Jonathan Rottenberg, Ph.D. on Depression

We think things that hold us back and dampen our spirit. But it's not just about thinking. Our actions matter. It takes conscious, consistent, and creative effort to make a life worth living. This podcast is about how other people keep themselves moving in the right direction, how they feed their good wolf. Yeah, thanks for joining us. On today's episode, we have Jonathan Rottenberg, an associate professor of psychology at the University of South Florida, where he's the director of

the Mood and Emotion Laboratory. Jonathan is also the author of The Depths, a book which Eric has discussed with him before, and today they're going to discuss some of these studies and research that Jonathan is involved with. Hi, Jonathan, welcome to the show. Thank you for having me. It's great to be here. It's a pleasure to have you

on again. You and I talked, I was remarking to you before the interview about four years ago, and we had a great conversation then, and listeners can go back and listen to that where we talked about your book, The Depth, which was a book that really talked about how depression can be viewed through an evolutionary psychology lens as an adaptation. And you've gone on since then to do some other interesting studies. This is a lot of what you focus on in your work as a researcher.

So we'll get into all this stuff, but let's start like we always do, with the parable. There's a grandfather who's talking with his grandson. He says, in life, there are two wolves inside of us that are always at battle. One is a good wolf, which represents things like kindness and bravery and love, and the other is a bad wolf,

which represents things like greed and hatred and fear. And the grandson stops and thinks about it for a second and looks up at his grandfather and he says, well, grandfather, which one wins? And the grandfather says, the one you feed. So I'd like to start off by asking you what that parable means to you in your life and in the work that you do. Very much interested in finding out which wolf wins. Um very invested in the topic of depression, and it's been viewed as something that is destructive,

that takes people in a terrifying negative direction. But I think that there's another overlooked possibility that if we feed ourselves in the right way, we might be able to take depression in a much more creative, productive direction. And so that's what the parable really means for me, this duality,

this dual potential. So one of the things that most recently a study you released really talks about how one of the main things that seems to be missing in all the research that's getting done is looking at people who thrive after depression and really wondering, you know, a make that more of a common thing that people realize it happens, but also look at people who thrive as a lens to see what might work to help with depression. And you've recently done a study about that. Can you

share a little bit about what you've learned? Sure, I think it helps to back up UM a little bit. So, I like most people have been studying all the things that make people depressed, that UM make depression lasts longer, that make depression recur, and we've really gotten a message that depression is is terrible, is destructive, and it's borne out in all the statistics UM. You probably have heard about the statistics as being the most disabling UM disease

in the world. But I think we've kind of gotten that message too much in the sense that UM researchers have neglected to even look for good outcomes. And if you don't look for something, you're surely not going to find it. So in this new program research, what I'm interested UH in doing is focusing our lens on those who enjoy well being after depression. And so what does some initial work look like. It looks like there was

a very small research study as part of this initial work. Well, I actually think that what we found is quite significant. If you think about again the destructive potential of depression, how it does tend to recur in disabled people in a variety of ways, it's destructive to relationships, it impairs

us at work, it leaves us feeling miserable. You think that after someone experienced one or more depressive episodes that they're unlikely to experience the levels of well being, balance in life, feeling that their existence is purposeful to the extent are greater than people who had never had depression. So we did a study where we were looking at a big data set of adults and we had norms on well being for both people who are depressed in people who are non depressed, and we first had to

figure out, so who's doing well in life? And we've essentially had all these different categories, all these different aspects of well being, like purpose in life, positive emotion, not experiencing negative emotion, And we found that about a fifth of non depressed people had this consistent profile of looking like they were really doing well, had very consistent high levels of psychological well being. So then the big question

is what is having depression due to that possibility? And I think a lot of people going in would think that depression not that it would be zero, but it would be very low. Your chances of enjoying well being at the same level. Is that top fifth, that kind of rarefied air of people who are really going along

in life, in and um and flourishing. And so what we found was that depression reduced the chances by about one half, So about ten percent of people who had a documented depressive episode when they were followed ten years later, we're flourishing at in that kind of rarefied air. And so I know, you know, some people are glass half full, other people are class half empty. I see this as

