The 3 Lies Depression Tells You Every Day | Ep. 456

Kimberley Quinlan exposes the three lies depression tells (hopelessness, helplessness, worthlessness) and shares simple, science-backed steps—thought witnessing, compassionate reframes, and opposite action—to break the cycle and rebuild momentum.

What you’ll learn in this episode:

• How to spot depression’s “red-flag” words (always, never, nothing, forever) and use the quick courtroom test to challenge them. 
• A 5-question checklist to restructure heavy thoughts without toxic positivity—grounded, neutral, and doable. 
• The opposite action playbook: tiny, realistic moves that create motivation after you start. 
• The compassionate routine trifecta: steady sleep/wake times, scheduled daily pleasure, and simple nourishment. 
• Smart ways to ask for help and connect (texts, therapy, support groups) so isolation doesn’t win. 
• When to consider medication alongside CBT—and how to decide with your clinician.

The 3 Lies Depression Tells You (and How to Stop Believing Them)

If you live with depression, you already know—it can be cruel, convincing, and relentless.
But what if many of the thoughts that feel the heaviest aren’t true at all?

In this episode of Your Anxiety Toolkit, Kimberley Quinlan breaks down the three biggest lies depression tells you—and teaches you how to break free from their grip using science-backed and compassion-based tools.

 

First, Start with Self-Compassion

As Kimberley always says, recovery begins with kindness and self-compassion.
Before we challenge a single thought, we start with a promise:

“I commit to treating myself kindly today.”

You won’t do this perfectly. You’ll forget. You’ll fall back into self-criticism. That’s okay. Healing happens in baby steps—and baby steps lead to big change.

 

Understanding the Cycle of Depression

Depression follows a painful loop:

1. Negative thoughts (“I’m a failure,” “Nothing will ever change”) 
2. Painful emotions (shame, guilt, self-judgment) 
3. Avoidant behaviors (canceling plans, isolating) 
4. More negative thoughts (“See, no one likes me”) 

The goal of recovery is to break this cycle early—by catching depressive lies before they spiral you deeper.

 

The 3 Lies Depression Tells You

Let’s look at the three most common—and convincing—lies depression repeats daily.

 

Lie #1: “There’s No Point”

The Theme: Hopelessness

This lie whispers, “Nothing will ever get better.”
Depression uses sneaky little words like nothing, never, always, all, forever, bad.

Examples:

• “Nothing will work out for me.” 
• “Everything is terrible.” 
• “I’ll always be a failure.” 

Be a Depression Detective:
When you hear words like always or never, flag them!
They’re red-alert words of hopelessness.
If you brought these thoughts to a jury, they’d be thrown out—because real life is flexible, ever-changing, and rarely “all or nothing.”

 

Lie #2: “No One Can Help Me”

The Theme: Helplessness

This lie tells you you’re beyond help. It isolates you with thoughts like:

• “No one understands.” 
• “I’m too broken.” 
• “Nothing anyone does will make a difference.” 

Depression convinces you that being stuck means being unfixable.
But feeling stuck is just that—a feeling. Small, consistent baby steps can move you forward.

 

Lie #3: “I’m Worth Nothing”

The Theme: Worthlessness

This one cuts the deepest. It says:

“You don’t matter. You’re unlovable. You’re a failure.”

The truth? You matter simply because you exist.
Every person you smile at, help, or comfort creates a ripple effect of goodness.
Even in pain, you bring light into the world. That alone makes you worthy.

 

3 Tools to Break Free from Depression’s Lies

Now that we know the lies, let’s learn how to stop believing them.

 

1. Witness Your Thoughts

When a harsh thought appears, say:

“Oh, there’s the thought that I’m worthless again.”

This simple awareness creates distance. You’re not your thoughts—you’re the observer of them.

Try picturing your thoughts as clouds passing through the sky. You don’t need to chase them or run from them. Juts notice, breathe, and let them drift by. 🌤️

 

2. Correct Faulty Thinking

Depression thrives on extremes. To balance it, ask yourself:

1. Is this thought true? 
2. Is it helpful? 
3. Would someone I trust think this way? 
4. Is there a more balanced way to see this? 

You’re not trying to “cheerlead” yourself with toxic positivity.
You’re simply aiming for truthful, neutral thoughts.
Example:

Instead of “I’ll never get better,” try “Recovery takes time, but small steps help.”

 

3. React Differently (Even When You Don’t Feel Like It)

Thoughts shape feelings, and feelings shape actions.
To reverse the cycle, act as if you matter—because you do.

