THE DARK NIGHT OF THE SOUL: DEPRESSION AS A SPIRITUAL JOURNEY. Rev. Tom Rhodes Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Raleigh September 12, 2010

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1 THE DARK NIGHT OF THE SOUL: DEPRESSION AS A SPIRITUAL JOURNEY Rev. Tom Rhodes Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Raleigh September 12, 2010 Meditation: So often we live our lives as a succession of moments, in division, in parts, in particles. But within us each is the soul of the whole, for the Highest dwells also within us. Just as there is no barrier between our heads and the infinite heavens, There is no bar or wall in our souls where we, the effect, cease, and God, the cause, begins. There is a deep power in which we exist, and whose blessings are accessible to us. Every moment when we feel invaded by it is memorable: It comes to the lowly and simple, It comes to whoever will put off what is foreign and proud, It comes as insight and serenity and grandeur. Our souls health depend on the fullness of its reception, For within us is the soul of the whole, the wise silence, the universal beauty to which every part of us is related, The eternal One. When it breaks through our intellect, it is understanding, When it breathes through our will, it is virtue, When it flows through our affections, it is love. Let us keep our silence in the presence of our souls and that greater Soul of which we are a part. Ralph Waldo Emerson (adapted)

2 This morning s reading comes from an essay entitled Finding One s Way By Losing It by Michael Washburn, as found in the book Sacred Sorrows: Embracing and Transforming Depression. There comes a point in some people s lives when worldly goals lose their significance and life loses its perceived value. When this happens, it seems as though life in any meaningful sense has come to an end. In fact, however, this apparent endpoint can be a turning point toward a new beginning. It is a paradox that we sometimes need to lose our way in order to truly find it, or as Jesus says in the gospels, that to save one s life is to lose it and to lose one s life is to save it. In existential terms, the paradox is that despair is sometimes the precondition of faith. The process of losing one s way and the spiritual possibilities that can ripen within it have been recognized in the world s spiritual traditions. The overall process, for example, has been described as the dark night of the senses, the spiritual desert or wilderness, the state of self accusing (in Islam) or the great doubt (in Zen Buddhism). It is the ordeal of dying to the world, or the death of the self. THE DARK NIGHT OF THE SOUL: DEPRESSION AS A SPIRITUAL JOURNEY Rev. Tom Rhodes According to the National Institute of Mental Health nearly 20 million people, or about six percent of the US population, suffer from major or chronic depression. Earlier this spring I joined those ranks and (in the language of 12 step programs), I don t know if I ll ever be able to call myself fully recovered. But I am in recovery, thanks to antidepressant drugs, counseling therapy, and the love and support of family, friends, and so many of you and I believe that sharing a bit of my own journey over these past few months may be helpful to many people here. I say this because although depression is often diagnosed using medical terms, there is a deeply spiritual dimension to this disease. Another reason is that I was touched by how many notes of support I received when I first announced my own diagnosis last May touched and also surprised by how many of you said that you or someone you love has also suffered from depression. It was in April that I first sensed that something was seriously wrong with my outlook on life and my ability to function in what is admittedly a high stress vocation. I remember working on the sermon for this past Earth Day when I was suddenly overtaken by a sense of deep despair. At first I thought it was the topic it was, after all, the fortieth anniversary of that first Earth Day, and the more I read and researched, the more I recognized how little we had actually done in the past four decades to slow (much less reverse) the tide of environmental degradation. It was also the week that the BP oil rig, Deepwater Horizon, exploded and sank in the Gulf, touching off the largest oil spill in history.

