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The Enlightened Response to Depression
A Spiritual Antidote for Dealing with Depression from Ram Dass
Ram Dass, the ’70s Psychonaut/Spiritual Teacher, has this way of speaking that you just can’t help but love, even when it cuts deep. He can make fun of your deepest neuroses while making you feel seen, understood, and forgiven, all at once.
That’s never more true than when he talks about Depression.
“Are you depressed,” he asks a fictional character.
“Yes,” he answers himself, sitting up rigidly in his chair.
“Are you completely depressed,” he asks.
“Completely,” he answers in the overly serious voice usually reserved for impersonating his father, an old-fashioned, upper-middle-class Jewish lawyer from Boston who founded Brandies University, among other things.
“Every part of you?”
“Every. Single. Part.”
“Is the part of you that is aware of the Depression depressed?”
“No, that part is just aware.”
“Aha!”