a big glass half full kind of finding. But we can talk about what it means, right, So essentially, what you're saying is that for a lot of people, depression is not the end of the road. And not only do they recover from depression or come back to what we would consider a normalized state, they fall into the category of people who were really thriving in life. I think that's important to know that that happens if you

look at messaging around depression. Heck, if you go into a doctor's office and you have depression and you want to know, what are my chances what's likely to happen to me? By and large, what you here are very very cautious statements. The best you could hope for is, we'll try to keep these symptoms at bay, will try to make sure you have some wealth periods, stay on

the medication, stay in treatment. And I'm not saying that those are unwise things, but the expectations are awfully low and the picture of the future is awfully dim, and I think that this proves to be true in other studies. I think that doctors and other mental health professionals can

be somewhat more positive about the possibilities. And so let's briefly talk about some of these measures of well being because I thought they were really interesting to explore on their own of this is what someone who is again to use the word that was certainly used in the New York Times article, this is a description of people who are thriving. So let's maybe talk through what some of those facets are, because I do think they helped paint a more nuanced picture of what mental health and

emotional health looks like. Yeah, it's a great it's a great point. I'm glad you're asking about that. So I think that what is mental health has not received nearly the same attention as what is mental ill health, So we had to we had to do some work here to come out with a credible battery, focusing on psychological well being, knowing that there are other elements of well being that we couldn't We couldn't do everything all at once, so we focused on psychological well being, and that included

things like experiencing positive emotions, experiencing negative emotions to relatively low degree, feeling that your life was purposeful, feeling that you have balance in your life, having meaningful relationships, Feeling a sense of autonomy like you're in control of your life as opposed to being in control. So some of those are some of the major facets of well being

that we we examined. Yeah, and as I was reading it, you know, a thought occurred to me, which is how many of these characteristics can you have and still be considered to be highly functioning. That's a great question because one's assumption would be the depression would destroy various manifestations of well being, and it's a reasonable assumption, um but

it does not appear to be the case. Because if we want to find out we want to predict which people of those who are originally depressed are the most likely to be flourishing ten years later. The thing that predicted it was actually being able to report some level of well being at the at the get go, at the outset. So yes, depression on average is very harmful to these multiple aspects of well being, but there still are individual differences. So you could imagine someone who, for example,

had depression. They're very depressed, but they just had a baby, so they are depressed, they're very sad about it, but their life does have purpose in the sense that even if their life right now is in the trash, can they look at their look at their newborn. They feel like, that's a reason to live, that's a purpose in my life, that's meaning in my life. And and it was exactly that sort of thing, having um, those kinds of experiences

that was predictive of doing better ten years later. As I look at this list, I mean, there are two categories that sound like what we normally think about when we think about depression, which is, you know, having lots of positive emotions or you know, not having a lot of negative emotions, um and but all the other categories here, they're not so much based on what we're feeling exactly there. They involve u to what extent our lives are full

of meaning and purpose. That's many of the the elements or in some way are satisfying, despite the pain that

might be inherent in being alive. Right, And this is interesting to me, you know when we talked before, and listeners know, I mean, I am someone who um wrestled with depression for a long time, and I don't know how to describe my relationship with it now right um, because I do have what feel like moments of unexplained low mood, so not so much like negative emotions as in like oh my dog died, I'm sad, not that, but I feel empty or you know, the traditional and

hedonia like that still shows up for me from time to time. But when I look at all these other measures, and if you asked me, I would say I am absolutely thriving, Like I look at having had depression as as generally a positive in my life, maybe because I'm a podcaster who deals with these things and that's part

of what I do. But but I'm struck by how many of these measures I would say yes, yes, yes, yes, even if I might say that the positive and negative emotions maybe aren't quite where I would want them to be. And again I I always wrestle with us and you and I talked about this a little bit in the other episode around how happy should we expect to be? And by expecting to be uh, super happy in some

cases leads to less happiness. Well, you don't mind my saying something uh personal, Uh, I think that the the fact that you have some elements of well being even in the middle of depression is a kind of armor that should help you word off the really significant, bone

crushing chronic depression. And and that's something that, um, if we could give that to all people who struggled with depression, I suspect that we would have We would still have depression, of course, but the depression would be shorter, it wouldn't take over and be as destructive as as it often is. So I think that's a pretty important insight. Yeah, it death really has my depression such that I have it, and again I often am like to have it? Do

