very good question I think that its both I also get depressed around these times not sure exactly

I don't really know of the difference between the two, as that's really an objective thing. However I'll say that it's a mental thing more so than anything.

I agree

I feel that everyone has a 'God-Shaped Hole' (to paraphrase Blase Pascal) but how we fill it is up to us.

My personal view is that our Society lost it Spiritual Barometer when positions of Human Authority were granted a status of divinity. As a result our Society is being punished. (I believe God punishes Societies as opposed to Individuals, which is how I differ from the Westboro Baptist types)

IT IS BOTH.
GBU
DRENA B
;-O

Mine comes from my heart and soul. But that's where everything comes from for me. I think with my heart. I love with my heart. I cry with my heart. If my head is telling me one thing and my heart another.....I go with my heart every time.

Yesterday at mass, the priest was talking about joy and how joy is a choice. Insat there very confused. Don't "choices" come from our head? Mine do. And if I am depressed and sad from my very heart and soul.....I cannot "choose" joy. My heart and soul have to heal. How do we make that happen?

Diane, I don't see joy as a choice. Joy comes upon us as a by product of the choices. Choices like following the ten commandments, etc. For my heart and soul to heal, it takes time and continuing to do the next best right thing, praying. Depression for me comes from the heart and soul, where there is something just not right. My thinking gets confused with emotions, and I can't make sound choices until I let the emotions pass. If I'm able to, I busy myself to distract the negativity.

QUESTION...............................
CAN SOMEONE EXPERIENCE JOY AND DEPRESSION AT THE SAME TIME?
I THINK SO..................................
GBU
DRENA B
;-]

When my sister, her husband and their kids were in town, I was feeling great joy and was not depressed at all, because I was so involved with them, busy with them, focused on loving them, having a great time, showing them a great time, living life to the fullest. Now that they've gone back up north where they live, I'm feeling the withdrawals of their absence, pulling inward again. I'll get through it. Keeping myself busy.

I believe it is mental because depression comes from chemicals not doing something right. I would only say it was spiritual if it happened when we don't go to church or pray. I get very depressed when the time changes in November and mine actually does not go away or start lifting up until June. It starts off mild for about two weeks then from that point to mid January is moderate and from that point to June it is severe and I am completely numb and suicidal but have no energy to carry through with an attempt. Depression has plagued me since I was a child and my mother was my abuser. I cried alot and had no one to tell about my dysfunctional home life. I hated my mom for years. I was even an alcoholic and drug addict due to trauma from child abuse, and I was raped, and my ex husband is a narcissistic sociopath.

Koolman I've never heard anyone but myself say that before.

This is my potted analysis of the situation:

They call it a mood disorder. Moods are emotional, and emotions are where morality/spirituality sit. It is definitely a disorder of the soul and your soul cries. The proof of it is that depression is generally caused by issues of injustice, or perceived injustice, based on moral rearing, which force you to endure things your body/soul cannot endure. So it's locked into enduring things it can't endure. And it cacks itself as a consequence.

So you can call it a spirituality disorder. Or a morality disorder. :D

The mental disorder comes down the track when you have a nervous breakdown like I did as a result of the above cacking of self, and realise your brain is now officially fried, the wiring exploded due to overheating of the circuits, and you can barely dribble effectively. You now make silly mistakes, cannot concentrate, you don't remember things and stuff like time is fluid so that an hour can take a week, or a minute, randomly. That's when you know it is seriously something wrong with your brain.

but when it was wrong with your mind, as opposed to your brain, is very early on, before you ever got the depression, when you were taught to endure things you should not have endured, or inflict things you should not have inflicted, or believe and value things that have no value and disregard those things which do.

So that's my philosophy. I tend to think that your psychology is your own rainy day topic to navel gaze about when you want; but issues of justice, fairness, truth - if you focus yourself there you will resolve the depression.

Although for me it took medication and serious counselling to even discover how normal people function, my rearing was that far up the wack. :D And now I'm still dealing with the fallout. (Anger. :D)

Perceived injustice/disruption of morality: You nailed it for me, bridgie! There are a lot of things in this world that I feel are unfair and beneath my morality and even human dignity. When I'm forced to subject myself to a job that puts me in a hostile situation filled with verbal abuse dealing with the public, just to make a few bucks, because my other, more fun, more creative business is slow. When I look at being in a relationship as a means of living a more fulfilling life, only to look at my relationships as well as others' and see a little bit of fun and mostly misery, misunderstandings, poor communication or no communication at all, a lot of anger and hurt.

Bridgie...that definition of depression is EXACTLY how I feel. I was never able to put it into words.