Mindset/Mindfulness: Moment of Clarity for the depression and addiction sufferers.

"When in despair with fortune and men's eyes, I alone beweep my outcast state." -William Shakespeare.

 

It was Seneca that reminded his readers that he was claiming to be no expert, not condescending to give advice to lesser people, but rather, he was in this boat called Life just like anyone else, and he was not the physician, but the sufferer, just like you and me, sharing notes and advice from the common malaise.

In the common course of things, we can indeed be sidetracked some times down some unhealthy footpaths.  Many of us are eventually saved or spared by that rare moment of clarity, like a healing touch of sunshine on our scalp, our neck, our faces.

This is "mindset", when the Moment of Clarity comes and refreshes the senses.  Immediately, we are back in control, back in our good senses, able to take an overview but also able to make granular, fine adjustments, as well.

Sometimes maybe, we find that our own tears have dried, our frown has lost its fire, and we've gotten on with the necessarily business of living, and that as a distraction.  But while distracted, while, we're "not dealing with the problem", something in the mind or spirit has worked away at it in the darkness of some corner of our mind, while we were scrubbing a toilet or making toast, something other than not wallowing or obsessing in our despairs and secret fears.

In the Goth mosh pit of despair, Opium den, it was like the end of a vampire movie, where the vampires are slain by the approach of dawn, and there it was, one healing ray of sunshine to dispel the adversary, the drapes left askew by the rookie.

They say, in all these darknesses, there is somewhere, be it alcohol addiction or some other, there is a moment, a clear moment, somewhere within years of dissipation and feeding the beast that is simultaneous destroying the host being, there is a moment of clarity, where all comes into focus.

"I just now remembered who I am."

"Who's your deddy, baby?"

"I know that dude, I wot."

"I got a face, I got a will, and now I got a name."

A moment in the most vile sort of pit, where paradoxically, the answers, solutions readily at hand in the province of mind, and none of the pressing despairs or joys can touch you, but perhaps, you've blown some kind of fuse in your mind already after years of substance abuse, and its like you're that sage, suddenly, on the mountain, you know the what and why-for of all the things not to do, and you're ready for that other path, the seemingly better-in-every-way one.  You're the sage, clear-headed and suddenly, after being down cast so long, there is a new certainty and clarity in you, something solidified, you've looked the addiction demon in the face and lived to tell about it, and in the clear mountain air of newly-found consciousness, you are ready to give that advice to the sufferer, the needy, the poor in spirit.