The more you can refrain from leaping to naming what ails you "depression," the better your chances of finding homespun solutions to your painful problems.

Dear Friends,

Sadness is an inevitable part of being human, and on most occasions we can bounce back with time and self-care. However, when sadness begins to eat away at your motivation and purpose, depression may have set in. To help us have a clearer understanding of depression and how we can develop more resilience to cope with it, we spoke with therapist and mental health advocate Eric Maisel about his DailyOM course, How to Overcome Depression.

Course Overview
In this powerful program, therapist and coach Eric Maisel will provide expert guidance on gaining a new perspective on depression and a proven, holistic approach to overcoming it. With helpful insights and tools, he'll show you how to regain control over your mood and adopt healthy habits that promotes self-love and overall well-being. Therapeutic exercises will encourage self-awareness and resilience, which will carry you beyond this course. By the end, you'll have all that you need to positively transform your thoughts and create lasting contentment.
  • Receive a new lesson every week for 8 weeks (total of 8 lessons).
  • Have lifetime access to the course for reference whenever you want.
  • Select the amount you can afford, and get the same course as everyone.
  • If you are not 100% satisfied, you may request a refund.
How much do you want to pay?

$15$35$50

This is the total amount for all 8 lessons


Interview With Eric Maisel

DailyOM: Depression is on the rise worldwide. Why is it so prevalent?

Eric Maisel: Well, is it depression -- some medical-sounding, biological-sounding thing -- or good old fashioned sadness and despair? In this course, I want to try to spell out what is going on here and help you get a better sense of what depression is and what it is not. I am guessing that you get sad some amount of the time and that you would like to know what to do about those bouts of the blues. If they are "really" depressed, they ought to be handled in certain ways. If they are not "really" depression, but sadness, then they ought to be handled in other ways.

By the end of the course, I hope that you will have become practiced at not morphing every bit of sadness into a depression in need of treatment. The more you can refrain from leaping to naming what ails you "depression," the better your chances of finding homespun solutions to your painful problems. We will begin at the beginning and try to make sense of the following question: "Is it something called 'depression' that is on the rise worldwide, or are more and more people unhappy with their lot and despairing about their chances?"

DailyOM: How is this course different from other programs for fighting depression?

EM: Our starting point in this course is not the usual starting point in a discussion about depression. We will start elsewhere. Usually, depression is characterized as an illness or as a biological, psychological, social, or spiritual disorder. We will start at a different place by asserting that the thing called "depression" is human sadness in one or more of three areas: sadness about the self, sadness about one's circumstances, and sadness about life itself. It is no longer possible to feel sad and blue without someone wanting to call that "depression." For the longest time, human beings made the sensible distinction between feeling sad for reasons (say, because they were jobless or homeless), and feeling sad for "no reason," a state traditionally called melancholia. With the rise of four powerful industries -- the pharmaceutical industry, the psychotherapy industry, the social work industry, and the pastoral industry -- it has become increasingly difficult for people to consider that sadness might be a very normal reaction to unpleasant facts and circumstances. Cultural forces have transformed a great deal of normal sadness into the "mental illness" of depression.

In fact, sadness and depression have become virtual synonyms. Nowadays if you feel sad you are supposed to get help from a pill, a therapist, a social worker, or a pastoral counselor -- even if you are sad because you are having trouble paying the bills, your career is not taking off, your relationship is on the sour side, or life did not turn out how you hoped it would. That is, even if your sadness is rooted in your circumstances and your unhappiness with life, social forces maneuver you into the world of the medical model, where psychiatrists dispense pills and psychotherapists diagnose you. It is very hard for the average person -- who suffers and feels pain because she is a human being and not because she has a mental illness -- to see through this maneuvering.

DailyOM: What does ECBT mean? How does it help people suffering from depression?

EM: Many studies have shown that cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) is quite effective in the treatment of all sorts of ailments and rather more effective than other sorts of therapy. By focusing on improving your thoughts and changing your behaviors, you reduce your symptoms and you feel better. Existential cognitive-behavior therapy or ECBT adds a new, important dimension to the traditional model. In ECBT, you focus on making these changes and improvements in the context of meaning, value, and purpose. In an ECBT context, you are improving your thoughts and changing your behaviors not just to relieve your symptoms or to feel better but also to take charge of the meaning in your life. The ideas of "making meaning" and "life purpose" are added to the mix. This existential component has been the missing link in traditional CBT therapy. A focus on meaning adds a depth and richness that CBT has always lacked. The wise, goal-oriented emphasis of CBT is not changed by this new emphasis, but the goal now is a self-created meaningful life and not the mere relief of symptoms. This is a game-changing improvement.