Here’s how:

• Create a steady sleep routine. Wake up and go to bed at the same time each day. 
• Ask for help. Text a friend, schedule therapy, or reach out for support. 
• Schedule pleasure first. Plan small joys daily—music, sunlight, laughter, a walk. 
• Nourish your body. Eat regularly and kindly, not perfectly. 
• Consider medication if recommended by a professional. It’s not weakness—it’s care. 
• Connect, connect, connect. Isolation feeds depression; connection heals it. 

When depression says, “Stay in bed,” try opposite action—get up, stretch, or move a little.
Motivation doesn’t start the action; it grows from it.

Gentle Reminder 

Depression will keep trying to convince you that everything is hopeless, helpless, and worthless.
But every small act of kindness toward yourself proves otherwise.

You are not your thoughts.
You are not your depression.
You are a whole, worthy human learning new ways to care for yourself.

 

Want to Go Deeper?

Kimberley Quinlan’s Overcoming Depression online course walks you step-by-step through everything covered here—with workbooks, symptom checklists, and compassionate guidance.

Learn more at cbtschool.com/depression

You matter. You’re important. And it’s a beautiful day to do hard things. 

The podcast is made possible by NOCD. NOCD offers effective, convenient therapy available in the US and outside the US. To find out more about NOCD, their therapy plans, and if they currently take your insurance, head over to https://learn.nocd.com/youranxietytoolkit

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Transcription: The 3 Lies Depression Tells You Every Day

There are three lies. Depression tells you every day. Nope. Let’s start again. Ready? Hang on. Let me make sure I’m recording. We are. Okay, here we go again. Let’s start now. There are three lies. Depression tells you every day, and if you struggle with depression, you know it can be cruel, it can be convincing, and it can be relentless.

 

Depression is such a difficult thing to manage, and we are here today to overcome this and get steps towards overcoming it. Now what if I told you that there.

 

What if I told you that many of the thoughts you believe every single day, especially the ones that feel the heaviest, aren’t true at all Today in this video, you will. We’ve got three main agendas. Number one is you’ll learn the three lies. Depression tells you, you will not just learn, but you will rac.

 

Dis the specific tools that will help you stop believing these lies. And then finally, you’ll learn the three components of depression treatment that will protect you from depression taking you down. So let’s get into it. Welcome. This is your anxiety toolkit. This is a podcast where I. Share proven practical skills, the exact skills that I use with my own one-on-one clients facing anxiety, depression, and OCD.

 

My name is Kimberly Quinlan. I am here to offer you weekly support, a lot of self-compassion and real tools. For your recovery. So just like any of the resources we have at CBT School and here on your anxiety toolkit, we always start with self-compassion first. Always, I say it in every single course that I make.

 

At CBT School, we say we start with self-compassion first. Always. We wanna start with this commitment to honoring. Ourselves and respecting ourselves and saying, I am committing to treating myself kindly. Today. I am committing to not beating myself up today. I am committed to doing the thing that is kind towards myself, and it is a commitment that we make.

 

Now, you will need to remember here that this is a. Baby step process. I believe in baby steps. Now, you’re not gonna go and do this perfectly. You’re gonna fail a whole bunch of times, and that’s okay. We are going to take baby steps, and those baby steps lead to medium-sized steps, and those medium-sized steps lead to long-term recovery outcomes.

 

So we’re here to do a gentle, kind, realistic. Realistic expectations as well. Um, as we move into this recovery process. Now, let’s get into it. There are three specific lies or themes that depression tells you. Now, it’s important to know that if you can catch these three lies early enough, it will. Um,

 

let me go back from here. Edit that out now, if not, curl. Now, if not caught early, these three lies can cause us to spiral deeper and deeper into a depression hole. And once you’re deep in a depression hole, it is a little tough to get out of. We all know that once you know the person who’s had depression, you will really understand as I have too, that once you get into that hole, it feels almost impossible to get out.

 

Of, and let me explain to you what this process looks like. There is actually what we, a cycle called the cycle of depression. Now, this cycle starts with thoughts, usually very negative thoughts, very mean thoughts, and they’re usually attacking who we are and what kind of person we are, and how we show up and our success in the future and the world that we live in.

 

Now, when we have these. Thoughts, they can often lead to some pretty painful emotions like guilt, shame, disgust, very critical, judgmental towards ourselves. And when we then get into those emotions, if again, if not caught early, they can start to lead to a lot of mental bigoting up a lot of criticism, a lot of punishment.

