Good for you for getting up and moving your body!! Great job!!

So, back when my depression was dominant in my bp 1 and when no med could budge it, I tried to help myself. I began thinking of all the non-pdoc ways people have, over the millenia, tried to help themselves feel better. Being an old medical research dude, I am always curious about the craziest things, most of which, others often find completely nuts. People think I am nuts, and I am sure you will, too. But, I wnted to share a couple of things I learned about my depression.


So, one day, I though to myself: Why is it that sad people, depressed people, so often aim their eyes downward? What is that? What is that all about? Is it just some weird response of the eyes to feeling depression, to that state? Or, is it actually part of the problem? Meaning, what if, when I am depressed and feeling awful and find my eyes looking at the floor or whatever, what if I forced myself in those times to look up? Maybe even, way up? What would happen to my sadness and depression if my eyes were up instead of down?


Well, guess what? In me, forcing my eyes upward helped and still helps me feel meaningfully better. There is a negative impact on my mood in the downward direction when I gaze downward. It aggravates sadness. No question about it in me.

How could this be? Well, think about this. What happens when you look at a Van Gogh? Or a Monet? Or a beautiful animal or human? Or a spectacular mountain, valley, waterfall, or beach? You feel good. You feel better than you did before you saw it--assuming these are all things you, yourself, like. This is part of why people go to the beach. It makes them feel good, looking at it all.

Okay. So, I had this weird info about my eyes. And realized that many people find sunshine to make them feel good/better. Some people get SAD--you don't even have to live here or Seattle or Vancouver to be affected by this. Why is this, I next wondered? Why, other than the beaches, greenery (in Hawaii's case, eg.) and the warmth do people flock on vacation to sunny destinations? Is it just being bathed in bright light, sunlight? Or could it also maybe be something else, too?

I really wondered about this. People love to look at sunrises and sunsets. They will wait and wait to see them. Tons of pictures taken all over the world of them. Why? Why does it make so many humans feel so good to look at sunsets and sunrises?

I really wondered. What if part of it is just the colors. What if there is something specific about those very colors that, when seen by a human, causes us to feel good or better than we did before we saw them?


I was curious. So, I bought some orange, amber, and yellow flood lights. Set them up in my office. In various places, so that the colors were illuminating parts of walls and other objects. So, the walls became orange, yellow, amber -ish. I would work , do my thing. And from time to time, gaze over at those walls. Just look at them, for a few moments, every now and then.

Guess what? It makes me feel better. No doubt about it. Making a fake, lame, mini-sun for 60 bucks in my office and looking at those colors, having them readily available, improves my mood, fairly markedly. And I do not respond at all to SAD lights--never have.

So, my point is, I believe vision and mood are very closely tied to one another, in ways we do not understand. It might be worth spending a few minutes playing with ideas about trying to use your vision to help your mood when you are down. You never know. As nutso as this all must sound, it may be that your own eyes could be helping you to feel better, if you were just doing the right thing with them. Just a random, crazy idea for you.

Hope you feel better soon!!!!!!