I not have it? What's my relationship to it? But it is certainly, um, far more reduced than it than it once was. And but it it does that does seem to be some recurrence of it. And in your book The Depths, you talk about three things that seed sort of a low mood, and you talk about events, um, temperaments and routines, And I think that that's so useful when we're trying to sort of look at the question of are we depressed or how depressed are we? Or

what are these things? Is is sort of examining those things because I do think they give a little bit of a more nuanced window into this question of am I depressed or not depressed? Yeah, I think that if people think of their moodsm more normal thing, not as the enemy, and again sort of like the parable, you

can do. You can do things that are feeding your better mood, and in the extent that you do that, you still have depression, but it will be briefer, it will be less destructive, and it will be less intense. So I do think that in our culture there's a tendency to be binary. Am I depressed? I'm not sure that's the right question. Um, A question is what sort of mood am I in? And what are the things that are feeding it? And what are the things that that are within my control that I can do to

learn from it and to be healthier. Right, one of the things I wanted to ask you is you publish something in the Annual Review of Clinical Psychology not too long ago, but the title of it was Emotions in Depression, What do we really know? And um, you you talk about you say that we you know, you report on what we've learned thus far about how depression influences emotional reactivity and emotion regulation and also really show what we

don't yet know. And I'd be curious if you could maybe talk just a little bit about some of what you wrote in that article. You know, what do we know about depression and emotional reactivity and regulation versus what don't we know? Yeah, we have more questions than answers, but I think our questions are more interesting questions than the questions we used to have. So we'll call that progress.

So I think that we started out with a kind of a cartoon version that depressed people have sadness attacks, uh, sort of like people who have panic disorder have panic attacks, sudden bursts of sadness. In my research, in research from other investigators, is really shown that not to be the case. What seems to be true is that depression really kind of devoids the emotional landscape of bumps. In a sense, it flattens it out in people experience less differentiation. So

I go to a happy context, I feel terrible. I go and I look at something that's tragic, and I have a very similar reaction. Especially in laboratory studies, this phenomenon called emotion context and sense ativity, where people are

reporting the same emotions in different contexts. So that's one thing that we've learned, but studies of everyday life give us a somewhat different picture, where though it's true that people don't have the same kind of predictable emotions, people with depression have negative emotions in kind of unpredictable ways, in the sense that there's nothing about their context that's negative,

but nevertheless they have the experience of negative emotions. So it's almost like there's a decoupling or a disjunction between the things that normally make us feel emotion when we're in a state of depression. So, for example, depressed people, they might have periods where they feel really intensely upset, but it might be actually a very minor, minor event that provokes that, not the sort of thing that ordinarily would would get us to experience strong bursts of emotion.

So if you know, I add one sentence to describe it. The depression kind of removes the normal emotion antecedence, but then replaces them with ones that are unpredictable and confusing. And I think that this sort of accords with how a lot of depressed people experience their emotions, is often being confusing, not understanding their mood and and and just feeling like they they're always searching for why it is that they feel the way that they do. I've looked

at depression as I've been in two different ways. One one way and it's mostly the way I do it now is I almost just treat it because it's it's cyclical for me, and it it doesn't it doesn't really land on me and stay on me in the same way, you know, I tend to look at it and treat it sort of as an emotional flu I just look at it and go, Okay, well, am I taking care of myself? All right? Let me make sure I'm doing the things that I know are good for me, and

then I'm going to kind of ride this out. And I don't go plumbing the depths for deeper meaning of what's wrong, because I know with enough history that there isn't much of anything wrong really, or it seems like there's not anything particularly wrong, but they're also does seem to be the case that you know and and your your previous book discusses this to some extent, where you know, the depression is an adapt aation to something happening, and

it's worth digging a little deeper to find out what that might be. And I'm just kind of curious from your perspective, is what are those approaches better than the other or is it totally context dependent? Yeah, I don't think there's one right way to respond to depression, but I do think that the dominant response that people are having right now in our culture is often very harmful. Our culture is very intolerant and in some ways frightened of negative emotion, and we interpret this as a sign

that there's something wrong with us. There's something wrong with Howard, thinking there's something wrong with Howard, feeling there's something wrong with our our life. And this has a sense in which it can actually magnify the state, because we're wondering why am I not happier? Why am I still unhappy?