 

A lot of judgment. And this. Again, can dig us deeper and deeper into this cycle of depression. And then what we often do is we then engage in an action that reinforces those thoughts and feelings. So an example of this might be if you have a thought that like you’re, you know, a failure or you’re a loser, that’s gonna create a lot of.

 

Humiliation, blame, shame, um, you know, embarrassment. Um, then you’re gonna beat yourself up and then you’re likely to not go to the social event. Or if you do go to the social event, you kind of like stay back and you don’t get that engaged in connecting with other people, which then as you leave the event or the party, you’re gonna have even more thoughts like, see.

 

You. No one likes you. Everybody hates you. You are a loser. Look at everybody else. And then you’re having more of those negative thoughts, which leads to more of those negative feelings, which leads to more beating yourself up. And that’s why this cycle can really become out of control. Now what we are here to do is we are here to break this cycle.

 

We wanna break this cycle. ’cause number one, now that we know. What the cycle is, we want to be able to identify right at the very top of that cycle, the thoughts or the lies that depression tells you. So let’s get going to looking at what it is like if you can catch this, number one. We can be much kinder to ourselves.

 

Number two, we can respect ourselves so much more when we can catch these lies. Number three, we will feel more confident because once we catch the lies, we can identify they are lies instead of treating them like they’re facts. And then we can be more effective in the actions that we engage in in our day.

 

Now, let’s get started to lie number one, ’cause you’re here for the good stuff. Lie number one is. There is no point. Now, this is a big one, and I hear it all the time with my clients who have depression or coexisting depression with another anxiety disorder. Now, the thing to remember here is the theme of this lie is hopelessness.

 

We need to be able to identify. Any lies, depression, tell us with the theme of hopelessness, saying there is no hope. Now I want us to pause here and I’m going to teach you a really important trick. This trick will help you. All through your days. The thing to remember here is we wanna become a depression detective.

 

Depression uses very specific little words that catch you and hold you down and make it sound really believable, and let’s go through some of those thoughts. The first one is nothing. Now nothing. A lot of depression will be in black and white thinking. Another one is good. Another one is. Everything.

 

Another one is all. Another one is none. Another one is bad, another one is forever. Another one is never. You will often hear depression using these words, and this is what makes them so convincing, like. Everything is bad. Nothing is going good. Everything is terrible. I will never succeed. I will be a loser forever.

 

Once you add these specific little teeny words, they might be just one word, but when you add them to a sentence, they feel so much more real and we want to be able to identify them once we can identify them. We have a much easier time getting out of that depression hole. So examples of lie number one, nothing will work out for me.

 

It’s a very hopeless thought. Another one, I will never achieve success again. They’re very permanent. They’re making it sound like there is no other way. You’re backed into a corner, you’re or you’re at a dead end and there’s nothing good coming. Another one will be, everything will go badly. Next one, it will all fail, or I’ll always be a failure.

 

Everything will go bad again. Similar to the last one, I will be a loser forever or things never work out for me. These are hopeless. Themes. And they are lies. They are lies. Because the thing to remember is never say never and never say always. What I mean by that is we want to always make it the goal, as we talked about with self-compassion, always.

 

That’s a goal, right? But we’re not gonna make a statement about ourselves because the truth of the matter is. Life is flexible. Nothing is forever. Everything changes. You know, we, we, there’s changing all the time, so we don’t want to get engaged with these thoughts that stamp it with these sort of very rigid views.

 

We wanna be able to identify these thoughts and we wanna be able to recognize that if we went to court. I always use this example with clients. If we went to court and there was a jury sitting there and you got up onto the stage and you said to the judge, I would like to, uh, run my case by you, that everything will go badly, and then we’re going to sit and watch this court play out, and the jury at the end of the day is going to come to the verdict, that that’s impossible.

 

Not everything will go badly. How did you get to work today? Did you drive? Yes. Did you crash? No. Okay. So not everything goes badly. Did you go go to work today? Did you make somebody’s day a tiny bit better, even if you just helped them with a small task? Okay, so we have some evidence that something went well today, and so we always talk with clients about will the jury throw this case out?

 

And in this case, with this lie, the jury will always throw this case out. It’s really important that you’d catch that. Now let’s move on to lie number two, which is the lie that no one can help me. Now the theme of this lie is helplessness. So the last lie and theme was hopelessness, and this one is helplessness with helplessness.