3 Like the officials at BP, my first reaction was to minimize the situation. I had been working long hours and had been putting extra time into interfaith organizing around the Wake County Schools issue I thought that maybe I just needed a break. It had been several months since I had taken any time for myself, so I decided to take a few days and go up to the mountains, explore some new hiking trails, and spend some time away from the constant busyness that made up my life here. While it felt good to spend some time in the mountains that I know and love, when I returned four days later and tried to reengage with my life here in Raleigh, I really felt no better. If you remember, the BP oil spill was still all over the news, was much worse than originally reported, and would probably continue unabated for weeks if not months. My own despair felt much the same blacker than ever, with no hope for resolution in sight. There is an important distinction, I believe, between depression and simple sadness or even profound grief. We all feel sad at times, and even deep grief is a natural response to losing someone we love or finding our own hopes and dreams quashed by ending a relationship, financial difficulties, or circumstances beyond our control. Grief and pain are natural responses to loss, and as unpleasant as they may be, they are part of a healthy and healing process part of learning to let go of what we have lost and beginning to find hope and love once more. The writer Andrew Sullivan, author of Noonday Demon: An Atlas of Depression, makes this distinction between grief and depression. He says, Grief is a humble angel who leaves you with strong clear thoughts and a sense of your own depth. Depression is a demon that leaves you appalled. My own depression felt like that inky blackness boiling up from the ocean floor in the Gulf, sticking to and polluting everything it touched, and with no end in sight. And I was appalled because I felt as though I had lost my faith (and when a Unitarian Universalist loses his faith, you know he s in trouble!) Worse, I felt like a hypocrite. How could I preach on hope, faith, and love, when I felt none of these things myself? I knew that I had to get help. I made an appointment with my doctor, described my feelings, and also shared that there is a history of depression in my family. His first reaction was to prescribe an anti depressant, which he warned me would take three or four weeks to take effect, and an anti anxiety medicine, which would help me to sleep at night. He also strongly recommended counseling or psychotherapy to help me look at some deeper underlying issues which may have contributed to my depression. I cannot stress enough how important this was. If you find yourself feeling anxious (especially without being able to name the cause) or if you ve been feeling down for more than a few weeks, seek help. If you re grieving a major loss and cannot see the way forward, seek help. Tell your doctor, tell a close friend or family member. Tell your minister If you are uninsured and cannot afford a doctor, we ll help you find the help you need. I ll be exploring the spiritual ramifications of depression in a moment, but I also want to stress that many cases of depression have specific medical causes which can be treated chemically. Just as there is no shame in taking medicine for diabetes, high blood pressure, heart disease, or any number of other problems, there should be no stigma attached to taking anti depressants if prescribed by a physician. As so many of you

4 reminded me in your notes earlier this spring, there is no shame in seeking help whenever we have a problem we cannot cope with alone. What causes depression? There are no easy answers, although sometimes the cause is as direct as a chemical imbalance in the brain. But in most cases, we might as well ask, what causes happiness? Many factors contribute, but no single source will by itself cause more than momentary pleasure. Many people speak of depression as a loss of will, of hope, and of meaning. I felt all of these things this past summer, but what resonated with me most was the writer Parker Palmer s description of depression as the ultimate state of disconnection, not only between people, and between mind and heart, but between one s self image and public mask. I found Palmer s book, Let Your Life Speak, to be most helpful in my own recovery. In it he writes, Depression demands that we reject simplistic answers, both religious and scientific, and learn to embrace mystery, something that our culture resists. Mystery surrounds every deep experience in the human heart: the deeper we go into the heart s darkness or light, the closer we get to the ultimate mystery of God. But (he continues) our culture wants to turn mystery into puzzles to be explained or problems to be solved, because maintaining the illusion that we can straighten things out makes us feel powerful. I think there is much truth in this. We spend the first part of our lives exploring our potential, and we live in a society that promises that our potential is limitless. Be the change you want to see Be all you can be. No limits, no fear, just do it! While such a philosophy is important to young, growing persons, they may also be recipes for failure as we grow older, especially if our ego or self image is unable to keep pace with the changing reality of our lives. Don t get me wrong having a healthy ego, or sense of self is important especially during the first half of our lives, when much of our energy is devoted to personal growth, self definition, moving away from our birth families and starting one of our own. But there comes a time when we discover that the strategies that worked for us during the first half of our lives are no longer viable. We don t have the physical strength or stamina that we once had. We may feel less sexually attractive than before, or come to recognize that we have reached the highest point in our professional careers, and where do we go from here? At this point we encounter what is commonly known as a mid life crisis a cliché in part precisely because it is so common, and a potential source of depression because it involves reassessing one s life and self image. Sadly, our culture with its emphasis on youth and vitality worsens rather than helps the problem. Another source of depression comes from heightened or unrealistic sense of responsibility. If we consistently approach life as Parker laments, like a problem to be solved rather than a mystery to be lived, our natural inclination is to go around trying to fix things. Those of us who grew up as oldest children in our own families often learn early on to be responsible for our younger siblings. Those who grew up in alcoholic or otherwise dysfunctional families often have responsibilities thrust on them that no child should have