I'm still unhappy? Why? And what you're describing is a somewhat more patient attitude, where while we on the one hand, we do we do inquire um into into the state and what it might mean, but we don't do it with a kind of desperation. And I think it's the kind of desperation that the kind of desperate responses that people have that prolonged the depression, and sometimes they don't even produce the kind of insight that you would think they might produce by by constantly asking the question why

am I still sad? Why am I still sad? Right? Because that can lead to depression, which is rumination. Absolutely, depression is a tricky thing. So it may mean something that that you need to change in your life, or it may be that you're not getting enough sleep, or it may be that your your diet needs to change, you need to get more exercise, or you need to get more light and so, because the mood system is

open to so many different inputs. But in terms of the original design, yes, it's true that the mood system was there originally in part to register major shocks, so major threats to your long term well being. So you can predict that people will get depressed when a person close to them dies. Still feel depression now it may not last for months and years, but it's a normative response. It's a natural response, and it's part, part and parcel

of why we have moods. And so I, I, like you, am not against depression and trying to eradicate it to zero. The question is how do we how do we live with it, how do we how do we contain it, how do we take it in a positive direction. I think that's a different set of questions than the questions

we typically ask of depression. Now, in the situation that you described, which is something very close to you dies and you are in a grief state, would we consider that or would you consider that depression or is that just a word that we throw on a low mood state of grief and loss. I don't think there's any hard and fast way to distinguish between a low mood that is non pathological and the clinical depression that is that is pathological. It's just a it's a continuum of mood.

And I know it's a nerving because people want the clear labels. They want to know, you know, what is the bad depression versus the good depression. But the truth is that some people have berievement that leads to clinical depression and suicidality and losing forty pounds and not coming out of it, whereas other people have some months of grief or even longer periods, but they're able to resume

their lives. So and I wish there were a bright line we could draw between the pathological and non pathological, but there really isn't. This conversation makes me think of and I don't know whose quote it was who said this, but they said, sadness is where everything means you know something or too much, and depression is when nothing really means um anything. And I've always thought that's an interesting point.

But I do think that at least um in my life, my I suspect I wrestled with depression far before I ever knew it, because um, you know, I was a

substance abuse attic and had lots of other things. But I do remember that the kickoff for me of what I would consider the major depression in my adulthood was there was a period of deep grief, um for the loss of a marriage, and I realized that there was just a period of time where I went like, this isn't getting better, Like I'm I'm just not getting better.

And I don't feel maybe as sad about that as I used to, but I still feel like shit right like, And that was when I was like, all right, I think I need to seek more treatment because to your point, that triggered what appeared to be a depression condition that wasn't remitting. Oh, I am all four getting help. I don't see, just because mood is the product of a natural system doesn't mean that we should just wallow in our depression and and wait for it to tell us.

You know, wisdom, Um, you know I've been in some ways. I would say that I was a victim of a severe depression. Now, treatments were not terribly helpful, helpful for me, and I had to suffer for a long time, and it was hard for me to tell what the meaning of the depression was. But now, many decades later, UM, I don't think it's too strong to say that I feel grateful that I had that experience, and I do think it led me to a better place, led me to be a better person, led me to a totally

different career. I believe that we can't We should look for answers, we should look for clarity. Um, But I respect the primitive nature of depression in our limited ability to decipher um it's meaning, and that requires sometimes a kind of patients that most people don't have. And so what have you learned over the last several years about