 

The lie is telling us that we are unhelpable, that no one could help us, that we are so bad, we’re in such bad shape. We’re such a failure that no one will be able to pull me out of that, including ourselves. The thing to remember here, if we were to be a depression detective again, is they will often say things like No one.

 

Can help me remember, that’s a very rigid thinking. No one can help me. I am too broken for them to help. Again, this is helplessness. I’m completely alone and no one can help. Again, it’s isolating. They’re telling this story that I’m the only person going through this. I’m the only one struggling. I’m the only one who’s not winning at all the things.

 

So this is just me and no one can help me get out of this. Problem that I’m in, and the truth of the matter is often when I treat people with depression, they are going through something difficult. They are kind of stuck with maybe they’re struggling with schoolwork or they’re struggling with their OCD recovery, or they’re struggling with relationships.

 

They can feel stuck, but just because they feel stuck doesn’t mean they are stuck, and it doesn’t mean that with small baby steps they can get out of that stuckness. Again, we gotta to come back to small baby steps is our way out here. So let’s now take a look at lie number three, and this is that I am worth nothing.

 

The theme here is worthlessness. Depression will often tell us that we have no worth, that we are useless, we are a failure. And it’s basically saying. At your core, you are not worthy of love. You are not worthy of success. You are not worthy of pleasure. It really strips you of the joy and the beauty of you and the person you are and the joy that you can bring.

 

I’ve never met a human being who doesn’t bring me joy in some way, even in their suffering. Sometimes when we suffer together is where I enjoy them the most because it’s the most real human connection we can have. No one. Worthless. We are all equally worthy. We are all equally valuable. It doesn’t matter your accolades, how much money you’ve got on your bank account, we are all worthy.

 

So let’s take a look at some examples. We’re gonna be, again, a depression detective here. Some examples of line number three is I am worthless. I am a failure. No one will ever love me again. It’s saying that we’re unworthy of receiving genuine love and care and compassion. Everyone thinks I’m a loser. Do you hear that same little why there that it’s basically saying.

 

That everybody believes this about me, that they’ve all come to this verdict. But the truth of the matter is, again, if we went to court and we said, okay, stand up on the podium, this person would like to cling that they are worthless and a failure and that no one loves them and they’re a loser. In come the crowds of people who can say otherwise, and the truth of the matter is.

 

You might believe this to be true, but if we went back into your life, we could probably bring in lots of, um, what do you call them, witnesses of people who have witnessed you, um, and who have loved you, or you have improved their day by giving them a smile or you’ve improved their day by helping them, or you’ve improved their day by making art or, um, sharing your own suffering.

 

There are so many ways in which we. Create this trickle effect, this butterfly effect of joy. Now the way I like to think about this is myself. I was talking about this with a couple of my loved ones over the weekend. We were, um, going out on this girl’s day trip and it was such a beautiful day. We went to, um, this chocolate salon, it’s like a conference for chocolate and you get to go and try all these chocolates and we sat down for lunch and we were talking about.

 

What’s the actual purpose of life? Because we were so overwhelmed with pleasure at that moment. We started to have this really deep conversation and we were talking about how. The real purpose is connection and love and, and just being on this planet and making it a better place. And I, and I said to them, my goal is just to make small, small, little butterfly effects that maybe I could smile at somebody today, which may lift their spirits, which may mean that they then smile at somebody at the coffee shop, which then lives their spirits.

 

And then that person just smiles at somebody else. And before we know it, there’s this. Butterfly effect or this, this, um, this sort of domino effect, I should say, of little baby moments of joy and pleasure for somebody. And that matters. Those things matter way more than huge accolades and getting into Harvard or getting a million dollars in your bank account, getting married, getting the job, you’re like, I believe those small little domino moments matter as much as any of those big events.

 

So now let’s talk about tools. As you know, this is your anxiety toolkit and we try to bring you the actual tools that will help you. And so let’s get into the specific tools that you can use with these three themes or these three lies that depression tells you. Now, the tool number one, we’ve already learned.

 

So the good news is. You’ve already been learning one of the tools, you just didn’t know it. And that first tool is the art of witnessing your thoughts. Being able to witness your thoughts means that you can observe them and identify that they are lies or identify that they are thoughts, and I’ll have more on that in just a second.

 

So an example of this is if you have the thought, you suck. So let’s say you’ve made a mistake and your brain says, ah, you suck. You can be an observer by going, oh, there’s the thought that I suck again. That’s all you have to do to create a little bit of distance with that thought. Oh, there’s that thought that I suck again.

