Hi mimiblue
Wish I was there with you, making a positive difference, being able to relate to many of those things that definitely have the potential to bring us down and keep us there.
While the advantages of coming out of our depression include finally feeling a difference, from my experience one of the greatest advantages is being able to look back and see clearly how it all played out, that journey into depression. It can be hard to see this when we're in our depression. When hitting the depths of depression, we can be so far removed from our natural self at this point, we can be left with that all too common statement 'I don't know who I am anymore'. In those videos, I'm wondering how much of your natural self you see and miss. I'm not talking about the physical side of things, more the emotional energetic side. At that point where you felt your self again, did you feel energetic?
The journey back to our natural self can be a long one and it can also be a wonderful one. When I say 'wonderful', what I mean is it can be packed with wonder. Wondering how or why things went wrong on its own can be depressing yet wondering to the point where things begin to make sense within the revelations we crave is what leads us to raise our self. Wondering who brings us down and why (triggers), wondering about why we're not feeling the vibe of our natural self and wondering about how we tick on the level of a highly interactive triad known as 'mind/body/spirit' is all stuff worth wondering about in my opinion. I've taught myself to wonder a lot. Wonder is one of our natural abilities we began life with. Maintaining it is extremely important. Wondering at someone, 'I wonder why you're being such an insensitive so and so' is liberating :)
I believe unless we've got some obvious 'raisers' in our life we will feel no difference while we're in a depression - someone to raise our spirits, our consciousness, our energy, our motivation levels etc. If the people around us are either bringing us down or leaving us vibing at the same depressing level, the difference we seek cannot be found through them.
Food, I get it. For me, food is an emotional experience. Heck, just thinking about chocolate leads me to physical excitement. Looking at me, you'd easily be able to tell how much this gal loves food. Exercise not so much. It shows :) Caring for our natural self is definitely a challenge at times.
Strange question perhaps but 'Do you know how to identify your natural self?'
:)