How to overcome depression | Jonathan Reisman and Lex Fridman 

I’ve lost too many friends to suicide. I feel guilty for not knowing it and not being there somehow. I pray they are no longer in pain.

Depression is overcome by keeping busy. The times I was depressed I wasn't doing much and had too much time to think. Doing things that you like. Music is a big key! Talking to friends about what you feel and hanging out with them even if you don't feel like it.

Lex is such a nice person. He's so compassionate and genuine. Thank you for your great work Lex !

Thank you Lex for bringing to the “everyday “ person, all these wonderful complex humans with diverse views, ideas and unique minds. Thank you also for all the thought and preparation that goes into these podcasts however mostly, I thank you for the humanity you bring to the intelligent conversation, through your natural childlike curiosity, coupled with the courage and audacity to ask both “silly”, and difficult questions. Your podcast forces one to ponder life and our unique place in the world whilst at the same time humbling us by forcing us to acknowledge our relative insignificance in the universe.

I’m 57 now, but back in the early 90’s I was in college and really down by what I was seeing going on in the world, and all around the campus they had these suicide hotline numbers posted. One weekend I was really depressed and thinking about doing it, but thought I should call the number and talk to someone about it. I called it and it started ringing. And ringing. And ringing. I sat there with tears rolling down my cheeks with the receiver mashed up against my ear and listened to it ringing for a half hour, and finally realized nobody was there. That I was on my own. And I had to rely on only my own wits and solutions and basically I healed myself while listening to an endlessly ringing telephone.

Gratitude

He spoke truth at noone knows what they're doing.

A very popular RU-vid Rabbi, Manis Friedman, deals with the deep issues raised by Lex in this excellent, much needed conversation. His Kabalistic insights are well balanced by psychology expertise. Recommend it highly to anyone wishing to manage these existential angst. Thank you Lex for another fantastic conversation 💗

"Why suffer" is probably more difficult to answer than "why live." I've never needed a reason to live, but that's probably because I've never had to equate life to suffering, the way many have.

Derek Prince's vids on "depression" or "spiritual warfare" helped me more than anything.

Speaking from personal experience, you have to get up and get goin… fake it til you make it if you will. Thats part of it , but you also need to open your mind to first learn and accept who YOU are… then learn to love yourself for who YOU are, & learn to take care of yourself out of that love, and out of the knowledge that others love YOU and want to see you thrive. Get outside, get in the sunshine. Learn to appreciate the simple things, and never ever lose touch with the fact that we are human being’s and for some odd reason our species inherently takes SO much shit for granted. 150 years ago there was almost certainly no plumbing in houses,no electricity or running water, just imagine that for a sec. Learn to fight that side of yourself and remind yourself regularly, steadily to appreciate the simple things and accept that we actually got it pretty damn good. Oh ya & Drugs and alcohol won’t do jack shit for you but make it worse. Hard days are gonna come , its how you learn to deal with them that will leave much of the true legacy, in the end , of who u are… Take pride in yourself. Be positive, keep your head up and one day you’ll see that if you can keep on plugging, keep taking care of yourself , life can be pretty cool , & there’s a lotta amazing stuff out there in this crazy ass world to see , and there is good :) its very hard sometimes to find but I promise you its out there.

It takes a great deal of honesty and intellectual courage to admit that life has no intrinsic meaning. That is not to say that meaning doesn’t exist, it just doesn’t enjoy the same kind of existence as a cold hard fact. Meaning is a state of mind. People find meaning in various things, and no two people are exactly alike. If you find something trivial that you can get lost in, do it. And if you can’t, then you don’t have to stay.

I hope conversations like this can ease us into the discussion of medically assisted suicide. Ive read the arguments against and in my own opinion feel that they are weak and that the convo deserves to be explored further. At the end of the day it is our lives.

Lex, thank you for this.

Getting plenty of sun is a big help.

I have a 14 year old son that has been diagnosed with depression and it breaks my heart. I don't know what to do. He has weekly counseling and has a psychiatrist. At his age I was chasing girls and listening to Iron Maiden so I don't understand.

I think death is a lot like sleep. But when you die you wake up from a dream as another person.

👏🏽 This was a beautiful discussion 🧠 🤜🏽

Depression (which is exhibited in its most extreme form in suicide) isn't a condition. It's a prediction. It's not pain. It's a matter of being certain that the pain will never end (or get worse).

It’s hard to imagine the fear I might feel if I believed that death was simply the end of consciousness. No matter how you feel about a Biblical version of God, you cannot deny that mankind is designed to worship. Whether you worship God the Father, an ideology, or maybe even an identity, I promise you that you will worship something. Faith gives us hope, so to circle back to the title of the video, hope can be a cure for depression.