 

Okay. What you’re doing here is you’re recognizing that thoughts are not facts. Their thoughts, you’re gonna have millions of them in your lifetime, and a lot of them aren’t going to be factual. Right. I could have a, it’s funny, I always say to clients, I could be with a client and in that 50 minute session, I could have the thought that I’m excellent at my job.

 

I could have the thought that I suck at my job. I could have the thought that I’m helping them. I could have a thought that I’m not helping them. I could have a thought that I’m making them worse. How is it in 50 minutes that I could have five completely opposing thoughts? It proves that thoughts aren’t facts.

 

We just have these crazy thoughts all the time, and we have to be able to ground in. I always ask, what would a jury agree on in this case? So we have to recognize that thoughts are not facts, and we also need to be able to witness those thoughts. As passing clouds. So let’s use this metaphor. So you’re sitting on this beautiful green lawn.

 

You’re looking up at the sky, and you’re just watching the clouds pass. Now as the the clouds approach you and then pass over you, you’re not immediately gonna freak out and go, oh my God, here comes the rain, and you’re not gonna run to your car. You’re just gonna observe them as thoughts. You’re gonna observe that.

 

These clouds are above me and I’m witnessing them, but I’m not gonna run away and change my behavior because of the presence of a cloud. And I want you to do that with your thoughts too. I want you to be able to identify thoughts, acknowledge that they’re there, recognize that. If you have depression, it will tell you lies of those three themes that we’ve already talked about, and we can just shrug and go, oh, okay, brain.

 

Thank you for that. Once again, very dramatic. Once again, very extreme, very rigid, and let’s actually try to find some nuance in those thoughts. Now that’s gonna bring us to our tool number two, which we are going to correct. These faulty thoughts. Now, for those folks of you who’ve taken any of my courses for OCD or in anxiety, we don’t do that a ton in anxiety and OCD, um, specifically OCD because sometimes that can become compulsive, right?

 

You can spend a lot of time ruminating trying to like fix your thoughts. However, with depression, we actually know that science-based skills for depression involves correcting. Faulty depressive lies, right? We want to be able to identify when depression is telling us a lie about ourselves or our future, or the world we live in, and we wanna be able to correct those thoughts.

 

So let’s talk about it now in our online course for depression over at CBT School. We have a very specific module where we walk you through this, and I’m gonna walk you through a shorter version of this today so that you can get a feel for what we use. In session with our clients and that I’ve taught here in over in Overcoming Depression, which is our online course for depression.

 

Now, what we do here is we identify all of the thoughts that we have that are either mean. Incorrect. Completely over the top, dramatic or catastrophic. And we work to create thoughts that are more helpful, strength-based and rational. And I wanna show you how we do that. Now, again, here are some of the thoughts that we here at, excuse me.

 

Here are some of the questions we ask when we are doing this activity again. In overcoming depression, we have a whole bunch of worksheets and workbooks that you can go deeper into this, but I want you to sort of, to tip your, dip your toe in a little today and do this with me in real time so that you can start to practice this important skill.

 

Now, the questions that we want to ask ourselves are here. So if you were to identify, I want you to think about one specific depression lie that we’ve already covered, that you hear in your brain. Okay, maybe you have a whole list of them, and I encourage you to write them down because writing them down will get you to see like, whoa, my brain is really, really mean.

 

Once we do that, you’re going to write them all down on the left side, similar to what we have in some of those worksheets, and then on the right hand side, you are going to correct them with some alternative thoughts, thoughts that feel true and real to you. So what we wanna ask ourselves is, number one, is this thought true?

 

Right. Is the thought that I am always a failure? True. Do you have any evidence against that? Number two is, is this thought helpful? The reason that we ask that question is sometimes clients will say a thought like, I am never going to pass this test. Maybe they’ve failed it a bunch of times and they might say, is this thought true?

 

And they go, well, yeah, it feels true because I’ve failed like three times already. Like, I don’t think I’ll ever pass this test. And that’s when I’ll say, okay, that might be true, but is it helpful? Does it help you to feel motivated and and confident moving forward to continue studying? And they’ll go, no.

 

And I’ll say, well, we’re gonna have to come up with something different because this thought alone is sabotaging you into feeling hopeless. Remember that cycle we talked about? The thought creates the feeling. The feeling creates more self-judgment, and then that adds to it. An action that sometimes self fulfills.

