What is being depressed? (July)

I count myself fortunate that so far I have not been hospitalized or taken on medication for clinical depression. I have close friends and family who will help me get the attention I need if that ever becomes the case. I have experienced a different sort of depression that comes with life events. In particular it came following our hurricane and then the deaths of two of my nieces the spring after. The grief that shadowed over me, and still remains is another sort of depression. That sort also comes with sickness and injury. 

I want to write here about a third type of depression that comes along from time to time in life's journey. It emerges as a haunting, and can help reveal where we are stuck in life. It can prompt us to wake up in the middle of the night with a dream or a thought we would rather ignore. Those promptings, and this sort of depression I have learned to see as a gift, though one I would usually rather not accept at first. Again, I am fortunate to have people in my life to guide me to go through this sort of depression, and ask the revealing question: What is being depressed? 

Recall Jonah's depression. He was swallowed by a big fish, and went underwater. There was nothing he could do but wait and pray. When he finally got clear about what was being asked of him, he was vomited up on the beach. He had three days in the dark, and then went on to follow his calling (and was met with even more challenges as he witnessed God's mercy where Jonah would have preferred justice.) 

That image of being in the taken under in the belly of a fish, the waiting and prayer, and eventual clarity of calling works well with this third type of depression. I think of it as a vocational depression. That word comes from the latin vocare, which means to call. Sometimes in life's journey, we look around and wonder who's life we are living. Expectations are given to us in the first half of life as we learn to navigate and survive adulthood. We learn to provide for ourselves and others, and then at some point a deeper calling may begin to emerge. It may not have to do with a job directly, but it is about our vocation in a broader sense: who we are called to be. I believe we were born to become who God created us to become. While our parents, families, schools, and even churches try to support us and guide us, it is ultimately from within our soul that God's calling may be heard. This third depression is a revelation of that very calling no longer tolerating being depressed. It is ready to come out, and will let us know. 

Like Jonah, we may have to wait and pray before we have clarity of that calling. Or like St. Paul, we it may come all at once and knock us to the ground, temporarily blinding us so that we can finally see. Another wonderful phrase on this topic, is not to waste a crisis. A crisis is a decision point. When we find ourselves in a mid-life or other crisis of vocation, the best thing to do is wait long enough to discover what God is calling us to. It is not likely to be a new spouse or new red car, though plenty seek to anesthetize against the calling that way. Going through and not avoiding such depressions can lead to a fuller, authentic life. The life God created you to live.