I have just recently found a more-or-less correct metaphor for my depression a.k.a self-loathing cycle. It's like this: imagine you have lots of pipes in your mind. Each carries a different stream, some are happy stream of thoughts, other are poisonous negative ones. The thing about these pipes are I don't know where the valves or ends are. Sometimes the happy stream of thoughts will just burst on one end, and fill my head with amazing optimistic thoughts. Sometimes other pipes send different streams of thoughts and so on.
There's one pipe, special for self-loathing and low self-esteem that leaks. I think it started leaking when I moved to Jakarta. That place sort of corroded my brain for different reasons. Or maybe it had started to crack long time ago, but I just didn't realise it. Anyway, this particular pipe always leaks. So imagine my mind is like a big bucket. It can be filled with different things. Generally, what's inside the bucket is quite neutral, not amazingly happy but not amazingly sad. Now, this dumb leaking pipe will always let some of its content drip down into my mind bucket, sort of tarnishing it bits by bits. When I'm depressed, the stream of bad thoughts will surge into this one leaky pipe causing the content to fall into the mind bucket in larger quantity. And slowly but sure, my mind is corrupted by these bad thoughts. Sometimes the pipe will burst and I will get dragged down to my own bad thoughts and sometimes, it will take me weeks to recover.
So, basically I'm generally not a happy sort of person. I don't go out in the morning and think to myself how wonderful the world is, for instance. I get frustrated so easily. I get annoyed by people a lot. I'm generally the kind of person that you don't want to meet when you have low confidence in humanity because I will crush what's left of your hope. Although to be fair, I am not evil, as in Hitler-evil for instance. I don't abuse people because I think it's great fun. I abuse myself emotionally but by doing that I realise that I abuse other people who care and love me.
However, there have been times when the pipe where all good thoughts and rainbows and kittens and ponies and leprechauns and mermaids and dolphins swim burst on one end and I'd be ecstatic. My mind bucket would full of these wonderful things and I would be smiling a lot. I'd also be able to enjoy things better.
This is not unique at all and I think this is just how humans operate in general. Some people are happier and more relaxed than others; some are more mellow and anxious. I know that everything in my mind should be manageable although often it doesn't feel like that at all. Often I'd just prefer to curl myself into a tiny ball and cry myself to sleep. Sometimes it makes me feel better. Sometimes it eliminates all good things that I have in life.
I know that hating or blaming myself constantly will not actually solve anything. It's so cliche and easy to say, but in practice when you are drowning in your own hatred for yourself, cliche easy things aren't so cliche and easy anymore. Which is why, it is important to have an emergency drain on your mind bucket. And writing my problems down on something permanent (internet) is my emergency drain. Who knows? Maybe someone will stumble upon this post and think it's helpful so they feel better about themselves, or shit and yet they feel better about themselves. It's really about making choices.
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