 

So we wanna look at is it helpful? And if it’s not helpful, we have to change it. Number three is, do I, the people I trust think in this way, think about someone who you really trust, who is very, very wise. Would they agree with you or think about that you go into, uh, court and there are all these amazing civic servants there who are donating their time to be on a jury, and you’d say, would they agree, even if they don’t really know you that well, would they agree based on their general understanding of the human being?

 

Number four is, is there a more rational or effective way to think about this situation? I always go to, yeah, baby steps. If we were to practice, let’s say, learning these tests that we have to take, if we could learn, do five questions a a week or five questions a day, and we could really get better at that, eventually you will.

 

Based on what we know about the science of the brain, you will pass at some point. Then the fifth one is, how do I want to respond to this thought? Now, remember here, the biggest mistake my clients make is they look at me with this smirk on their face and they say, what do you want me just to like say that I’m great all the time and that everything’s gonna be perfect and I’ll go, whoa.

 

Let’s take a little look here at what The Depression detective. So you’ve just swung from everything’s gonna be bad, and you think the solution is to swing the whole other end of the spectrum by saying everything’s gonna be great. That’s just more faulty thoughts. We don’t wanna do that. We’re not here to be a toxic positivity cheerleader.

 

We wanna catch how depression. Always wants us to swing from one to the other and neither of them work. Neither of them work. We don’t wanna swing from toxic meanness and negativity to toxic positivity. We want to say something that actually is true. An example would be yes, sometimes I will fail and sometimes I won’t, and sometimes I.

 

Improve and over time that improvement will grow and that’s okay because that’s what humans do. Humans have to grow. The winners in the world have failed a whole bunch of times. I always remind myself that in order to become someone who works out Google, let’s say you have to have failed many, many times.

 

They, in fact, as a part of their interview. I have heard is they require you to show them a time where you have failed miserably and how you fixed it. That’s what really successful people do. They fail and they keep going, and we wanna get good at failing and keep going. That is what we wanna do, but we do not want depression to come in and tell faulty stories about that event.

 

So what I want you to do here, if you would like, is you can pause this episode and do this exercise. Or you can listen to this whole episode and then sit down and do this every single day. When I give this homework to my students at CBT School or with my clients, I say, I want you to sit down and correct your thoughts for about 20 to 30 minutes every single day.

 

Now. Just to give you another example of what I do, if I am doing my taxes, and I’ve talked about this already once before on your anxiety toolkit. When I am doing my taxes, I have this irrational fear that I am going to make a big mistake and I will have to go to jail because of it. And I like to pay my taxes.

 

I feel joyful about paying my taxes because it means I get roads and it means our kids get to go to school, they go to a public school, and you know, I think it’s. I’m joyful that I get to pay taxes, but sometimes my depression or my negative thinking get in the way. So I will actually sit this piece of paper down next to me and as I’m doing the tech, my, my taxes, I will write down any thoughts that are lies, just to be able to witness them.

 

In some cases, when the thought. Really aggressive and falls under one of these three themes, these lies. I might correct them in real time. If the thought is you’re a failure and you should have made more money, I will go. That’s not kind. I made a good amount of money where I supported my family, or I did the best I could, or, um, that’s not true.

 

Here is actually the technical amount of money I made. I’m just giving that as an example. Um, or, or if your, your brain tells you any of these lies, you will sit down and you will get in the practice of correcting the extreme nature of these thoughts. Don’t swing to the other extreme. Just come to some neutral response that disarms this negativity.

 

Now, let’s go now to the third strategy of your anxiety toolkit. And this is where we learn to react differently. Again, remember the cycle thoughts lead to feelings. Feelings lead to beating yourself up and judgment, and then that action reinforces the cycle. So let’s now talk about how we can change how we act.

 

What I want you to do. When it comes to the lies that depression tells you is I want you to act like you matter because you do. I want you to act like you are worthy of love because you are. I want you to act like things are hopeful because they are hopeful. I want you to act like things are, you are able to be helped because you are.

 

Things are not. Helpless either. So I want you to master the art of acting as if, okay, again, do not go extreme on me here. Do not swing to the other end. Like you have to constantly act like you’re happy all the time. That’s not what I’m saying. I’m saying I want you to act as if you matter, and that you deserve to have success.

 

You deserve to have love, you deserve to have joy, and all of those things. Let’s talk more about it now. What you’ll see here is when you do this, you start to have. Better interactions with people, which gives you positive thoughts, which gives you more positive feelings, which makes you interact more. And then as you notice, you’re coming out of this spiral or this, well, this deep hole that you’re in.

