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Fiona Tate, The Depression Muse, is on a mission to eradicate suicide from the planet. She believes that to achieve this, we have to create a society where we celebrate differences rather than discriminate against them. In line with this, we have to work against self-stigma and discrimination which many people with long-standing depression struggle with.

As The Depression Muse, Fiona works with women who are fed-up with a medical profession that tells them they need to recover from their long-standing depression, as if it was a fault that somehow makes them less than other people, rather than teaching them how to live a fulfilling life WITH depression. Fiona guides the women she works with to not only live well with depression but to use it to create what she calls Creatures of Fucking Beauty. She does this by using a mix of her own lived experience of long-standing depression, the Tarot, her intuition, and her spirit guides. Her Psychology BA, mental health and addiction work experience are extra bonuses she throws in.

Living well with Depression. Recovery is bullshit. If you have long-standing depression its probably not going to miraculously disappear one day so it makes more sense to use it to create art and beauty in your life. Whether it is a new hobby, business, or craft.

depressionmuse.com

You can watch her Webinar: Real Feelings or Demon Dealings (Depression Muse): https://youtu.be/sMvcGQlc268

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FULL TRANSCRIPTION

Welcome to the podcast, Fiona. Thank you. Hello. I am really excited. We’ve been in each other’s faces for almost four years now, which is so exciting to go on this journey with you. I know that you have come from this background of while that you tell, can you tell us a little bit about your backstory instead of me introducing you.
Okay. All right. So yeah, so basically, I’m the depression mood. I’m all about the mental health, I’m all about depression, I’m all about psychology, it’s all about that kind of thing. And I’m not a light worker, I’m afraid, I, if I have to be called something like that, I’ll be a dark light worker, I tend towards the dark side of things. I tend towards sarcasm, vampires, all that kind of stuff. So I’m not very good with the sugar coating, as we were just talking about before, I’m not very good, very good with the love and light. So I guess it’s no wonder that I really, you know, had depression. When I was nine years old, I was first first started showing signs of depression. And now back then we didn’t know what depression was. I was just told that I had a psychosomatic illness at nine years old. So you can imagine what they did to me and my mother. But anyway, long story short. When I was in my early 20s, I was finally diagnosed with depression. And in my mid 20s, mid 20s, to late 30s, I actually began working in the mental health field that took me to remind me how much I loved studying and how much I loved learning. So while I was working in mental health, I went back and I got a degree in psychology. So I’ve spent 25 years about 25 years working in the mental health industry. I have my own. And that’s working with people from anywhere from depression to schizophrenia, borderline personality disorder, all the biggies. Where was I going with that? Yeah, so 25 years, and in the depression, kind of mental illness arena, and dealing with with myself bounce on and off my mental, my mental health is pretty stable. Nowadays. It’s stable, because I work hard to make sure that it is stable. Yeah, and I mean, I’m 51, I’ve had a lot of practice at this stuff. But a few years ago, I kind of I ran into a major, a major life changing thing, which was the realization that I had, I was never going to be a mother. So that was a massive thing for me. And that really led me to really delve into a whole lot of other things. So down into my spirituality a lot more. And I really delved into looking after myself, because at that point, I could either given to the depression, and really just basically, let it kill me, or do something about it, and make the depression that I’ve lived with, and the situation that I have, being childless, not being childless by circumstance, not by choice, make it stand for something. And by late stage, I hear was was pretty much over the whole situation working in mental health. Now, when I say that not working with the client, loved working with the clients. If I couldn’t spend all my time with the clients be more than happy. What I was fit out with was a medical profession that didn’t understand and would just preach to you from your tip from the textbooks. And with the bureaucracy that goes into mental health care in our country, and I’m assuming it’s the same in your country, it seems to be a global thing. Obviously, it’s a global thing, or a suicide rate wouldn’t be so Hi. So that lead me to the whole recovery is bullshit, which is really my mantra. Recovery is bullshit. My thing is helping people learn how to manage the depression in a way that works for them in a way that’s more realistic, because recovery is not realistic. There are a few people out there who have one bout of depression and never have another but the few and far between and they’re becoming fewer, most of us that have depression. Whoa, have another bout and another bout and another bout and the medical efficient. They have the place I’m not by any means. I’m not saying don’t take your medication don’t see a tear. I’m not saying any of that. However,
they don’t really live in the real world. They treat the illness, whereas we, as people, who are living with depression, have to get on with the rest of our lives. We can’t just spend an hour in an office and do what we told, and then make it all go away. doesn’t work that way. So yes, so Did that answer the question I tend to ramble on, as I tend to when I get started on about this. So yes, so that’s lead me to where I am today, and to the work that I’m doing today.