In addition to feeling less depressed and anxious by virtue of improving your self-talk and altering your behaviors, you feel positively motivated to live life as the creator of your meaning and as the hero of your own story. You decide not only to rid yourself of symptoms, you decide to matter. This decision to matter is a special announcement in the realm of meaning that signals your intention to take personal responsibility for your thoughts, feelings, attitudes, and efforts. This crucial step and this singular focus distinguish ECBT from traditional CBT therapies.

DailyOM: We all experience sadness, and even some level of depression. How can we practice accepting our sadness as a natural part of life? When should we seek help?

EM: We are obliged to accept that life is a process. We have a longing and a craving for life to "finally settle down" and "finally become comprehensible." Surely, we don't have to repeat our mistakes, make new whopping mistakes, stand before life not knowing what to do next, or experience serious doubts and anxieties, do we? Unfortunately, we do. Life can't settle down and become comprehensible in the ways that we crave. Tomorrow I may lose a parent or a child -- that may change everything. Tomorrow I may start on something more ambitious than anything I have ever tackled before, something with a steep learning curve -- of course I am likely to doubt, grow anxious, and make mistakes! We want something like a guarantee out of life: if I reach a certain age or take enough workshops I can finally stand in a place of certitude. But life only allows for process, not certitude. When you accept that you still have more mistakes to make, your next mistake need not be accompanied by sadness.

You create your meaning. I get to decide what will make me feel righteous and happy, and you get to decide what will make you feel righteous and happy. You can turn the meaning that was waiting to be made into the meaning of your life. You let go of wondering what the universe wants of you, you let go of the fear that nothing matters, and you announce that you will make life mean exactly what you intend it to mean. The instant that you realize that meaning is not provided (as traditional belief systems teach) and that it is not absent (as nihilists feel), a new world of potential opens up for you. You suddenly have the opportunity to pursue personally relevant activities and the philosophical and psychological pillars to support those pursuits. You have aimed yourself in a brilliant direction: in the direction of your own creation. So much sadness evaporates in that instant!

DailyOM: What are ways to be more proactive and prevent the onset of depression?

EM: ECBT is a therapy that accentuates meaning, thought, and action. ECBT self-therapy -- applying the ideas and practices of ECBT to your personal growth and healing -- can help you reduce your experience of sadness and depression by helping you focus on your meaning needs and on how your thoughts and actions can be aligned to support your intentions. If you accept the responsibilities of freedom and create your life according to your own lights -- deciding what you will do, who you will be, and how you will live -- you will extinguish most of your sadness. Some percentage can't go away -- after all, we are human. We must live with the irreducible sadness that remains. But we can keep that irreducible sadness to a minimum and rejoice at what an excellent job we are doing of making ourselves proud in living.

Cognitively, you want to think of yourself as a human being and not a prospective patient; you want to flip the internal switch that returns existential control to you; you want to have "the chat" with yourself, the chat in which you identify yourself as the hero of your own story and as someone who intends to make herself proud; and you want to ask and answer questions like "How am I making my own misery?", "Do I genuinely accept responsibility for my life?", "What needs to change?", "What is my program?" and "Where do I start?" That is the cognitive piece. Then the behavioral piece kicks in. First you get a grip on your mind; then you follow through in the world.

How Does It Work?
Starting today, you will receive a new lesson every week for 8 weeks (total of 8 lessons). Each lesson is yours to keep and you'll be able to refer back to it whenever you want. And if you miss a lesson or are too busy to get to it that day, each lesson will conveniently remain in your account so you won't have to search for it when you're ready to get back to it.

Free Gift
As a free gift, when you sign up for this course, you will also receive the award-winning DailyOM inspiration newsletter which gives you daily inspirational thoughts for a happy, healthy and fulfilling day. We will also let you know about other courses and offers from DailyOM and Eric Maisel that we think you might be interested in.

Get Started Now
We are offering this course with the option of selecting how much you want to pay. No matter how much you pay, you'll be getting the same course as everybody else. We simply trust that people are honest and will support the author of the course with whatever they can afford. And if you are not 100% satisfied, we will refund your money.

How much do you want to pay?

$15$35$50

This is the total amount for all 8 lessons


Thank you, Eric. He brings decades of knowledge and experience to this course, which not only educates, but also teaches proven tools and practices that you can use for a lifetime. Get to the heart of your sadness -- and find your joy and meaning again. Until next time.

Be well,

DailyOM