I do force myself to do things I would otherwise enjoy. Its almost impossible to just change feelings, it's much more doable to change actions, actions change thoughts and thoughts change feelings. So I try to start at the beginning and work on the actions and the rest will follow, eventually, but it will if you consistently work on the actions. That's really hard but everything is hard when you are depressed.

I try to do the opposite of what I want to when I'm depressed. I think depression tells us what we want to do, and it's the exact things that will worsen the depression. It's a bit like slaying a monster or feeding it.

When I am depressed I get blips of feeling great even if it's only for an hour or a whole day. When I feel stable I could feel depressed for a day here or there, it's never a solid thing for me. But I think and this makes me curious , that to qualify as mania it has to last a week or more? I'm just trying to remember what I read in the diagnostic criteria. It sounds a bit and I don't want to be out of line, that your dr. Could be over analyzing every blip in the road.

Moods are very pliable, they shift a lot, it's pretty normal to a varying degrees of depression and even good times throughout a depressed period. I think it's kinda of normal for the mood to shift a bit, especially for short periods. But this is just my opinion on it.