And I think that it’s so important that you’re bringing that other side and you know, being somebody who came from not depression, but from the chronic illness world, I feel like there’s a lot of overlap in those situations of like, you’re gonna recover. And it’s like, you get to a certain point, and you’re like, I’m not getting better. It’s me. Yeah. And I’m wondering, like, is that kind of what you’re talking about with the depression, too? I’m just coming at it from where I personally understand.
Yeah, absolutely. One of the major issues people with depression have, and why, again, why the suicide rate is so high globally. And I will talk about the suicide rate, because I take that very personally, and it needs to be dealt with. But one of the major things is the whole discrimination. discriminating against people who have depression, same as you say, with chronic illnesses, the same kind of thing in any kind of disability, it’s the same kind of thing. They give them the discrimination, and my opinion, is the self stigma that we have. And particularly with something like depression. And this is where the whole recovery thing comes. And recovery has the connotation that if you haven’t, if you do what your doctor says, you take the medication, you do the therapy, you think positively, because there will cure everything. You do that, and you haven’t recovered, well, then obviously, you didn’t do it right. There’s something wrong with you, you have failed at recovering from depression. That’s ridiculous. I mean, there really is ridiculous. So when you’re dealing with stuff, self stigma, to start with, because the depression also makes you feel like you should basically depression will tell you, I call it the demon because To my mind, it is a demon. So we demon in your head. And one of the things that does is it adjusts your self talk. So the depression demon will tell you, you’re useless. You can’t do anything, right. Nobody wants anything to do with you. You can’t do this. So you’ve got those symptoms in your head. That leads to and also starts with the self stigma all I’ve got depression, society tells me there’s something wrong with me. And I can’t make it go away. So you know, they just reinforces what the demons telling you. Your shirt. You’re useless. Nobody wants it. Alright, guys ran around around. Nonsense. It’s nonsense. I am now at the point where my depression is a gift. Now, I know there’s a lot of people out there that just had that and they just went how ridiculous Of course, it’s not It can’t be. It is it is. However, I’m gonna qualify that by saying, I didn’t feel that five years ago. Five years ago, it was not a gift at all. It was a friggin nightmare. So to my mind, instead of recovering from something that realistically, you’re not going to recover from because the other thing too is, once you have a bout of depression, you are more likely to have another one. So the odds are stacked against you. So instead of trying to get rid of this, wouldn’t it make more sense to find a way to manage it and find a way to use it to your own advantage. And that’s where the depression comes to be a gift. But you’ve got to get to that point. And our medical system is not set up to get you to the point where you can Okay, I’ve got this how am I going to manage it and medical system is set up to you feel bad, we must make it go away. Because that’s the other thing too. in this society. We are so determined not to feel bad, that we will do everything we possibly can to avoid it. We must think positive. We must exercise daily. We must eat all the right foods blardy blardy blar But also we don’t feel sad. Tonight, there’s not actually anything wrong with feeling sick. Nothing wrong with that. When it flips over into an illness like depression, this don’t nothing wrong with it. But it does need to be managed a little bit differently. So yeah, again, did I answer your question? Or if I wandered off, I see what you’re saying about the whole the chronic illness as well as the same thing. It’s it’s all tied up. It’s all about the society we live in mainland. Yeah,
I just because I don’t know, depression. So that’s why I asked to see if it was something that I could relate to. And just making sure that I was understanding, again, because that’s where I come from, that’s the world I come from is fighting the medical world on that side. So when somebody is getting stuck in this, you’re saying, like, manage it live well with it. I know that you work with clients, and the way that you’re doing things is something that I have never heard of before, but I think it’s magical. Can you tell us a little bit about like, when you are working with somebody or like how you’ve managed to manage this demon in your in your thoughts, or I’m not even sure in your mind? I don’t again, I’m not depression expert. So I don’t know the right terminology for Yeah,
yeah, no, no. I mean, yeah, yeah. And enemy terminologies, another big thing that we have to be very careful of, because of the whole politically correct thing. Also, because of the connotations, and really, in my opinion, we need to stop worrying about that shit. You know, if you say something in you offend somebody, they tell you, they’re offended. