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    • Your Mind Is Not Always Your Friend

      An excerpt from When Antidepressants Aren’t Enough by Dr. Stuart Eisendrath

      Seventeen years ago, Dr. Stuart Eisendrath piloted research into the therapeutic effects of mindfulness-based cognitive therapy (MBCT) on people experiencing clinical depression. Ever since, he has been helping those who struggle with depression dramatically improve their symptoms and quality of life by changing how they relate to their thoughts and feelings.

      In When Antidepressants Aren’t Enough: Harnessing the Power of Mindfulness to Alleviate Depression (New World Library, October 1, 2019), Dr. Eisendrath outlines an easy-to-implement MBCT program that has been scientifically proven in a National Institute of Health study to bring relief to chronic sufferers of depression by helping them realize that their thoughts are not their reality. We hope you’ll enjoy this except from the book.

      The mind tends to do things it is particularly good at: thinking, problem solving, worrying, judging, and analyzing. But these things are often not in your best interest. It’s somewhat like reading an article from a website or newspaper. What is written may not be accurate. If you suffer from depression, memories and thoughts tend to be biased toward the negative, which diminishes your problem-solving abilities. These factors may lead to misinterpretations, inaccurate assessments, and inappropriate decision making.

      For example, Carol was walking down the street and saw a friend walking the other direction on the other side of the street. She waved to her but got no response. She felt rejected and depressed. Only later did she learn that her friend had been preoccupied by some bad news about a problem in her own life and hadn’t noticed Carol. As she later learned, her friend was watching for an important business email she’d have to respond to.

      Bill assessed himself as being incapable of completing a marathon. Only after joining a special training program did he realize he could be successful.

      Sam thought of refusing a promotion, because he thought his boss was setting him up to fail rather than having confidence in his ability to handle the new position. Such an approach could have severe consequences for his career.

      A key step in coping with such thoughts is trying to decide if such situations are facts or just thoughts. Mindfulness gives you the space to look at the situation from multiple perspectives and without judgment. Then you can decide how to respond to the situation skillfully. You can evaluate your thoughts in several ways. One is to hold back on acting on a thought while you gather more data to assess whether the thought is a valid one. Another way of assessing a thought is to ask yourself how you feel in thinking it. If you feel more depressed (for example, “Yes, my friends really don’t like me”), there is a very good chance the thought is being driven by depression.

      One time, I was teaching a beginning class in meditation. One woman said, “I can’t meditate as well as everybody else here.” This is one of the most common thoughts of beginning meditators. Then several other members of the group expressed a similar idea about themselves. I asked them how they knew this, and as we assessed the situation, it became clear that such a thought was based more in the critical voice of depression rather than in any fact. Since none of the members had had any prior experience with meditation, it would be hard to expect anyone to be “better” than anybody else. Moreover, there actually is no competition in meditation; there is no score as in a game of basketball or golf. Mindful meditation is more about being present than about doing something better or worse than someone else.

      So the woman’s thought that she was somehow worse than others in her meditation practice was a valuable lesson about how her mind generated negative thoughts that were unnecessarily critical of her. She could begin to label them as such and become more able to bring her attention back to a neutral object like her breath. Perhaps just as important, when she was able to recognize such thoughts for what they were, she would not feel compelled to act on them by doing something such as dropping the class.

      Stuart Eisendrath, MD, is the author of When Antidepressants Aren’t Enough and the founding director of the University of California San Francisco Depression Center. Visit him online at www.stuarteisendrath.com.

      Excerpted from the book When Antidepressants Aren’t Enough. Copyright ©2019 by Stuart Eisendrath. Printed with permission from New World Library.

