Sunlight sends me on my way – Part II

“The true story about what happened when I came back to Sweden in the middle of winter.”

Before I went home to New Zealand for Christmas, I wrote an article “Sunlight sends me on my way” about overcoming depression by putting energy into your life. I still believe everything I wrote in that article, but I think I should add that sometimes the best way of helping yourself is to ask for help.

Because I learnt the hard way that you can't just keep putting energy into things without getting energy back in return. It seems some problems, require too much personal sacrifice to make it worth it. Everyone has a breaking point and I found mine just before I went home to New Zealand.

Luckily, when I hit this point, I was with my family and old friends. NZ was both a place to escape to and a chance to ground myself again. When you travel I believe that it’s important to be open to new ideas and ways of thinking, but I think I took it too far and I lost my own sense of self.

Don’t get me wrong, I’ve got some good supportive friends in Stockholm also, but at that time life and work were spiraling out of control. I needed to get away. I am deeply grateful for the love and friendship shown to me of everyone, both here and there, during this time. It was so important to know how much you all cared.

Unfortunately I wasn’t home long enough and when I got back to Sweden things fell apart. The darkness, alone at home, the same old place and the same problems were too much and I realized I needed professional help. But it wasn’t easy seeking psychiatric help in Sweden. I couldn’t speak without crying and yet I had to ring four different numbers, all in a foreign language just to get an appointment. The first day I gave up after three.

Luckily with help from my workmates, on my third attempt I finally met someone who could really help me. This person helped me make sense of what had happened. He helped me see that it was very destructive for me to try and fix everything myself. It was time to walk away for a while.


So if you’ve been wondering why I didn’t write much for three months, it’s because sometimes there are more important things to spend your energy on than telling the world how good life is. However honesty is important to me, so now I want other people in a similar situation to know that in truth I didn’t fix my depression on my own. Friends maybe great, but sometimes they lack both the time and knowledge that can really make the difference.

I don’t feel embarrassed about my depression, because is simply part of who I am. I feel it makes me humble and compassionate and this in turn makes me a better mentor and teacher. I also don’t judge other people so harshly because I know that normally happy, loving people can sometimes do really crazy and mean things. I know it because I am that crazy person just as I am that loving person.

Now I really do feel better again. The warm glow has slowly returned and in truth I feel an inner peace that I have missed for the last couple of years. I have more energy to do the things that are really important to me. Things like writing this blog in the hope that it helps you to accept your weaknesses and remember all the wonderful things about yourself. And if you can't do that then maybe it's time to seek help from someone who can help you remember what is so special about you.

As my mum would say, "The world would be a boring place if we were all the perfect".

"Egoless State" - it's an interesting read