ways that people can work with depression more skillfully? I think you and I very much agree on one common point, which is that, you know, walking into a doctor's office and just getting a medication and leaving it that is probably not the best approach. I mean, I my depression has responded to what I would you know, I often jokingly referred to as like throwing the kitchen sink at it, right, Like I worked on it on multiple levels, you know, medicine, therapy, exercise,

eating right. Are there any other things besides sort of those that sort of the well known things that you have learned maybe since you published the book about other useful approaches to depression? I think that that there's both incredible good news and incredible bad news. The bad news is that so many different things can trigger depression, and we've talked about a number of them. But the good news is that many of those same things, uh if if skillfully played out, can be leavers to move mood

in a more positive direction. So you you've mentioned already a number of those levers, but cognitive change is an important one. So having a different relationship with your with your thoughts, with your negative thoughts, being able to reinterpret them more skillfully is one additional lever. And we haven't

mentioned interpersonal uh factors. So what friends you have, how supportive they are, what you do with them, um, Having things to look forward to with other people as another important buffering factor, having even someone to talk to about your depression. I mean, depression is so profoundly isolating in our in our culture. Unfortunately, even now when stigma is starting to a road to a degree, when people get oppressed, their strong urges to withdraw, they feel misunderstood. It's very

hard for them to reach out to others. They feel that others won't understand them, and they're depriving themselves of a really important lever. Um. So then all the lifestyle factors that you that you mentioned that I think are a bit unsung as anti depressive heroes, and the list really goes on because I think there will also be individualistic um antidotes. That's one reason I'm so interested in

this research. Unflourishing because I think what we're gonna learn is that there's a multitude of different ways that people find a way out of depression. And I'm eager to meet those people maybe they listen to because I think that they need we need to learn from these wise people. Now, it may not all be specific things that people are doing. I mean, we can't neglect the possibility that some of us has to do with You have lucky genes, you have,

You're just an intelligent person. You can figure things out. But I think it has to be true that some of getting out of depression is within human control, in in the things that we can change or modify. Right. I think that's such an interesting question that um I've been pondering lately, which is really how much control do we have over this stuff? And I think that the most honest answer I've been able to come up with is some right, Like, I do think that by doing

certain things we can improve our condition. But to what degree, I think depends on so many other factors about like you said, about genes or previous trauma or lots of other things. But it does seem that there is some role for the actions that we take to make some degree of improvement us. My message, one of my big messages,

is that it's never too late. So someone out there may have had depression that recurred three or four times, or they might be in the middle of a chronic depression, and they may think that I've tried everything and nothing has worked, and I have no control, and and depression does tap does sap your patients. But the more we learn, the more we see that given enough time, people can discover and if it's a tried and true method or

if it's a unique method, we need. That's why we need these models of individuals who found a way out, because I think there's a lot we can learn flip from them. And even if it is and it surely is less than control, even if it's ten percent control, for someone who feels that they have no control, they

would kill for ten percent with anything in life. Is it's like, well, I tried this and it didn't work for me, and then I try it again another time and it works for me great Or I tried this thing and it's working for me, but it doesn't work for me anymore. So now I need to find something else to try. But I think that that your message that that comes through with this is that there is hope at the end of this. There is hope at the end of this. That and it's just it's just

the truth. It's it's not wishful thinking. And the other thing that I really want people to appreciate that some people are fortunate enough to find a way out is not a negative reflection on any of the people who are still in depressions. Grip. This does not mean that

it's your fault. And we get it. We have this culture that's always try trying to labeling who's responsible, whose fault is it, And that's just a nonsensical way of thinking, especially about something that is is elusive and is poorly understood as depression. So we we try to get our baby footholds on depression and we try to cut it

down to size. So the fact that that some people are are doing better and learning to live with depression and living better afterwards, I see as as hope, but not as diminishing or degrading or debasing people who are still struggling with depression. These are all really these are real and important experiences of depression that are uh that must be respected. Um, you know, sort of in and

up themselves. Yeah. I often think in some ways we've gone from the depression model or idea of well you just you know, shake it off or pull yourself up by your bootstraps. We've we've evolved that to a slightly more nuanced version of well are you exercising or you

eating right? Are you? You know that that again we can turn that into our fault and so you know, I think that's such an interesting line to have to walk as a person, which is, you know, on one hand, am I really trying as best I am able to all these things that I know might help, and at the same time not being too hard on myself when I'm unable to do those things because of depression exactly.