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    • Double Vision: Seven Signs from Spirit
      lookforsigns

      Over the last three years, the number seven has appeared to me almost every day through various means. One incident was particularly special: I was going down the stairs at a subway station when I stepped on a playing card that was upside down, and when I turned it over, it was the seven of hearts. This was the point when I began to really take notice of all these sevens! It now happens almost daily. I am aware of the meaning/significance of the number seven, yet I still don’t know what all these signs are trying to tell me, as it seems like it could be so many things. Any light you can shed on this would deeply appreciated.

       – Ani

      Astrea:

      I’ve read and studied quite a bit about the number seven because it has been significant in my own life.

      Sevens occur everywhere and in all religions. In biblical scripture, the number seven denotes spiritual perfection. In Catholicism, the Virgin Mary has seven joys and seven sorrows. Buddha is said to have walked seven steps at his birth.

      The seven candles are our eyes, nostrils, mouth and ears. In Islam seven is the number of heavens. In some religions, there are seven archangels. It’s the number of palms in an Egyptian Sacred Cubit, and of particular significance in Cherokee cosmology.

      Ishtar traveled through seven gates to save her husband. Seven is the number of notes in the western musical scale, and Indian ragas are based on seven sounds and rhythms.

      In Harry Potter, seven is the most magical of numbers. In the Tolkien books, there are the seven Lords of the Valar. There are seven wonders of the ancient world, and the earth is said to have seven seas.

      In Gypsy fortune telling, depending on the suit, the number seven means different things. The seven of hearts can deal with love, jealousy, insecurity, and even problems concerning children and pets. It’s a card of emotion and sometimes a misplaced sense of loyalty in someone who doesn’t deserve either our friendship or our love.

      In Tarot, I read hearts as cups, for water represents our flowing emotions. Thus the Seven of Hearts usually concerns some worry for a loved one or someone close to us. Often it means that the other person we’re focusing on isn’t holding up his or her end of the relationship. Of course, this depends on the other cards that surround it and the meanings of those cards too.

      No matter where we look, we can find the number seven or something representing it. That you are noticing it so much means that you’ve begun your own spiritual quest.

      Ask yourself if you’re happy in your current relationship and if there are issues that need to be clarified before it moves to the next level. Seven of hearts in an isolated case could mean that it’s time to stop and take the next seven steps in your personal life more slowly.

      It certainly has something to do with where your relationships are emotionally right now, so if I were you, that’s where I would start to look for answers.

      *****

      Susyn:

      At a fairly early age, many of us recognize a certain number as being somehow lucky, and once we become aware of it, the number appears over and over again in our lives in some way.

      For example, at the age of 10, I realized that 11 was my lucky number when for the first time ever, I won something at a carnival by choosing that number. Since then, 11 has appeared regularly in my life, so much so that when it shows up, I pay close attention.

      Like our names and birthdays, the numerical totals of these very personal identifiers suggest a certain destiny or lifestyle. Numerologists have written many books and articles about numbers drawn from our personal information. You may want to explore some of them for further enlightenment.

      You mention that you are aware of the meanings and significance of the number seven. Throughout history, this numeral has meant many different things in different cultures.

      Seven is considered a holy number and the representation of completeness or totality in Christian religions. Buddhists speak of seven different heavens; the Chinese of seven different stars representing seven openings in the human body and seven parts of the human heart.

      Until the 20th century, astrologers based their findings on the seven planets known at the time, for they were unaware that more would be discovered in the future.

      Without attaching any particular meaning to the number seven, or viewing it as prophetic, I would encourage you to simply adopt it as your special number. Watch for it and expect it to help you make decisions and serve as a reminder that you are always being guided.

      It is also possible that the number seven is attached to a loved one who has crossed over to the spirit world. These sevens could be their way of reminding you that they are close by every day.

      If you can determine who this spirit is by virtue of a birthday, the sum of the numerological letters in their name, or a specific incident or memory that connects this number to them, you can attribute the daily appearance of this number to them.

      Embrace this number as your own and think of it as one of the very special ways the universe guides and directs you. Like a fingerprint or birthmark, it’s one of the things that makes you unique!

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