In layman’s terms, depression is characterized by a deficiency in your “motivation hormone” (dopamine) and your “happy hormone” (serotonin).
Dopamine deals directly with motivation. I believe our generation’s relationship and struggle with depression has everything to do with the imbalance of dopamine within our systems. Those in this generation and those with depression have been overloaded with stimulus that directly impacts dopamine.
We used to dream of what to become. But our culture and generation have been raised to become a generation and people who, instead of directly engaging in the myth of their own personal life, building themselves into a figure (fireman, professor, etc), have opted to view life from the third person. How? Through engaging in hours and hours of content about other people, netflix, tik-tok, social media, all directs the awareness and heart of an individual to an artifical experience. Where our ancestors rarely engaged in spectatorship. It was rare for people to enjoy the relief of a concert, stage-play, movie, or musical. But now, our generation has the means to engage in a constant stream of media, outwieghing the direct experience with the experience of spectatorship. This has drastic consequences on identity and meaning. Dopamine is stimulated by old, ancient even, visual cues. These cues have been there not just to aid us in survial, but to help us form relational bonds between other humans, and especially within own selves, how we orient ourselves to the world and see oursevles.
Our ancestors used to spend tireless hours becoming something. Working towards a goal, even if that goal was as small (yet so essential and beautiful) as providing food for the offspring, raising a child. Yet our goals thanks to modernity, farming, and the advancement of techlogoy have been allowed to grow, and be “chosen”. This is not a bad thing, it is just that in this liberation, a great deal of inevitable angst entered the picture. Our culture in America and throughout the liberal, captialistic world puts great deal of importance and attention to what a person “becomes” or what career they chose. It signals things like success, intelligence, and better life quality.
This is not necessarily a bad thing. However, in our generation where we have everything at our disposal, the motivation to become anything, and to truly find joy in that pursuit, has dwindeled. The expectation to become something great, to work hard, and to suceed however, has not dwindeled, but remained deeply intact in our families, and in the ethos of the culture. This gap between lack of motivation and expectation is what is probaly causing the wide and vast prevelance of angst and depression currently. And this expectation is not even one that comes externally, rather it is probaly primarily internal due to our learning. Can we escape this need to become something? Maybe through deep spiritual work, but even in the pursuit of the spiritual, the indiviudal becomes a “mystic”, or a priest.
So, I believe the path towards healing is to dream again. No matter the age, having a goal that inspires the indiviudal to become something they love, admire, and could see benefiting the world and others, can bring a deep inner peace. This is essential to discuss if we are to get serious about healing and transformation.
Furthermore, this is why the spiritual experience can aid so much in this prevalant gap. I will speak more on this later. We are spiritual beings, in the pursuit of “becoming”, the spiritual reminds us that that which we are striving for, working towards, we already are. I mean this as the most important thing of any goal is to come into contact with just how special, unique, and gifted you are as an individual. It is this encounter that also brings lasting healing and peace. Self-compassion is rooted in the awareness of the beauty of the self. And that beauty once experienced can never be forgotten.
Voyagers 