Doing everything right but...

Hey @Campbarry I believe that giving ourselves a timeframe can actually set us up for failure as there are so many factors that can influence/change on our recovery. I myself was off work for nearly 2 and a half years. I was not at all ready to go back full-time after that despite being in a much better place. It took me another year and a half to get back into full time work - with A LOT of help along the way. When I was so ill I could not even imagine returning to work, I could not even imagine living in-fact, but little by little and bit by bit things started to change/fall into place/improve. For me it was so much more about ME - and the main change was self-care - knowing when to push, knowing when to sit, knowing when to scream, knowing when to just Be and knowing when to ask for help. Of course it was not easy nor did it happen instantaneously - it was a very, very long and difficult road - one I am still on and will continue to be moving forward. The biggest change for me was a mindset change - an understanding within myself that I was important and worthy - and also an understanding that I will have those lows (even to crisis point) but that does not mean I am not improving, it just means that the road is a bit bumpier for the time being. Putting pressure on ourselves to achieve certain things by a certain time does not allow for the ebs and flows we endure with our mental health and maybe if we free up our thinking on what it means to 'achieve' and notice that we are already doing that then we can actually give ourselves credit for all those positives we have in our lives already ....then we can also begin building the mindset that we are indeed enough as we are.

Hi @Campbarry , well done for doing all those positive things, I'm impressed.

I remember back to when I was severely depressed and suicidal, and what helped me was a change of medication. My antidepressant at the time couldn't cope with SI (suicidal ideation), it was not strong enough. The change to a stronger antidepressant made all the difference. Might be worth considering?

I know how you feel. It's great you got those coping skills. A good idea might be to just try something new. A few months ago I went back to paper quilling or in while listening to music and it helped. Something I want to go back to again. Colouring in for adults is good too. Something worth trying!

---

@Campbarry wrote:
I haven't discovered what is meaningful in my life yet, I want to but I can't seem to find it. I'm at a point where I want to ask random people what they find meaningful about life just to get some ideas, but I don't want to freak people out

---

I vote go for it! Some people might be taken aback, buuuut I know I would love it if someone asked me this, as I find small talk to be frightfully dull. It's always worth asking, and if someone isn't too keen on the question then maybe they aren't your kind of person anyhow 😉

Also, I don't think life needs to have some great meaning or purpose. I think we are allowed to just wander through our lives, to wonder at nature, make art, form relationships, explore and create, and be curious and play games and then eventually die without having achieved some grand purpose. That's me though. I really hope you find - or maybe create - what you're looking for soon 💜

@Campbarry, there might be a certain beauty or meaningfulness in the struggle, the labour, the striving to live well?

Apparently Nietzche wrote "My humanity is a constant self-overcoming" - ie the challenge provides meaning. And Camus wrote about this Greek king Sisyphus, whose divine punishment was to spend eternity rolling a rock up a hill during the day, only to have it roll down to the bottom the next day. Apparently when Sisyphus walks down the hill to retrieve his rock, he can think about "the battle between his fulfillment for pushing the boulder and the meaninglessness of reality" - he's about the journey, not the destination. After all, the guy who gets silver in the Olympics is still fairly happy, yeah?

Stuff that I find helps give meaningfulness to me, is helping others, be that teaching a kid how to tie their shoelaces or improving hospital procedures when I've been wronged by the hospital. When I work, I help others too, like the last volunteer role I had, I wrote a policy and training manuals for the organisation for my direct supervisor to take over and implement which improves the organisation's credentials - and my direct supervisor couldn't have done it alone, she liked how I was not only doing the day to day stuff but dreaming of improvements. Every so often, I also make myself list things that I'm grateful for, and that helps me appreciate what's in my life more, and makes it seem more meaningful - that I'm savouring my life.

I also have purposeful goals, stuff like exercising to improve my physical fitness, both for myself (reduce later disease and improve health) but also to better help others. Learning more about knitting is also meaningful because I'm improving a skill and keeping my connection to my grandmother alive, and it can help me with my mental health and prevent stress problems. I show my commitment to these goals by knitting most evenings, and by exercising twice a week.

Something I've had to work on is building a strength-based personal history of who I am. Instead of seeing myself through the prism of my disabilities, something I've done since childhood, I'm introducing myself as a person.

Even the bad stuff can help provide meaning - I was able to support my friend who has been intensively worrying about her cat lately by telling her that her worry served a purpose - it was trying to protect her. She asked me how it was trying to protect her, and I, because 'sugar coating' is my middle name, told her that she was probably scared her cat was going to die due to her missing some symptom. She was a bit shocked at that, but she did laugh, and I think it helped her deal with her worry in a kinder, wiser, way.

Something you might like to look into is how you are expressing yourself - do you have outlets for self-expression?