Emotions
Thought processes. Cognition, the way we think, must be changed. Jerome Frank talked about our “assumptive world,”1 the set of beliefs that we all have that explain how life works. We get some assumptions from our parents, we develop others as we grow up, and we continue to add to and revise our beliefs
about what makes things tick into adulthood and old age. Depressed people tend to have certain assumptions in common, which are self-perpetuating and not corrected by experience. We think that we are responsible for the bad things that happen to us, while the good things are just accidental. We are pessimists, thinking that things left alone will usually go to pieces rather than working out for the best. We think that we have to be in control of things at all times, and if we’re not, disaster will happen. These habits of thinking are largely unconscious. They must be brought out into the open, challenged, and changed for the depressive to recover.
Relationships. Relationships with other people are always difficult for the depressive. We walk around with a vast hurt inside and long for someone to heal it, but we’re also ashamed of feeling that way, so we don’t let anyone know. We care too much about how others feel and think about us, but we’re afraid to let them know we care; consequently we’re almost always disappointed. Always expecting rejection, we may reject first as a defense. Our boundaries are too permeable, so that we often assume others know how we feel, and that we know how they feel. Despite the fact that we’re wrong about this so often, we don’t learn from experience and stop making these assumptions. We have to learn specific techniques of communication that will establish boundaries and stop the confusion.