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to offend you and carry on with it. You know, it doesn’t have to be a World War. But anyway. Alright. So going back to how Yes, I manage it. And I’m going to find a better way to manage, but I managed it with Tara Cass is one of the tools that I use. I also do a lot of visualization, meditation, and there’s a few other things that I do as well. But in particular, I work with Tara cants, and I work with the shadow side of Tara Katz. And that’s what, how I work with my clients and my programs. So what that means, and I’m assuming that many of your listeners will be familiar with Tarot, and some may not be tarot cards are an old, old, old ancient system, they’re not something new. They’re an old, old system. They are when they’re used in the field of depression and psychology. It’s, what you’re working with is because there’s different ways that you can work with tarot cards, you can work with the actual like mathematical meaning, so you can work with the numerology of it. I tend to work with the visual visuals of it. If you think of it this way, you know how a situation will happen. And what they say about witnesses, you know, when you take witnesses to court, you’ll have five different witnesses that tell five different stories. And the truth of it is in the sample is you know, in the same way, and it’s because everybody sees everything different. So, for example, I’m sitting here next to the 10 of wands, okay, so I pull a card every morning. And I, there is a bit of intuition and a bit of kind of psychic stuff going on. But I pull a card every morning. Now, if I wasn’t using those, I could work with the booklet that comes with the tarot cards. Now, your book club will tell you what they call the meaning which is Australia meaning of this card that it was originally intended. They can also work with the reverse meaning if the CAD turns upside down. There’s a reverse meaning, which is pretty much start the opposite. But it’s like the shadow side, the dark side of the cat. Now, that’s a very, very simplistic view of of Tara CAD. So people who know Tara codes, well are gonna say, Oh, hang on, you didn’t mention this, that the other thing I don’t have time to go into that, okay. But I will take the tin of ones as I did this morning. And I will have a look at it. And I will look at what pops out into my head. Okay. So for example, this always looks like a pregnant woman to me. Now she’s not pregnant by any means. She’s kind of holding herself like this. So she’s got her cloak, and it’s how she’s holding your client. But she looks pregnant to me. So that leads me basically from there. I’ll take my journal and I’ll write down the word pregnant, and then I’ll see what comes. Okay. Now, when I do this with my clients, I get them to do it every day, and I get them to do it. Or I will do it for them and send them a prompt every day for about two weeks. Now after two weeks, you’re starting to see patterns. You see, once you’ve written down, and once you go back and look at it, you’ll see pens, like, for example, a big big thing for me is I underline myself with I struggle with being nervous about seeing being being heard. I struggle with that. Okay, so that’s the thing that’s come that comes up regularly. And my tarot readings monotonously To be honest, my tarot readings, and my Tarot pulls for myself. So once I’ve got the information that that’s a theme, I can then work on that theme, by, you know, journaling, meditation, things like that, to help me understand where that’s coming from, and how to change it and how to change my thinking and my self thoughts. Yeah, my self talk, and all my negativity and all those things, okay.
Now, that’s about keeping yourself well before the depression hurts, because those are the kinds of things that lead to depression. Now, when I say that, there are times if you have major depressive disorder, there are times when you’re going to get a bout of depression, just out of the blue, there is no reason for it, there is no triggers is no nothing, just bam, that’s it. Yep. And that’s just one of the things that we have to manage, we have to prepare for those days. So we know how to keep yourself safe when those days are happening. And we know how to move through it now, doing stuff like the shadow week beforehand, before those bad days actors, really, there is no point in how trying to do them. If you’re in the middle of a shoot day, it’s not going to work. So you need to do that when you’re well. And it’s all basically about it’s very simply about building yourself esteem. And it’s about knowing yourself so well that you know what’s good for you and what isn’t. So that’s one of the ways that I work with my tarot cards, and I work with my clients. I’ve also created a tarot card spread, which is specifically around depression. So the cards that are pulled in that spread, it’s just a five card spread. Because the thing too is we do like to make things complicated, don’t me. And what’s depression as with pretty much everything in your life, the simpler you can keep at it, the more effective anyway you try and manage it is going to be. So I have this very simple five card spread. And it looks at the basics, it looks at your past and your future, it looks at your values, and your emotions, and it looks at where you are now. And it’s all done in the framework of your mental health and of your depression. And that can oftenly often pull up things that you aren’t expecting. And it can often pull up things that will just help you cope just that wee bit better. also gives you a better way of understanding your depression, not understanding. I mean, you can simply go out and Google depression all you like, but you’ll be bored in no time. Because you’re going to see different versions of the same information over and over again. And it’s all textbook stuff. Okay. Depression is about the chemicals in your brain, your brain, body assets, your brain. So reading a textbook is only going to give you the latest information that these people know. Okay? If you really want to live well with your depression. You need to know yourself, like the back of your head. You need to know yourself inside out and you need to know as much as you can about how the demon depression affects you. Okay. And the tarot cards are one of those tools because it shows you you just that very simple act of looking at a tarot card can show you how your mind works and what you think. Okay, does that make sense?
