I have written several times on this blog and not taking antidepressants anymore. I want to be clear that I have not stopped taken my medication and I am cured. I have had to dig deep within myself to find courage, strength and happiness even when I didn’t feel like it. I have had to make myself get out of bed because I will not let depression anxiety keep me from doing the things that I love to do or from standing up when I need to.

Depression is a silent disease that will strip away your energy. Perhaps some people feel great and energetic one day and the next day feel like a boulder that can’t move. Some days the little things don’t amount to anything and some days even the smallest things seem like obstacles that will never go away. There are days when I am surrounded by people that love me and cheer me on but, secretly, I feel like a failure. Today is one of those days.

Yoga has helped me build strength and find the love for myself that says, ‘I’m worthy.’ I have had constant doubts about what I am doing but I always find that the more ignore those thoughts and let them pass, I feel like I made it out on the other side. Yoga is more than standing on a mountain cliff and taking a beautiful picture of everything on the external. Everyday you are challenged to take a snapshot of what’s on the inside. The thoughts, negative and positive, the fears and the amount of acceptance of what all of that looks like is far worse than any mirror you could put to my face.

Yoga is the one thing that makes me say that I can literally do anything. I can even beat this depression but, sometimes, I fail. I do this in my thoughts more than my actions. Self-doubt is one of the things I struggle with because my pattern in life. When things go great something always happens. A school closes our art gallery before my senior show. My best friend’s mom turns a drum major pick into a popularity contest. A community theatre organization gives me the boot for sticking up for what is right. I constantly remind myself that I get depressed because of other’s actions.

This keeps me up at night. This struggle between wanting to be free and feeling self righteous or like I don’t have the right to all the happiness and success I want. I lay in bed thinking about how if I got one more hour of sleep I’ll be rested, refreshed and able to tackle any obstacle that is thrown my way. I dream of a day where my ambitions line up with the amount of energy I have and not fight or second guess why I am the one that gets the reward.