5 to bear. While some people never learn to take responsibility for their own lives, others learn these lessons too well, and spend endless time and energy trying to keep their own or others lives from falling apart a situation known as co dependency. One of the saddest word games I know begins with the three words If only I Consider the following: If only I worked harder I wouldn t have gotten laid off. If only I had been more attentive, my spouse wouldn t have left me (or alternatively, if only I hadn t been so needy ) If only I had been a better parent, my son wouldn t have gotten in trouble. If only I had been there when my mother had her stroke if only I had been there to say goodbye. This is not to imply that we should blame others for our own shortcomings, but the truth is that much of what happens in our lives is largely beyond our control. When we can t see past our own role in a situation that may have many other factors, we put ourselves under enormous stress, and unresolved stress is one of the leading factors in causing depression. One of the mis perceptions that led to my own depression could probably be stated something like, if only I worked harder as your minister, the congregation would be more successful. Several of you have already pointed out the fallacy of that way of thinking! In addition to the physiological and psychological factors, I believe that there is a deeply spiritual side of depression as well. As the great psychologist Carl Jung once said, Among all my patients in the second half of life that is to say, over age 35 there has not been one whose problem was not ultimately that of finding a religious outlook on life. I think this is especially true for us as Unitarian Universalists. It has been said that ours is a religion of deep morals but a shallow faith. We focus much of our theology and our efforts on promoting justice, equity, and compassion, the interdependent web of which we are a part. But like hyper responsible or codependent adults, if our time and efforts are always outwardly focused, we end up missing something crucial. That crucial something is our relationship with our deeper selves. The very words psychology and psychiatry are named for Psyche, Eros lover in Greek mythology. But psyche is also the Greek word for soul. I know this word has little meaning, or even negative connotations for many UU s, but it think it s an important concept that we ignore at our peril. When I use the term soul, I m not referring to some immortal part of ourselves that lives on after we die. Instead, I am referring to that part of ourselves which contains the spark of divinity. As Palmer reminds us, we each contain a spark of divinity, and this truth is reflected in all of the world s religions. Some refer to it as Buddha essence, or the Christ within. Hinduism speaks of each person s atman reflecting the divine Brahmin. It is the source of each person s inherent worth and dignity. Jungian psychologist Thomas More writes, Soul is the font of who we are, and yet it is far beyond our capacity to devise and to control. We can cultivate, tend, enjoy, and participate in things of the soul, but we can t outwit it or manage it or shape it to the designs of a willful ego. As I understand the term, our soul is that exists beyond our conscious perceptions, that contains but transcends our individual ego and calls us to a deeper and more complete understanding of who we are. What feeds our egos are transient feelings like material

6 success or pleasure. But what feeds our souls is not simply pleasure, and our souls hungers will not be satiated in this way any more than we could satisfy our bodies with chocolate and marshmallows. For ultimately, our soul calls us towards wholeness, calls us to embrace our limitations as well as our potential, to recognize and affirm our shadows as well as our light. We may downplay or ignore these aspects of our being for years or even decades, but we do so at the risk of splitting these parts of our selves off from our consciousness. But the soul calls us to wholeness. It calls us in times of grief and pain as well as times of pleasure and success. And if we continue ignore those aspects of ours psyche that we find distasteful, we may find that the soul s calling comes in the form of depression. This morning s reading by Michael Washburn talks about the experience of moving through depression as finding one s way by losing it, or needing to die in order to save our lives, and this rings true for me. Of course, what Washburn is referring to is not a literal death, but rather the death of the ego that part of ourselves that spend so much time building up, that tells us that we can do it all and have it all, that we can (or at least should be able to) fix everything because we should be in control of our own lives. Intellectually, of course, we know that this isn t true. But it s easy to spend time in denial, and our culture reinforces this in so many ways. And if our denial is strong enough, our own egos get in the way of the deeper truths that our souls embody. When this happens, the illusions of the ego must die so that the soul can live. Parker Palmer recounts a conversation with his own therapist who told him, You seem to look at depression as the hand of an enemy trying to crush you. Do you think you could see it again as the hand of a friend, pressing you down to ground on which it is safe to stand? In contrast to our lofty ideals, which may be important but are often impossible to achieve, this groundedness can be found in the reality of our lives. It is a groundedness which encompasses our losses and limitations as well as our lust for life. It is a groundedness which is suffused with mystery. As Emerson says, Every moment when we feel invaded by it is memorable. It comes to the lowly and simple; it comes to whoever will put off that is foreign and proud; it comes as insight and serenity the soul of the whole, the wise silence, the universal beauty to which every part is related. Even, I might add, those shadowy parts of ourselves that we would deny, repress, or ignore. The journey through depression is not an easy one. My own path is not one that I would wish on anyone else, though many have walked it. It is a path which must be trod one step at a time, one day at a time. And it is grounded in the recognition that, as we spoke earlier, we cannot do everything, but we can still do some things. And we will not allow our high expectations or our failure to meet them keep us from the path our souls call us to walk, one day and one step at a time. Amen, Shalom, and blessed be.