I’m I’m out. into Visual. So it makes complete sense. I never thought of it that way, though that like, I could look at something and your interpretation brings up something that is that to me is like mind blowing. And I’m like, oh, how have I never thought of that before? That’s so cool.
Yeah, it’s, it works to my mind, because one of the other things to do is to do a lot of dream work as well. I’ve always dreamed very, very vividly. And up until I was about 20. Odd, I thought everybody did. And but the images that you dream images, when you wake up with those images, okay, how you interpret those images works in the same way that you can interpret images off the terror cat. It’s funny, get what it means to you, finding out what it means to you. Yeah, it’s quite involved work. It’s quite it’s. And this is, again, works with a self stigma as well, because one of the things that demon depression tells us is that you’re too self absorbed, you’re too self absorbed. And you are, when you’re depressed. When you’re in the middle of the bed, you are not because you’re a bad selfish person. It’s because you don’t have the brain capacity to be anywhere else. all you’ve got is in here. So again, it makes sense to go in here to raise debt, all the things that need to be raised. Okay. So yeah, so it’s all about, and it’s also very, very individualized. And this is one of the reasons why I’ve designed my program that the way that I have is because it’s about you, it’s about your own stuff. Okay. And I mean, this stuff. I’m, as I said before, I’m 51 years old, and I’ve had depression since childhood. And I’ve only figured this out in the last few years. This is stuff that the medical system don’t understand. So they can’t teach you. This is stuff that you have to come to yourself. But you don’t have to wait 51 years to do it. And this is why I’m doing this work. I mean, I’m really doing this work, because the global suicide rate is discussed, I cannot believe that there isn’t more people Abrams’ about the suicide rate. You know, we talk about suicide in it’s, Oh, that’s so sad. And finally they’ve done this. And finally they got the help and all the rest of it. Why are people more angry about it, I understand being sad. But this get angry about it. Let’s do something productive. I personally believe that the suicide rate would reduce drastically if we lived in a society that celebrated people’s differences, what even those differences are, whether they chronic illness disability, that people hear depression worry about. Instead, we designed to put these people in categories for anybody that we’ve seen is different and categories. Were who are either below or above or somewhere else all together. All right. We do it to ourselves as well. It’s not just that we’re doing it. And it’s not just, you know, the best people do this without meaning to. It’s the world that we live in. so far. And I believe once we get rid of that shit, once we get rid of it once we start celebrating actively celebrating differences, and this is why I say again, that depression as a gift, it’s something we should celebrate. It’s something we should joke about. It’s something that should be every nice conversation. The more we do that, the less likely people are to feel inferior. And the less likely, the less disempowered. They’re going to feel and the less likely they want to die. Do you know? Yeah, so I mean, that’s my whole reason for doing this. In people have said to me that it’s a very naive thing, you will never eradicate suicide. Well, I choose to not believe that because I think that very clearly, I don’t think we’ll do it in my generation. But I think very clearly it can be down. If we build human beings who loved themselves, no matter they love the darkness of the brain. Just as much as the light of the brain in, there’s no reason to feel discriminated against, and there’s no reason to discriminate other people.
