Depression

Visions of the Rewilding Renaissance Grief & Praise
#21

Yes, sometimes too I feel an immense sadness about the state of our beautiful world. I know I can deal with my personal life sorrows, and deal with whatever nature is doing, which is not always pretty. What makes me depressed, is the doings of mankind. We should know better, we have a choice, etc. But witness the matter-of-fact horrors we relentlessly unleash on the world.

So I deal with the haunting images the best I know how to: grieve, cry, replace them in my mind with healing thoughts. Sometimes stay in bed with a book and numb myself until I get out of it. Focus on what gives me joy (pet my cats, notice a flower, breathe, think of loved ones). Sometimes I’m feeling like it’s too much and I don’t want to live anymore in this world, but I know I’m not serious there, I need to go on.

Then comes anger. A good sequel to depression. And a good energy to draw on to take action.

Also, I’m wondering — since anti-depression pills are the most prescribed of all drugs in the US — how much of that depression is in fact stemming from the state of the world, although nobody talks about it — except here! ;D

#22

ofthewood,

I just moved to Marquette from SE Michigan and although I see protest signs everywhere, on cars and billboards and such, I wasn’t at all sure about what this entailed. I actually thought it was something over by Calumet… One of these is the river that runs by Big Bay, isn’t it? I was just there a few days ago. It’s a pleasant place. It’s a little sad seeing the difference between the old forest that the rich folks own and the logging area right next to it. I just looked at the map on the site you linked. That’s a lot of places.

I care a lot about this lake (and I mean the region, because things like that seem inseparable), but like with everything, I feel useless and dumb. I don’t know if I can keep Lake Superior anymore than I can keep Lake Baikal, even though I live right on it now.

For a time I had thought of this area as a place (like New England, maybe) that had already done its time and could start to live again. When I first heard about the mining on the radio a while back I was a little dismayed, but sort of brushed it off as a small thing. Now… I feel like I don’t know nor have anything at all.

Sometimes I just want to give up and embrace it, like I’ve sort of embraced my personal failure and isolation. It seems maybe like there’s little else to do. Sometimes I do.

#23

<<Ouch, that is horrible!! I can’t believe that legislation allowing shit like that still passes, in this day and age of urban planning.

What strategies are being employed to counter the decision?>>

The creepiest part, to me, is how difficult it was to actually find articles covering the decision. When I first moved back here my roommate told me gravely that it’d been decided. I tried to find concrete evidence that this indeed had been ruled, and it took me DAYS to find anything. It’s pretty damn hush-hush as far as I can tell–of course, it’s an extremely small minority who’s for it.

As for strategies to make it stop, I’ve had even less luck finding anything, although now that I’m finally settled into my house I’m going to be actively searching for people planning to take action. I’m almost positive Haskell University is planning for lawsuits up the wazoo.

The problem of this, of course, is how heavily the FBI is trying to infiltrate dissident groups, but surely that can be overcome somehow.