/lit/ - Literature

[Anonymous No.6932673]

Are there any books that can help with depression?
I dont really want a self-help book, I mean something more literary or philosophical.

[Anonymous No.6932693]

Meditations
Epictetus
Three Pillars of Zen
Good Poems for Hard Times

[Anonymous No.6932726]

This one

[Anonymous No.6932732]

>>6932673
rabelais

[Anonymous No.6932771]

>>6932673
The Stranger by Camus is really easy and it helped me a lot.

[Anonymous No.6932890]

>>6932673
I've never been depressed, but I've been sad for long periods, to the extent that it killed my ambition and led me into self-destructive behaviour. That's all behind me now, thank God.

The first thing I changed was diet, exercise, and sleep regularity. Getting on a normal sleep schedule, eating healthy food, getting exercise—I'm in no amazing shape now, but at least I feel a lot better. This is one of the most important changes. But there are other changed of attitude I underwent that made it easier to stick with those changes.

One thing that helped start my change of attitude early on was a line from the movie Fast Times at Ridgemont High, believe it or not. One of Mike Damone's points from the five-point plan. "Three. Act like wherever you are, that's the place to be. Isn't this great?" I had a friend in high school who, whenever I went out places with him, he would complain about how shit our town was, how everywhere we went was shit. And it was convincing because everywhere I went seemed shitty. But then I tried going to those shit places with people who liked being there and I noticed they suddenly didn't seem so awful.

It was a small step to apply this theory in general: give out the kind of energy you want to receive. Nobody wants to "sit and hear each other groan". You have to force enthusiasm sometimes. And this had a hint of a moral character to this: cf. Coleridge's "Dejection: An Ode"

Reading C. S. Lewis helped me turn all of this into a worldview with a simple idea at its centre: love. The point isn't just to radiate positive chi. It's to get yourself out of your head, to live in the world without rather than the dungeon within. And you can only get there by a sustained effort to be a source of the goodness you want to see, and by opening your mind as much as possible to see God's presence in the world instead of just your own tastes projected onto it.

And he was full of great little ideas, many of which he borrows from elsewhere—though Lewis has a remarkable knack for knowing just when you need to hear them—that change the way you see the world. 'A confusion (arising from the fact that both are voluntary) between the organization of a response and the pretence of a response. Von Hügel says somewhere, “I kiss my son not only because I love him, but in order that I may love him.” That is organization, and good. But you may also kiss children in order to make it appear that you love them. That is pretence, and bad. The distinction must not be overlooked.' This is the kind of shit that blew my mind. He showed me that organizing my life was of a certain moral importance; that by regulating myself in the right ways I became more human, and more myself.

(more in next post)

[Anonymous No.6932904]

>>6932890
(excerpt from the conclusion to Johnson's The Vanity of Human Wishes)

Enquirer, cease, Petitions yet remain,
Which Heav'n may hear, nor deem Religion vain.
Still raise for Good the supplicating Voice,
But leave to Heav'n the Measure and the Choice.
Safe in his Pow'r, whose Eyes discern afar
The secret Ambush of a specious Pray'r.
Implore his Aid, in his Decisions rest,
Secure whate'er he gives, he gives the best.
Yet with the Sense of sacred Presence prest,
When strong Devotion fills thy glowing Breast,
Pour forth thy Fervours for a healthful Mind,
Obedient Passions, and a Will resign'd;
For Love, which scarce collective Man can fill;
For Patience sov'reign o'er transmuted Ill;
For Faith, that panting for a happier Seat,
Thinks Death kind Nature's Signal of Retreat:
These Goods for Man the Laws of Heav'n ordain,
These Goods he grants, who grants the Pow'r to gain;
With these celestial Wisdom calms the Mind,
And makes the Happiness she does not find.

I remember when I studied this poem in school, my fellow students thought this a boring ending. The older I get, the more I think it's the best part.

[Anonymous No.6932905]

>>6932890
good shit

but you forgot goodness is a social construct :^)

nah realtalk good shit

[Anonymous No.6932991]

>>6932673
I've always been more prone to 'go with the flow' sort of coping.

Nescio- Amsterdam Stories
Rilke's Poetry
Pessoa(Alberto Caeiro/Alvaro de Campos)
McCarthy in Suttree and The Border Trilogy
the first few chapters of Ecclesiastes

[Anonymous No.6933238]

>>6932890
I liked your post, but can I ask, why on earth do you spend time on 4chan, the most negative, cynical and soul-crushing place on the web? Doesn't that make what you are trying to do a lot harder?

[Anonymous No.6933239]

>>6932890
>The point isn't just to radiate positive chi. It's to get yourself out of your head, to live in the world without rather than the dungeon within.

But my waifu is in there!

[Anonymous No.6933245]

>>6932673
why are you depressed?

[Anonymous No.6933283]

>>6932673
You cant THINK your way to RIGHT ACTION you can only ACT your way to RIGHT THINKING.