And that essentially, is what I believe will stop people from wanting to not be here. That’s a very simplified version. Yeah. Yeah, I
am like, my brain is just like, I don’t even know if I want to say anything after that, because that’s like, so incredibly powerful. It’s like, we do separate. And we are, we’ve seen it, we’ve seen it a lot more and more recently, like how any sort of discrimination just creates these massive divides and makes you feel not enough. And like going inward and being like, okay, yeah, this is part of who I am. And that empowers me in seeing it as a gift. And I think once you can start seeing those, what we’re told, or a society tells us is a different or handicap, I’m putting air quotes up, because you know, like, I can pretend like a podcaster can actually see me do air quotes. But that change is just, it me, it’s definitely something I’m so excited that you’re you’re bringing this out and sharing this message, because we do need to stop doing that. It shouldn’t be part of our everyday life, it’s not a be all end all. Because you have something, whether it’s depression, or something else, there’s a lot of gifts that are in those things do you have to be really aware of self. And that, for me is one of the things like, Yay, thank you for giving me whatever this this is, I get to be more aware of who I am.
And you need to do that. And it’s quite difficult when you when you’re feeling well. The last thing you want to do is delve into what was going on when you were feeling like shit. And I you don’t want to do that. But it’s when you’re well that you can make the decisions that will allow you to basically not kill yourself when you’re having those other dates. So there’s work that has to be done that the works not as hard. Because the other thing too is when you’re in the middle of about you think that you know, doing the works to get your right is going to be hard, it is going to it is hard, but it’s not as hard. When you Well, it’s not quite as overwhelming. I think that’s probably a better way of putting it. It’s still hard, but it’s not as overwhelming, as we knew well. And I mean, the gifts are enormous I can think of right now I can think of about straight people off the top of my head, who could do with a good bout of depression. Now, I wouldn’t wish on anybody, because it’s very mean, I wouldn’t do that. But it gives you an understanding. It gives you a empathy. It gives you a gives you the ability to enjoy the good times more. So these three things just like that, that that gives you and those three things can make an enormous effect on your life. enormous effect. When you are Yeah, when you’re at the point where you can get, you know, you see people who just get so bad from seeing the sunrise in the morning. Okay, now that comes from feeling so bad, whether it’s physically there, or emotionally be that sunrise that other people look at and think sons you can get so much more pleasure out of it. Okay, and there are people out there who aren’t lucky enough to hear that because their lives go on. They don’t have to deal with anything really they don’t have to deal with chronic illness or, or depression or anything like that. So it’s all kind of even coated life. And to be fair, those people are getting fewer and fewer. We notice that I live in Christchurch while I’m out of Christchurch now but we lived in Christchurch when we had the earthquakes and people died and it was quite big, quite big. Set sets quite, quite big doesn’t quite cover it. But anyway after for the first three months after those earthquakes suicide rate dropped to zero. And we’ve got one of the highest suicide rates in our country in our country is one of the highest for the suicide rate. It dropped to zero for about three months. I might be, you know, I could be wrong with the figures. But yeah, it was a good two, three months. I believe that was because we’ve got the likes of Grizz Wiley, telling us it’s okay to feel emotion. Now. For those that don’t know, Grizz while he was a all black Coach in New Zealand for donkey’s years, this man showed no expression at all, either. And he is a big graph. Or he is a big graph man’s man. And he was on telly saying to us, you must talk to people about your opinion about your feelings. Well, right. So there’s a ton of young boys that was like, Hey, I’m going to do that. Because currencies are should. So I think that that’s got something to do with them. I’ve lost my train of thought we were I was going for going with that. No, it’s gone. It might come back to me. But yeah, so that was after a big trauma. That was after a big mess of thing that happened when it was okay to ask people how they affect it was even a conversation. He would ask strangers, you’re right. You would it was a bigger community feeling. And they were in it was okay to ask people it was okay to talk to people.
It was also okay to not be okay, we had for a short space of time. in Christchurch, it was perfectly okay to not be coping. And that, again, wouldn’t wash. I wouldn’t wish an earthquake on anybody. But again for that, why can’t we carry on that time? Why can’t we? In case life gets in the way and things get back to normal? Well, why? I mean, one of the famous phrases, phrases that came out of yours, Craig, was that we now live in this new normal? Why isn’t this new normal? When we’re saying to your neighbor, Hey, how are you doing? And actually listening to the answer is very simple stuff. The answers are very simple, but very hard to do. They’re only hard to do. Because we’ve been conditioned, we’ve been taught, we’ve been conditioned. So there’s no reason why we can’t teach and conditioned ourselves to do things differently.
