How can I push forward when all I feel is the weight on my shoulders constantly pulling me back?!

I feel as though every single step I take moving forward, there’s a bungee cord pulling me back and disrupting my walkathon.

When my feet want to move ahead, that bungee cord locks my knees in their place and says “No thanks, I don’t feel like snapping today”.

So, I respond with “You’re flexible enough to go the distance without snapping…it just takes strength and perseverance.”

I wake up everyday lacking motivation, drive, and even passion now because depression took over…but it was an uninvited guest and I never asked for depression to be present.

But then it hit me: depression is not a choice and that’s why it was never part of my guest list. I didn’t choose depression over happiness; it happened because I felt powerless and defeated in that moment.

Depression has a cold soul and yet it’s faceless…because it can appear in any form at any time and I don’t like that kind of surprise. It’s not cute.

Depression has this incredibly awful way of doing business with humans. Depression’s goal is not to win you over positively by any means, but to take everything you have. Like, here’s one: “I’m going to make you feel your absolute worst because I don’t care how horrible you already feel”. And then BOOM, rude awakening…you realize that you don’t want to get out of bed or do any of your daily tasks, you couldn’t care less to talk to anyone, you have no energy to keep your hygiene in check, your mind is a mess, your heart hurts, etc. Or sometimes, just sometimes…you feel completely numb. And if the world hasn’t ended yet, that’s your cue to dim the light, call it a night, and hope that sunrise doesn’t show its face because depression can turn you into a zombie.

But then, on a random day, totally out of nowhere and nothing special about this day, you decide that you’re going to attempt this thing called life…give it another shot.

You thought that maybe, just maybe, you can hit the reset button and begin once again doing the things that once made you happy. You remembered that being outside in the fresh air getting a dose of those ultraviolet rays made your soul sing and that hearing nature’s hymn like the birds and the bees made your heart happy. You couldn’t possibly forget how unbelievably lucky you felt when mother nature showed you the way of the wild and introduced you to the beautiful animal kingdom surrounding us here on earth.

So, you took initiative and reintroduced all these positive things in your life and are now enjoying the beauty that life wants you to live through…you took one step and the bungee cord learned to follow along without snapping. And now that bungee cord understands that you’ve been trying to break free from pain and suffering but that you still need something to fall back on when times are tough, and that’s why the bungee cord never wanted to snap; it will always be there for support but it knows how far to go with you.

Don’t let depression stop you and don’t let it cut your lifeline…or bungee cord.