[Onward2wards]

I was about to share only this:

I have a decision to make, the biggest one of my entire life:
Do I pursue the big dreams I have always had, but which often seem enormously stress-inducing and discouragingly hard to achieve, or do I fully accept settling for less, which on the surface seems diminishing, but which has genuine advantages such as less stress and more immediate contentment? I know what I would prefer - the big dreams, the larger life. I dread the thought of one day realizing it has been a fool's errand, though, and maybe wishing I had taken the easier road and its angst-free rewards.

I am really struggling with this, and have before.

But now I am going to also share this:

I now realize that the big dreams path ought to be easier. It is SUSPICIOUSLY hard right now - there's something missing, something wrong. I would follow that path with zero qualms as a child, and it would not feel so intimidating back then. It isn't simple childlike ignorance talking here, I am sure of it.

I finally understand that it appears hard because I have lost some kind of faith, whether in myself or in the world as it appears to my adult mind, or both; the world has gradually come to seem smaller, and I have gradually come to seem less capable. I never thought of failure or questioned the validity of what I was feeling or doing as a child. As an adult, my mind has been rotten with such doubts.

I have made a decision: the big dreams, it is. As an adult, for whatever old reasons, I lack real decisiveness. I haven't been standing up for the future I want to see, I haven't been standing up for the Self that wants that future and is convinced it can make it happen.

I sometimes feel a vast, aching void inside. I can't properly describe how painful and bleak it feels. I think the void is the absence of the Self I need to believe in, and the world I need to believe in. I will try my best. I need to believe again. Anything less is unliveable; this time I can't stomach letting myself or the world remain so small and limited anymore.

This time is the last time I will ever ask myself that agonizing question I started this post with. That door has been closed. To my fears I say this: I am not powerless. I am not irrelevant. Life need not remain dark. I don't need you and I don't believe you, anymore.

I didn't post this in Depression Success Stories, because time will tell whether or not this truly is one, but right now, I haven't felt so free, so hopeful, so centered, or so fully alive in YEARS!

[shlump]

I'll be keeping my eye on the depression success stories. I will see you there. I'm psychic you know.

[Onward2wards]

Thanks shlump.