When the earthquakes were, and I mean, after the earthquakes, that’s what was told you, it would come back to me. One of the things that happened after the Okay, so we hit those first few initial months now, a year or so down the track. We start getting the we started to get the first suicides that were direct results of the earthquake news, quick stress, okay. But one of the things that we got, and I was still working in the mental health system at the time, is we had a new breed again, for better for want of a better word, a new breed of mental health client coming through. These were people who had never had depression or anxiety ever. And if they hadn’t lived through, you know, dangerous, people dying and earthquakes, if they hadn’t had that mess of trauma, they would probably never have experienced depression, or anxiety because depression and anxiety are very often linked, not always, but very often, right. So we had a whole breed of people who didn’t, who had probably never given depression or anxiety is sequence thought, and endure, all of a sudden they find themselves in a space where the needing to get actual help, because they had these illnesses, conditions, whatever you want to call it. So when I say things like you know, somebody needs a good bout of depression, that’s the kind of thing I mean, and that’s the kind of gift because these these are the people who have these, certainly a lot of them are left with long standing symptoms from these cracks, but at some point that tips over from depression and anxiety into post traumatic stress disorder. So the ones that are treated for depression and anxiety and managed to recover from it. These are the ones that are never going to hear it again. But they have also got a ton more understanding for people that do. And that, in my opinion makes them better people. That that’s just me making judgments. But it also makes them more likely to say to the neighbors, you know, you don’t seem quite right at the moment the things, okay, because they’ve been there, and now they get it. So this is the kind of world we want, we want to build. And you can’t fix everybody. But you can fix yourself. And by fix, I don’t mean get rid of bits you don’t like. I mean, learn how to enjoy them. Learn how to learn what to do with them. One of the one of the things that I talk about is, and one of the things I do with my clients, too, is I talk about something that I call a creature of fucking beauty. And I use that word because it is it’s not just something pretty, it’s a beauty. It’s a powerful, powerful thing. And this is what, this is my way of using the depression as a muse, I use my depression, to create a creature affecting beauty. And I teach other people to do that. Now, my creature affecting beauty, because what I do with clients is what worked for me. So it might create your fucking beauty is a vampire novel. I started writing. Going back to when I had to face the fact that I was never going to be a mother, I went back to find something else to find pleasure in meaning in my life with. And through a process, I realized I really remembered that I used to love writing. I used to love writing. So I started writing again. Now, at the time, I was not able to write about myself being childless, I was not there was not there. So I write this vampire fiction novel. Now there is something extremely satisfying about writing vampires, just as an example. Because you can do all kinds of naughty naughty things that you would not do in real life. And it’s actually quite cathartic, getting that out and doing it. And I mean, I’ll quite often write this very gory, horrible, bloody scene, and I’m giggling away to myself on every level.
Not everybody is that, like, there? But that’s, that’s what I mean, in terms of using the depression, there’s something therapeutic out of taking that and turning it into something turning into add. Yeah, I mean, that that creature of bucking, Busey or CFB, could be something as simple as cooking a meal for your family, if cooking a meal for your family, is something that really, really fires you up. And again, it gets back to identifying that when you well, because when you’re in the middle of a bout of depression, you cannot think about anything that makes you fired up, because you just there wasn’t anything. There wasn’t anything they never never has been. When you well, you know that there has been. So yeah. So essentially, in a nutshell, working with yourself, within yourself, knowing yourself using the good days to the full advantage to helping you cope with the bad days. And the first step, the very first step is getting rid of this recovery nonsense in your head. There’s nothing to recover from, you know, there’s nothing to recover from.
I love that. With nothing to recover, there’s nothing to fix. You’re great the way you are. It’s just living well with all parts.
