Shadows

This morning met me with some thoughts about depression. This is a black cloud that hangs over me often, though not as much as it did in highschool, early college, and the first several months of marriage. But I still struggle with it.
Sometimes I can't put a finger on the reason for it. Over the years, I have tried to pay better attention to the way I am feeling, and how it came about. I have come to realize that it seems to ribbon from the same source of trying to find 'peace on earth'. Plans will be foiled, people will fail, there will be heartbreak, and there will be physical pain - that is just the way that life is. It all proves how this life, though wonderful as well, will never sate the human appetite.

I ran to various things when I was younger, one failed me deeply.
I trusted in situations with all I had, they faded into new pictures for me to fit in.
I hoped for things that were not to be, and the Lord gave me what He willed.

I reacted to these in different ways:

Pouting - this will never do, especially when you are an adult. There is no good result in this, there is no good excuse for it either. None whatsoever. In a sense, this is basically self-pity that people cop off as "depression".

Bitterness - More common, more accepted by a surprising number. Why is this accepted? When we have been wronged by something, the immediate response is to let ourselves rot with bitterness, turn icy with coldheartedness, and be cruel to others.

Retaliation/Anger - acting out on that bitterness - will we be satisfied to see another bleed?

Anger again - the kind that you keep inside and fester - this actually readies itself for the previous.

Turning inward/retreating to self - Becoming a recluse only provokes the situation. When you are at your weakest point, that is when you are most prey to this. This is when you turn to everything except the Lord, or, when you try to shut out everything from yourself.

Through what I have learned so far, I do believe that there is a "good" sort of depression, just like I believe that there is a 'good' sort of anger. We need something to turn us to the Comforter, and He uses things like sorrows, disappointments and failures to do so.
The significant blows do leave lasting scars, but when we look at them, we see that they are our war wounds - The Lord has made us victors through it.

This last bit could use more time, and I have many more thoughts on this, but I have to scram.