Between the body and the deed

Posted on September 4, 2024  •  3 minutes  • 626 words

On the Possible “Physical” Nature of Depression

It’s a strange thing, comrades. Medicine is becoming more advanced, our hospitals are equipped with the latest technology, and medications promise instant recovery. You’d think that by now everyone should be recovering at a rapid pace. But the opposite seems to be happening.

There are more patients and more diseases. Can you imagine a person who is completely healthy and doesn’t suffer from any illness?

Personally, I am unaware of such cases. But even if you know of some—agree, they are exceptions to the rule. Generally, people are always suffering from something. And no matter how advanced medicine becomes, they don’t seem to recover, do they?

How People Lived to Eat in the Past

Why did humans invent tools? Why did they learn to make fire? Why did they domesticate animals? Why did they master agriculture? What is the main purpose of all these inventions, in your opinion?

To eat, that’s why.

Humans learned not only to hunt but to produce food. All their inventions in ancient times had one goal: to satisfy the body’s needs.

• Warmth (fire).
• Safety (weapons, fire).
• Food (tools, fire, agriculture).

Human intelligence helped with hunting, protecting themselves from predators, and getting more food. Consciousness was a tool for fulfilling the body’s needs.

This rule remained true for many centuries. Even at the beginning of the 20th century, life was predominantly agricultural. Why did peasants live? What was the meaning of what they did? None! They worked to feed themselves. That was the entire point of their lives.

And modern people? What’s the ultimate purpose of everything they do? It’s the same! To feed themselves. Only now, instead of plowing the land, they “plow” in accounting or sales departments. But the meaning is the same. To eat.

Of course, you may have other meanings—career, buying a house, a car. But again, what’s the ultimate goal of all this? The same as always: food, warmth, and safety. Psychologists call these basic needs.

How People Now Eat to Live

So, first and foremost, people work to satisfy the body’s needs. In ancient times, if bread grew on trees or mammoths jumped onto the spit, humans might not have evolved much beyond apes.

But food has to be obtained, and it’s easiest to do that by using intelligence. However, modern humans have gone so far in their intellectual pursuits that they no longer view the body’s needs as the basic meaning of their existence. What, live to eat? How vulgar! I eat to live. That’s right! And I live to achieve something in this life.

This is where the path to illness begins. People stop identifying with their physical “self” and start seeing themselves exclusively as sapiens. Their goals are sapiens-like, and the body is like a workhorse. And like any workhorse, it’s supposed to work as much as possible.

On the Possible “Physical” Nature of Depression

Depression is often understood as a mental haze. Mental, I emphasize this.

Everything seems fine—live and be happy, but the person, pardon the expression, feels awful and wants nothing. And as long as you assume it’s a mental quirk, progress in treatment might take years.

But what if it’s not your mind that has lost meaning, but your body? What if your physical self, exhausted by the meaningless pursuit of career or fashion, only wants one thing—to collapse and die?

Think about it.

It’s very likely that the true nature of depression is not mental but physical. Your body has become a slave to your mind, a slave to all the “musts” and “shoulds.”

And what does a slave want? Only one thing—freedom. Free your body from its slave labor, and you may return to a healthy, happy, and fulfilling life.

Share

Tags

Counters