing in playing five minutes a day with a dog or cat than in taking a vacation trip around the world."

-- Reduce depression by a regular regimen of physical activity. Daily exercise helps to induce physical tiredness and the need for rest, and at the same time, builds stamina.

-- Live one day at a time. Will Rogers defeated depression by mastering this art. His motto for living was, "Never let yesterday use up too much of today." One day a friend of his dolefully asked, "Will, if you had but 48 hours to live, how would you spend them?" The cowboy-philosopher laughed and replied, "One at a time, friend, one at a time."

-- Nurture a sense of humor. Humor helps us over the rough places. To be able to laugh at ourselves is a sign of wholeness and wholesomeness. One doctor prescribed for one of his uptight patients that he take himself with a grain of salt.

-- Strive to turn a minus into a plus. If life hands you a lemon, make lemonade. A positive personality sees some good even in compromising situations. (There is a sign in a Bainbridge Island barbershop that reads: "Lost dog. Has three legs. Blind in left eye; missing right ear; tail broken. Answers to the name "Lucky.")

-- Set out to do something for someone each day at some cost to oneself. In caring for the needs of others, we are less likely to be overcome by our own problems. Dr. Harry Emerson Fosdick wrote, "Much of the depression we struggle with downstream could be prevented upstream if we are wise.

"Great convictions to live by, great resources to live from, great purposes to live for, the love of nature, the companionship of books, the nurture of friendship, the fine uses of play, the satisfactions of an unashamed conscience - such factors enter into a life that keeps its savor, and furnish an immunity to despondency which makes cure needless."

Long ago a man in a deep depression asked, "Why art thou cast down, O my soul? And why art thou disquieted within me?" He then went about making a diagnosis.

And he made a prescription for himself: "Hope thou in God, for I shall yet praise him, who is the health of my countenance and my God."

If you stand very still at a difficult hour

And wait for a silence within,

You will be led in wisdom and strength

Through a world of confusion and din.

If day after day you keep inwardly still,

God will give you the help that you ask.

In the silence God gives, you will find what you need

God's wisdom, God's strength for each task.