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Andrew Solomon

Andrew Solomon Quotes

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Famous Andrew Solomon Quotes

“You are constantly told in depression that your judgment is compromised, but a part of depression is that it touches cognition. That you are having a breakdown does not mean that your life isn't a mess. If there are issues you have successfully skirted or avoided for years, they come cropping back up and stare you full in the face, and one aspect of depression is a deep knowledge that the comforting doctors who assure you that your judgment is bad are wrong. You are in touch with the real terribleness of your life. You can accept rationally that later, after the medication sets in, you will be better able to deal with the terribleness, but you will not be free of it. When you are depressed, the past and future are absorbed entirely by the present moment, as in the world of a three-year-old. You cannot remember a time when you felt better, at least not clearly; and you certainly cannot imagine a future time when you will feel better.”

IssuesFutureDepressionJudgmentPresentBreakdownCognitionTroubles
Book:The Noonday Demon: An Atlas Of Depression
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“The opposite of depression is not happiness, but vitality and my life, as I write this, is vital even when sad. I may wake up sometime next year without my mind again; it is not likely to stick around all the time. Meanwhile, however, I have discovered what I would have to call a soul, a part of myself I could never have imagined until one day, seven years ago, when hell came to pay me a surprise visit. It's a precious discovery.”

DepressionSelf DiscoverySelf KnowledgeDark Night Of The Soul
Book:The Noonday Demon: An Atlas Of Depression
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“You don't think in depression that you've put on a gray veil and are seeing the world through the haze of a bad mood. You think that the veil has been taken away, the veil of happiness, and that now you're seeing truly.”

ThinkingWorldHas BeensTruthHappinessTakenSeeingDepressionMoodUnhappyUnhappinessGrayVeilsBe True To YourselfNot HappySeeing The WorldBad MoodHaze
Book:The Noonday Demon: An Atlas Of Depression
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“A large proportion of my best friends are a little bit crazy. ... I try to be cautious with my friends who are too sane. Depression is itself destructive, and it breeds destructive impulses: I am easily disappointed in people who don't get it.”

PeopleTryingLittlesBitsCrazyDepressionLittle BitMy FriendsIllnessMental IllnessImpulseProportionDestructiveDisappointedSaneMy Best FriendCautiousSelf DestructiveBe Cautious
Book:The Noonday Demon: An Atlas Of Depression
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“Though many schizophrenics become curiously attached to their delusions, the fading of the nondelusional world puts them in loneliness beyond all reckoning, a fixed residence on a noxious private planet they can never leave, and where they can receive no visitors.”

WorldLonelinessPlanetsDepressionIllnessMental IllnessFixedDelusionVisitorsFadingReckoningResidence
Book:Far From the Tree: Parents, Children and the Search for Identity
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“Listen to the people who love you. Believe that they are worth living for even when you don't believe it. Seek out the memories depression takes away and project them into the future. Be brave; be strong; take your pills. Exercise because it's good for you even if every step weighs a thousand pounds. Eat when food itself disgusts you. Reason with yourself when you have lost your reason.”

PeopleIfsLoveBelieveReasonLostStrongMemoriesStepsLove YouExerciseThousandDepressionProjectsBraveDon't BelievePoundsDisgustingBe BravePillsWorth LivingEvery Step
Book:The Noonday Demon: An Atlas Of Depression
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“It is important not to suppress your feelings altogether when you are depressed. It is equally important to avoid terrible arguments or expressions of outrage. You should steer clear of emotionally damaging behavior. People forgive, but it is best not to stir things up to the point at which forgiveness is required. When you are depressed, you need the love of other people, and yet depression fosters actions that destroy that love. Depressed people often stick pins into their own life rafts. The conscious mind can intervene. One is not helpless.”

PeopleNeedsShouldMindImportantFeelingsActionClearExpressionTerribleDepressionBehaviorConsciousArgumentForgivingSticksFeel GoodHelplessPinsOutrageSteersConscious MindDepressed People
Book:The Noonday Demon: An Atlas Of Depression
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“Grief is depression in proportion to circumstance; depression is grief out of proportion to circumstance. It is tumbleweed distress that thrives on thin air, growing despite its detachment from the nourishing earth. It can be described only in metaphor and allegory”

EarthGriefGrowingAirCircumstancesDepressionMetaphorDespiteProportionThriveDistressDetachmentAllegoryThin AirTumbleweeds
Book:The Noonday Demon: An Atlas Of Depression
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