[Anonymous No.6933314]

>>6933239

A Beatrice can assist you but in our times she most likely won't.

A waifu, that is

[Anonymous No.6933342]

>>6932991

>Pessoa(Alberto Caeiro/Alvaro de Campos)

careful with Pessoa tho, he is the master of making you feel like shit.

[Anonymous No.6933357]

>>6932673

whats up with that painting? what is she reading?

[Anonymous No.6933361]

>>6933357

sade like any female would.

[Anonymous No.6933366]

>>6932890

It's all basically about how you see the world. Depression just makes seeing the good bits way harder.

To expand on this post, I'd say meditation helped me a lot in realising which thoughts and actions were "good" for me and which weren't, and was able to stop engaging in the ones that were clearly damaging.

[Anonymous No.6933391]

Your mind is a garden, fill it with positive seeds and you'll get positive results, don't fill it with negative seeds.
If you tell yourself that you can't do something, then you're right, but the same goes for telling yourself that you can do something.
Also
>>6932890
>>6932904

[Anonymous No.6933399]

>>6933283
It's actually the opposite, if you wholeheartedly believe you can, you will.

[Anonymous No.6933424]

>>6933399
>It's actually the opposite, if you wholeheartedly believe you can, you will.

it's only about believing though. Belief (or faith in the broad sense) is only a spark, it still needs the action as a fuel to get going.

That's what most people get wrong in the whole christian praying thing, for me. They believe in they hearts that praying will yeld them the results they want, but most don't put any personal effort behind that. They should use praying to get into the right mindset and then act on it.

[Anonymous No.6933445]

>>6933424
Except that belief != faith
With faith you're hoping, with belief you're knowing.

[Anonymous No.6933450]

Anthony Robbins

[Anonymous No.6933465]

>>6933445

nah friendo,

belief=/=knowledge

Also, I dunno why you think you are "hoping" with faith. Faith can be a very powerful tool for selfdevelopment, check out how Personal Belief Systems can be a game changer in how you organize your thoughts and ultimately your life.

You just have to use it well.

[Anonymous No.6933466]

Infinite Jest

[Anonymous No.6933519]

Having good regularity is the key to curing depression. Learn how to take good shits that kiss your ass on the way down like the inside of a milky war and nip themselves off at the end like a link of sausage so you only need push out two logs tops and you don't have to wipe.

I would suggest a spooky story to help you with this, try House of Leaves, Dr Jeckl and Mr Hyde or Say Cheese and Die!

[Anonymous No.6933535]

Pic related changed my life when I read it four years ago. It wasn't just transitory, but real and lasting change. Read it, and work it.

[Anonymous No.6933552]

>>6933535

isnt this a self-help book?

[Anonymous No.6933592]

>>6933552
It transcends and predates the genre. It's what self-help books should have been instead of what they are.

[Anonymous No.6933653]

>>6933535
i will vouch for this. do not let the stigma around self help books deter you as the book is not really of that category. bertrand russell was an extremely intelligent man.

[Anonymous No.6933724]

I'm really really sad because of Reasons and anything I read reads sad. You know, while reading you give a tone of voice to what you read in subvocal, and idk, Whitman doesn't seem as enthusiastic, Joyce doesn't seem as funny, I am projecting a lot and I am realizing that maybe you read what you are, given how much of yourself you put into the book.

Can books assist depression if you are depressed...

And then there's the times I can't even listen to music, because it all seems so condescending. A happy laughter out of the blue: feels wrong that the world is happy when I'm sad. The senses all seem so offending and wrong. I don't want to kill myself but I wish I could hibernate for a good 5 years after Reasons.

I haven't matured past 7, maybe.

I suggest reading something neutral, technical. Some book that wouldn't pity you.
But it just feels wrong to suggest a book for depression. Can't see how it would assist you. Maybe in helping you think clearly, but it's no use rationalizing wrong thoughts. Just like validity is independent of truth in classical logic, yknow.

[Anonymous No.6933731]

seriously just listen to Bach's passions. Can you hear the divine beauty?

also seconding this guy >>6932890 and this guy >>6932693

[Anonymous No.6933738]

>>6933731
forgot link - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P21qlB0K-Bs

[Anonymous No.6933757]

>>6933724
you speak true.
and i like calvin and hobbes
too
so with this poem
thee i woo

[Anonymous No.6933758]

>>6933731

Can you hear it? Can you hear the laughing of the immortals?

[Anonymous No.6933769]

>>6933724

>Can books assist depression if you are depressed...

Often times the cause of depression is in the way we see the world, so yes I think they could.

>Maybe in helping you think clearly, but it's no use rationalizing wrong thoughts.

The problem is not the "wrong thoughts" my friend, but how much attention you put on them.

[Anonymous No.6934225]

bop

[Anonymous No.6934482]

Nietzsche

nothing matters