And it takes practice. You know, you can’t just because they go into heavy guy now, this is another thing that annoys me about the medical system, right? Just think positively Fuck off. You can’t think positively. When you’re in the bout of depression, not even just know. Can’t be done. You can’t even foot you can’t even fake it. Cuz you can’t remember the words that you need to use to think positive. When you’re well, you realize just how pathetic think positively actually is. It’s, you know, we should get rid of that instead of recovery. It’s bullshit. It’s nothing. thinking positively is not living in the real world. It’s putting a bandaid over something and hoping that it will magically magically disappear. Even though there’s a bit the biggie Brian, that nice. thinking positively my app. After saying that, I mean, I’m all for positive self talk, but the difference is, it has to be realistic. Yeah, there is no, it’s like, affirmations. Stand in the mirror and say these affirmations I am Wonderful. Well, um, don’t get me wrong, it may work for some people, but I’ll guarantee it’s like maybe 1% of the world that that actually works for something an affirmation that’s more realistically, more realistic is I am becoming the best I can be. Now, all those cliched and corny as that sounds, it’s the I am becoming is much easier to believe, then I am. Yeah, I have to say that’s not my you know, I didn’t come up with that. There’s, there’s certainly practitioners and people out there who say that I couldn’t name any off the top of my head. So but but yeah, so that’s along the lines of the whole thing positively. Did you know, like people that need to lose weight, if you would just eat fruit and veggies? You’ll glaze why it comes, people say they’re just people that don’t get it. The brains do not understand if it was that simple. Nobody would be nobody would have depression, and nobody would be overweight. All right, so that’s my mini rant over on that one.
I love your mini rant. They just they’re so powerful. And it is such an important message. Like, like you said, there’s just there’s so many like Mic drop moments that you’ve been giving us between, like, you know, like, yeah, we can try to fake it till we make it, but that’s not gonna work. Like you have to find that thing that helps you and managing on the good days for those bad days. I think that’s that’s one of the things that they don’t teach you.
No, No, they don’t. They don’t. And you have to be. Yeah. Because there’ll be people out there listening to this. You’re saying, Yeah, but I don’t have a thing. I don’t have a thing. I don’t need you, Hadley, well, we’ve all got something, we’ve all got something. And working in the process of trying to find out you know what? To do, as you see CFP, I take people back to the childhood because back when, and not because that’s, you know, again, what the textbooks tell you today. Although, you know, that kind of therapy is helpful. take you back to your childhood, because when you’re at a certain point in your childhood, you have very clear ideas, you ask any kid very clear ideas of what they do and do not like and what does and what doesn’t make them happy. Okay, is adults we forget those things. Because we get bogged down with what we should be doing what we shouldn’t be, should be thinking what we shouldn’t be doing blahdy blahdy blah. So you may think, I don’t have a thing you do, you just don’t remember. And there is a way to go back and remember that if you can strip back to the sheer joy of whatever it is, you and I service some people it’s hard for some people it’s I mean, for me it’s writing in you go back I the first list that I’m aware of writing, I was six years old. And I loved it. I it’s a bit of a sad story, so I won’t go into it. But I had made a list of things about my father. And I carried that list with me for quite some time. Now that’s the first time that we remember that. And it may now it’s it’s a well known joke within the family, funeral alerts. She’s going to make a list. I love marking list. making lists and it’s the right thing. It Is the writing, it’s got to be written down, I can type it, that’s okay. But it’s got to be written down. And I had stopped that for so long, I had stopped that. And there’s nothing more absorbing, you know, when you’re getting it, the very act of me making that less, there’s nothing else going on in the world, nothing else. And everybody has something like that everybody has something like that. Think of the people, you know, think of the people that the people that like musicians, you know, their whole lives are consumed with making music. And they do that because they go somewhere else. When they’re doing then they go somewhere else. They’re not worrying about paying bills, or, you know, whether the bat looks big and laid out for or, you know, whatever. They’re just so absorbed in what they’re doing. And we think us, but that’s okay. Because musicians, you know, they have all the PR companies to do all that for them. And you know, they have people looking after kids and a heaven with that. And then I you think of the other musicians, the ones that you never hear of the ones that spend two, three hours a day playing music for the shareholders, even making money off it, play it, you know, kids parties, and anniversaries and all those kinds of things. Next time you see somebody doing that, you know, next time you want to do and you see musician playing away in the corner, keep an eye on them, because you can see quite easily they’ve gone somewhere else. Yeah. We’ve all got then I mean, that’s probably the easiest example of it. For my mother, it’s baking is baking. She goes somewhere else when she bakes.
I think that’s awesome. And remembering. And it’s hard to remember sometimes because you know, besides like you’re talking about depression, but besides that, just this world of hustle. Like we’re supposed to be in this fast driven world. And it’s like, when is clay? When is pleasure? When do I get to do something to like go somewhere else that lights my soul on fire? I think that that that’s so important. I’m so excited that that is what you are helping people find again on those well days. And that’s magical. And the creativity, like you mentioned, like using the Tarot, but using them in a different way. Like the vision part of it is just I love that. I love all of it. I love that way more than talk. They’re the first to admit that like, that sounds like a way that I could manage to go with the baby. Hey, here’s another thing.