I would also we define success, so you know, if you're in a crushing depression that's leaving you unable to work or think or have a thought that that you feel is a useful thought, that's your personality. Victory is more comfortable, so you know, it's incremental gains, so you you want to continually evolve so that you're in a better place. It's not like one day you go from having a severe chronic depression to flourishing, You're gonna have

to pass through some intermediate states. But I think the important point is that you can be confident that applying what we know and being patient, you're likely to end up in a better place than you are now if you're not satisfied with where you are, but also realizing that a lot of people, and this is may mean not appreciated by a lot of people, that um, it's

not like most people are experiencing bliss seven. I think we have a very unrealistic idea of what what people ordinarily experience and feel and part of it is that our our culture just just really idealizes euphoria and these very brief lived kind of high energies, fist bump, you know, peak states. You know, it sells cars, and it kind of makes the world go around our pursuit of euphoria.

And I'm not against euphoria by any means, but I think that we get into trouble and we think that it's normal to be experiencing these things for you know, eight hours a day. That's that's not going to happen, right. And I think you touched on something important there too, which is that, um, temperament plays a big role in this, and that some of us are more inclined towards high energy states or low energy states, or a happiness that's more intense versus a satisfaction that's a little bit more

um low key, but but contentment. I mean that we can't get rid of some of our basic temperament, and we wouldn't want to. I mean, I think that we need are more introverted people. We need are people who are maybe more reserved too, don't always look on the bright side, that they add value that you know, life

would be boring if everyone everyone were the same. And I do think that some of those we could say they're more depressive temperaments and more depressed toogenic temperaments that they do tend to be devalued as you know, this is a kill joy type person. But these these people are often very insightful and funny and interesting. We need to see their value. I never thought that the goal should be to erase anything anything depressive or depressing, you know.

I I feel like we need to expand you know that the possibilities uh for people and not have people feel bad about what their temperament is right, and that sort of circles us back to some of the early conversation we had as you as we talked through these factors of well being that really only a couple of them have to do with emotional state, and and so many more of them have to do with meaning and purpose and autonomy and growth and um relationship with others

and and so there's so many more factors to a life well lived than just whether you're in an upbeat mood. Understand why, Um, you know when people ask how you're doing, that's first you you're not talking about purpose and value that you're talking about. You know, you're feeling good, You're happy. That's the shorthand that people use. I understand that it's not really as rich as the reality. Right, Yeah, you don't want to be that person. How are you doing

well on six exactly? At a six out of nine facets, I'm I'm doing very well. Um. Let's um, we're near the end of our time. But let's wrap up a little bit with an organization that you founded called Depression or helped to found called Depression Army. And I'm wondering if you could tell us a little bit about that organization and some of the things that, um, maybe you've

learned by being part of it. Sure, So I've been on all sides of depression, as I mentioned, struggled with depression, and I've been a scientist, and I've been hankering to, um be more involved in the dialogue about depression in our culture. And so Depression Army really is a vehicle to have a more interesting conversation. So we have a website as a blog, and we have all the various social media flavors, whether you like Facebook or Tumbler, or

Instagram or Twitter. Um. But the purpose really is much like we've been talking about, to reflect on the experience of depression. And and I think that in addition to being a dreaded, terrible, frightening, horrible experience, depression is also very interesting. It's an interesting experience, and it's also a transformative experience. And so I think that in Depression Army, we're playing around or thinking about depression identity. What does it mean to have a depression? What does it mean

for your future? What does it mean for um, your relationships? And we don't we don't pretend to have the answer for this. Our purposes to to inspire thought and be provocative um and to try to hang onto the two sides, so both the hope, the possibility of recovery, but also the reality that so many people are still struggling, because those are both really important parts of depression. I agree. I think being able to paint that picture is is so important that that there is hope and if you're