Lex, would we ask what is the meaning of life if we didn't die? In other words, does the finite nature of life push us to ask that question? If so, perhaps we are asking why does life have to end. - Just an old RC priest's perspective.

*Biofilm* being medically upcoded through medical gaslighting?

The feat of death is a fear of the unknown.. Exactly why be afraid of we don't know ..we stress over soo much .. maybe we have a purpose maybe birth and death have purpose.. We don't know maybe it's ok not to know Maybe their are some questions that we just gotta experience

Exercise helps along with proper diet(I’m talking about what helps me) also I met someone who I fell in love with

Destroy your phone destroy it. And don’t buy a new phone until your ready. Your mind needs rest. I dong know if this will work for everyone but it worked for me. God bless!

Creating goals and finding hobbies for yourself is a way to overcome depression! By creating goals and finding hobbies is how you physically and mentally feel you have something to live for!!!

in Buddhism the first Noble Truth is life is suffering

It's not just hopeless. It's hopeless and helpless.

You should watch and study NDEs! Very interesting!

When it comes to depression, there are 1,000 possibilities, none of which work

WHY

I think there's 2 main factors to suicide. #1 is physical pain. Something that won't go away. And #2 is mental pain. Mental pain is tough. Especially when you're someone like me, I cannot turn my brain off. All day I think about 17 years worth of trauma. Wanna talk about beating a dead horse, this is more like hitting the ocean with a stick. It. Doesnt. Stop. I just want my brain to turn off, in anyway possible. I heard that about 15-20% of people dont have an internal monolog. How I wish that could be me. You guys hit it right on the head for me. I feel hopeless and want my brain to turn off. My life is absolutely ruined and idk how to fix it and I don't think there's any solution I love the positive outlook but idk man. When will the pain ever end?

So what was the answer to “how to overcome depression”?

Consciousness does not come to an end. It makes its journey into another part of the universe. And people who realize this are ok with dying and that's why they do it... the ancient Maya used to do child sacrifice but the kids were on Ayahuasca. Similarities of DMT, entities in another realm. I think the Maya were just trying to get these sacrificed kids closer to the next life If you want to understand more about consciousness, and the meaning of life and what's the afterlife you need to do some research. Ancient Egyptians, Ancient Maya, the Bible, and believe it or not, Edgar Cayce. You have to connect all the dots. It's all connected man

I choose to "live" because I've learned that everything passes.

I'm tired of trying to "think positive".. . .

From what I understand, it requires an all beef diet. 😂

Many of us that are at risk of committing suicide don't have the same privilege as though that don't have to consider it let alone not doing it...

Halt way thru, I’m stopping. This isn’t helpful.

Bai lan

Thank you.. good to not feel like an alone realist.

Having a child helped me. I wouldn't recommend it as a solution for everyone for obvious reasons. But it really switched something on in my brain and got rid of a good deal of the "meaninglessness". As a father I think that traditional family values and goals are a strong antidote to a lack of meaning in life.

Thanks for this Lex. Very helpful ; you handled a difficult subject so elegantly.

Thank you Lex

5:26 I felt that & deeply needed that 😔 So kind, my brother lex. 🤟🏻 oddly enough that time stamp was directly connected to me.

Thanks Lex for always being honest and open . You’re are a truly good man .

There is not quick fix to this. Especially when a victim of childhood sex trauma

Why why why.... I've been plagued by these questions since a young child...since I can remember. It's tiring..

Lex is the most deep thinking host of any podcast his questions are great 👍🏽

these thoughts add to the enjoyability of my suffering

Think beyond your animalistic survival needs, and beyond your animalistic fear/ego. Think of what are the larger forces at play in your life i.e. historical and social. This will help reduce depression, and you will become a communist.

I'm so glad technology has made life easier /s

Why live? The answer is simple. To see what happens next in the game of life.

I kinda worried bout Lex when he throws these kinda questions. Hope he's not depressed or have some disorder. ❤️

We’re here to be of service to others less fortunate than ourselves and to experience as much joy as possible. Simple.

Somebody needs to turn up the speed on that dark haired android. His speech is so slow it’s putting me to sleep.

On death, i think what mostly disgusted or horrified me is the idea of losing subjectivity and being just an object, i remember watching a cockroach slowly dying and how it was moving so quickly trying to survive i guess and then becoming an object like the carpet it was on or a chair, i contemplated death of loved ones and i don't know how I'd process it when it happens, to see memories just be an object. Even with not completely dying i don't know why it annoys me or gives me shivers the idea of losing subjectivity, even if I'm loved, imagine how much your mother loves you and when you digest that from her perspective and realise that that object is you, it's loathsome.

Depression is just a moment of clarity.

just stop being sad. Stop it! stop it right now!