 

For me, when I feel depressed, my instinct is to pull away from people and not share with them. But then I have this feeling like I’m alone and this no one can help me. And you know, I’m, no one would get it, and I’m only, I’m the dumb person who’s in this situation, but when I change how I act. To connect and tell people like, I’m struggling.

 

I’m having a hard time. It’s really hard for me. But then I usually get an interaction where they validate me or they care for me, or maybe they just give me a gentle smile, which reinforces I do matter. Again, spirals me into this positive trajectory instead of negative trajectory. That is so important.

 

That is the science here behind depression treatment. Now, the thing to remember here is we want to act in a way that is compassionate. We wanna act with compassionate. Action. Now, what does this mean? It means that you act in a way that is leading towards the you that you want to be, the you that you desire.

 

We are acting in that direction. Let me give you some examples here. The first compassionate action that I want you to engage in is first finding a sleep schedule. That works for you. That involves waking up at the same time every day, and then once you wake up. You have a time that you’re allowed to be in bed, but then you get out of bed.

 

One of the most important things, we talk about this in your anxiety talk. I mean, excuse me, we talk about this in overcoming depression as well, but a sleep schedule, a routine is going to be one of the most important parts of your depression management. And we first start with the sleep schedule. So you wake up at the same time every day, pick a time that’s reasonable, and then.

 

You make sure you have a sleep bedtime routine where you go to bed at the same time. Preferably, those activities will have accompanied. Um, with a positive and pleasurable activity. So if you are, let’s say, very depressed, you wake up and you immediately put on a song that you like so that you’re coupling it with something that’s got a little bit of a good mood.

 

If it’s at the end of the day you brush your teeth, you may again listen to a song that you like or put on some candles, or you say some affirmations, or you do a loving kindness meditation. Um, you. Read a book that feels really yummy and funny to you or, or lovely and kind or juicy and fun. Um, we want to be marrying these actions with positive things.

 

Even if you don’t feel like, let’s say depression’s taken all the joy out of things, do the things that you would’ve once done. That would’ve once given you joy. Now, the second compassionate act is to ask for help. Again, we direct this one at lie number two or theme number two, actually ask for help in whatever way that may be.

 

If you’re having a hard time getting out of bed, ask someone, can you text me at this time and encourage me to get out of bed? If you need therapy, raise your hand. I’m feeling depressed. Can you please help me? If it’s, um, I wanna take a course. Take a course. If it’s that you want someone to meet with you and take a walk, ask them to help you.

 

If it’s some, you’re asking for somebody to help you with a task that is very, very hard for you. Where depression hits you say, I don’t need you to do anything. I just need you to be here and sit with me while I do this task. Now, compassionate action number three is seek pleasure. We want to schedule pleasure.

 

First. Now, as you may know, if any of you have taken our time management course at CBT School, you will know that there are two main things that we schedule first, always, and that is number one, we schedule sleep, and number two, we then schedule pleasure. You do not wait to see if you actually just have time for pleasure.

 

No, we schedule pleasure first because that will release dopamine into your system. You know that you’ve got something to look forward to and you’ve scheduled it. Preferably you’ve asked someone to join you for it, because when we connect, we have that additional dopamine hit that we were looking for that can help you with managing depression.

 

Again, find the things you used to enjoy, find anything, and I don’t care if it’s literally sitting outside and just looking for B birds. I want you to get creative. I want you to again, go to a chocolate saloon if that brings you pleasure. Where you get to taste chocolates, if it means taking a walk. Or taking a bike ride.

 

Going for a swim. It might be putting your feet in water. It might be taking a bath. It doesn’t have to cost you money. It might be listening to music, your favorite comedy show. These are all things that can help protect against depression, and we wanna make sure we schedule this every single day because you deserve pleasure in your life.

 

Now the fourth is to eat well. I am not talking about perfectly. I am in no way do I advocate for perfect eating, but I want you to make sure you’re eating enough meals in the day. I don’t want you to be depriving yourself of food. You’re having your three main meals and snacks. Do your best to fill your body with nourishing, delicious, fresh.

 

Food, do your best to prepare foods or maybe have delivery or ask someone to help you prepare foods that will nourish your body. Again, we want you to act that way, like treating yourself so kindly If you’re eating a bunch of foods and you don’t actually feel good after eating it. Gift yourself with some food that nourishes your body and feels good.