right in the middle of it, boy, that hurts. And from your working with Depression Armies, there anything you feel like that that has taught you or opened up to you, or any particular stories from that that that you know come to mind for you. What really jumps out to me is the universality of depression that uh it. It's observed across cultures, it's observed across developmental ages, whether you're a man, whether you're a woman, and it's one of

the most universal human experiences. And yet it's kind of experience that we struggled to talk about. So I find it though it's not science, it's it's cultural dialogue. I find it very stimulating and helps me think about the science, what we need to study, what we need to understand from a systematic perspective. So depression Army, you know, in one sense, it's a way that I'm trying to give back too to the community and and reaching out, but

it's also giving me a tremendous amount. It's also helping me process my own depression. I mean, I'm grateful for the I'm grateful for the chance to have that platform, because depression for me was something terrible and unspeakable and frightening, and that we could do something that in any way either eases people's pain or helps them understand what they're going through, helps them build their identity. UM you know,

I I don't. I mean, I think, you know, if it does good, that makes me feel good, but it also really helps me and you know at a personal level, you know, you referenced this, you know, depression that you went through. Do you consider that sort of fully behind you know, because I'm a human being. Um So, if God forbid, something terrible happened in my life, UM if I had that kind of shock, I I would expect

that it could be a trigger to significant depression. But at the same time, I do feel like I have built up a lot of armor that really helps me contain contain the beast. Um I'm not saying it's like a furry dog that you know I can take out and pet, but um, you know it's been defanged. Um you know it tries to bite me, and um, it doesn't break the skin anymore. Um. But you know, it's always possible that I could and be in some really compromised state because I'm being battered in my my armor

would be overwhelmed. So I think, you know, no one should be so arrogant to say, it's great we have all these celebrities now that are talking about their depression, and in some ways it's inspiring this dialogue about recovery. So Dwayne Johnson, The Rock and J K. Rowling and and it's great to have them as part of the conversation. But I look at them and I see that they're doing really well. But are they immune well? They could

they never have a depression again? It seems unlikely, but they've obviously figured some some stuff out and we're lucky to have them on on this earth and we should learn from them. And uh, I guess I don't think anyone's I mean, I think that's that's what I'm saying. I love that analogy or metaphor you just made of like that old metaphor of depression is the black dog, right of it's um, it's been defying to do a certain extent, and it it bites, but it doesn't break

the skin. That's That's a great analogy and actually speaks to kind of how I feel about my relationship with it, Like, well, it's still kind of there, you know, he's I see guys around from time to time and maybe I get bit by it, but again, it it doesn't break the skin certainly in the way it used to. For me, I'm in a good place with it right now. Yeah. I mean if people could think about their low mood or their depression in that way, I think it would.

It's not that it's completely um reassuring that everything's fine, but it but it does allow you just see that this is something that can vary from a wild beast that you know has got savage fangs and and um, you you better uh, you better run. If it's coming to something that's been domesticated. It's still it's still not human and it's still you know, maybe has a bad day. Um, but you can you can live with it, you can coexist with it. I think that's I think that's the

idea that's the reality. People do co exist with it. Yeah, yeah, And I think that's a great term for what I was sort of stumbling over earlier, was this idea of coexistence. You know that life with it is still entirely possible. Back to the facets. You may not have all nine of those down, but you can have enough of them that that the whole thing is the coexisting relationship. And there are a lot of nice talks, lots of nice talks. Love the dogs. Well, thank you so much for taking

the time to come on again. I will continue to follow your work, and um, you know, I think you're you're doing great stuff. And I think this latest direction of looking at what people who have come out the other side of depression and are thriving, you know, what they're doing, I think is such a interesting area for research and I really hope that um it proves fruitful

and and and get some traction. Well. Thanks, I'd be grateful if I could come on in another five years and tell us to tell us to talk about what we found. Hopefully we'll we'll have some interesting things by then to report on any anytime, The offer is standing. If you've got something interesting about depression, will be glad to talk about it. Well, that sounds great, all right, Thanks so much, Jonathan, have a great evening, all right,

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