I opened it.
He’s another thing. All right. Thanks. Thanks. Okay, so talk therapies. Fabulous. Fabulous. Do not get me wrong. talk therapy is fabulous. I have been to many counselors. Over the years, some have been brilliant. And some have done me the Word of God, some not so much, but some of them head back. Again, you have to be at a certain point for talk therapy to be able to work. And there are people out there who don’t like to talk. And they don’t like to talk because that’s their personality. It’s not because of their symptoms. It’s not because the textbook says Oh, you’re not talking to people, you must talk to people. If you don’t like talking to people, how was talking people going to make you feel this way, I eventually created a whole webinar around this because it just pisses me off. That we don’t often know the difference between our own emotions and a symptom. Okay. So, as I said, I created the webinar to help you find the difference. But what we also need to do is teach the medical system the difference between a symptom and a person’s tract. If talking is a new thing, talk therapy is not going to work. I mean, it’s simple. It’s simple. So with somebody like that, think Tara kads, like the priestess thing in the whole wide world, they can work with those tarot cards on their own. They can express themselves either by talking by drawing by writing by doing whatever they want, creating cartoon characters, whatever. the privacy of their own home. And as long as they know what they’re doing, and they’re given the guidance, they can get that same help, if not more than they would for forcing themselves to go and talk to somebody. Yeah. I think part of the problem is those people that make these decisions and decide that, you know, this is the best treatment for blahdy blahdy, blah, this week, because, of course, it changes every week. I mean, you know, ask some of your grandparents about thalidomide or when when time that was the best thing ever. Now, we now know it was caught. But I honestly, I’ve lost my train of thought game because I’ve been ranting off, right? No, that’s it. These these perils, that they seem to think that there was one solution, and one solution only. Isn’t? There isn’t. And we’re back to not wanting people to be different. We’re right back to here you are right here in your box and stay there place. Be quiet now.
No more putting people in a box. Let’s get rid of the boxes. Get rid of the box. If we will the same, we’d all be bored stupid.
We have nobody to talk to you have any interest in making you make the conversation when someone’s just agreeing with you all the time? We have no conversation, would there be no art? They’d be you know, there’d be no. I mean, the whole premise of every movie you’ve ever watched, and every book you’ve ever read is conflict. So if we were all the same, they’d be Maconie bored to tears. So why are we still putting people down for being different? Why are we not celebrating?
That Let’s celebrate our differences. So you mentioned a webinar? Where can people find you or find the webinar? Like what’s the best way people can get in touch with you? Okay,
so at the moment, I’m in the process of putting my website together. Probably a few weeks away, because of course, I’m a one man band at this stage. So I’m doing it all myself. So the best way to get a hold of me right now is probably through Facebook, or Instagram, Facebook or Instagram. Basically, if you put Fiona Tate, the depression muse, you’ll get some form of that will come up and either Facebook or Instagram, or Pinterest, actually. So Fiona Tate, ta T, the depression muse. Now, if you’re specifically interested in seeing that webinar, because I haven’t released it yet, I will be releasing it in a couple of weeks. And I’ll let know, let you know. information in the show notes for you too. Yeah, that’s true. And if you’re interested in that, and you want to just get a touch make in touch with me, just let me an email. Seriously, let me an email and I will email you the link. So the best email to use is Drusilla it depression news.com.
Okay, perfect. Now make sure again, to get all the information in the show notes, because sometimes it’s easier to just click and go. Yeah, like Yeah, I like talking about keeping it simple. I’m like, push a button.
Just don’t just the end. Yeah. And as I say, the webinar hasn’t been released yet, but I am more than happy to release it to people individually. Until I get it out there.
I love that. So if someone was to walk away with just like that one, like boom, Mic drop out moment. What would you want them to walk away with?
No, recovery is bullshit. Recovery is bullshit. I mean, it really is. Recovery is bullshit. Why do you need to get rid of something? That is so intrinsically a part of you. I mean, you wouldn’t get your league cut off just for the hell of it would you know, maybe you weren’t who knows people are different. People might like to do that. So yeah, yeah, if I can install any mantra and people’s heads, it’s recovery is bullshit.