 

Now, number five is to consider medication. The gold standard treatment for depression is cognitive behavioral therapy. Meds. So I’m not here to push meds, but I’m here to say if you feel like you require them, there’s no shame in taking meds for depression. Um, it’s again, it’s a proven treatment. Go and speak to your doctor and see if it would be an appropriate step for you.

 

There is no shame in raising your hand asking for help and saying maybe is this something that might be working or help me? And then the last one is to connect, connect, connect, connect. I want you to, even though it’s hard, and I know you probably don’t feel like it, I want you to do your best to connect in any way text messages, voice messages.

 

Phone calls, FaceTime meeting in person. Zoom calls even if it’s you. If you’re not connected, let’s say you don’t have a ton of friends right now. I want you to take a walk and go and smile at people. I want you to join, uh, a free class and interact with people. There are lots of free meetups where you can practice connecting.

 

Join us. Support group. Um, these are all options for you, or maybe it’s just therapy for now, but connection is so important to your depression. Um, treatment. Now, the last thing here is I want you to get out there and act as if you don’t have depression. I’m not saying fake it. I mean, I kind of am saying fake it actually.

 

It’s ’cause I don’t want you to walk around with a sad face on you. It’s okay if you do. It’s okay if you cry. It’s okay. If you’re struggling, do the best you can. But there is a skill that we use in overcoming depression, and we use it in our one-on-one clients as well when we’re treating depression, and it’s called opposite action.

 

Opposite action is when. In that moment, if you are in bed and depression is telling you to stay there and go back to sleep, you would do the opposite of what depression tells you to do. So the opposite of that would be to get up and dance, or to get up and move your body, do some light stretching it. The opposite would be to sit down and do one.

 

Of the, like I talked about one of the five study questions. It’s engaging in small baby things and getting you back into those things. Whatever you can do to engage in the opposite of what depression wants you to do, usually the better things will go because the. As you get going, remember, motivation isn’t something you start with.

 

It’s something you generate. Once you get going, then you start to notice those positive feelings showing up and then you wanna keep going. I know for me, when I am running and I’ve taken up running recently, um. The, I listen to this like audio coach in my head. Um, it’s a, it’s a, a free program that Nike has.

 

I’m not sponsored by Nike, but um, it, I find it really beneficial ’cause he’ll say, um, pick the 20 minute run and he’ll say, the joy is. A 20 minute run feels doable, but once you get going, you probably will end up doing a 22 minute run or a 24 minute run because once you’re going, you actually feel good.

 

But when you start, you’re like, no, I do not want to do a 25 minute run. And so you start small and then before you know it, you feel like you could keep going. And it’s, the science behind that is really true. Um, it’s really about getting that bowl going and once it’s going it’s, it’s usually a little easier to keep maintaining that action.

 

Now a couple other things that you can do here again, is move your body, get out, stretch, do some yoga, take a walk, move your body. It’s gonna be so important for depression. Um, it’s so important that you also schedule that because again, depression is gonna make you wanna sort of feel really sluggish and stay in bed and stay in indoors with the all the windows closed.

 

Um, so, uh, there are a couple other compassionate actions you can take. All right, so let’s do a review. Here are the lies that depression has told you. Number one, everything is hopeless. Number two, I am helpless. Number three, I am worthless. These are the lies depression tells you, and you have to be able to identify them.

 

Now, what we wanna do here is we have learned to witness our thoughts, restructure our thoughts, and we just learned that we want to also react differently. Now, what we wanna do here is if you wanna go a little deeper into some of these strategies. We do have an online course called Overcoming Depression.

 

We have workbooks, we have worksheets, we have schedules, we have symptom checklists, we have self-compassion activities. It’s all there for you. You can head over to cbt school.com/depression to learn more about that. Um. Once you have access to it and you purchase the course, you have free access for the lifetime of that course.

 

You can watch it as many times as you want, and I will walk you specifically through the activities with a workbook. So it’s all there, ready to go. Now, the conclusion here for you is this. There is hope. Please accept help and that you matter. You’re important. Your world here on this earth is important.

 

You can make a change, you can impact and, and. Feel joy in this lifetime, and this often happens with those small baby steps. Now, I wanna thank you so much for being here with me today. It has been such a joy. Once again, if you wanna go deeper into this, head over to cbt school.com com. Um. Slash depression and I am so excited.

 

I will see you all next week and please do be kind. I’m sending you so much love and I hope that you learn something so helpful today and that you feel a little bit more understood and that you can detect those lies moving forward. Have a great day, everybody.