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"Is depression a gift?"

I understand how utterly moronic this may seem at first glance, but it's something I've been thinking about recently.

Why are so many intelligent and gifted people so unhappy with life and the way they live? What on earth makes them so utterly deprived of their ability to enjoy themselves?

Or then, is depression something that comes with intelligence... or does it actually cause intelligence? Making us smarter and wiser, causing us to think more. Hundreds of artists, musicians, most talent in the world can be linked with a depressed childhood, and traumatic experiences. Can we link those to our gifts and talents, or is it only a compensation for something that we are born with?

I refuse to believe that a man is born an artist. Perhaps you have stronger muscles which have been genetically inherited... but we are not born with the ability to use a pen. We are not born with the ability to run, and we are not born with the ability to speak. We are basic humans, waiting for the template of the world to be set apon us.

So then, if our lives are not set, then would something like a traumatic experience make that much difference to our lives? Can it change us that much to give us skills and talents that we only ever dreamed of before?

I say yes. For trauma brings emotion, and emotion must be controlled. Once that is learned, then it can be filtered, and through practise of translating this emotion, creativity lives.

Assuming that this is correct... it does bring a huge discussion point, something that I can't decide, for confusion of humanity.

Is it right to traumatize a child, in the hope that the emotion caused by this will make the child stronger? Can something so utterly bad end up making something so perfectly good?

Surely there is another way that emotion can be carried? Surely depression isn't the only way to spark creativity...?

I'd certainly like to hope not... but depression and fear are very strong emotions, and it's hard to equal them with emotions of the other side...

On a last note, creativity and depression I feel are heavily linked. For depression causes so many thoughts to cross you, and creativity is the only real way of expressing those thoughts. Without creativity, we would all probably kill ourselves.

Yeah, nice to see you better Dr Duck. :0)

Thanks

Good to hear things are starting to sort themselves out mate!

Thanks guys.
I've been giving VB's advice on the work, which is kind of working - cutting out the short breaks, time wasted thinking about doing it, wasted hours between lectures. There's still a lot to do, but i'm on top of it.

My girlfriend thinks i should quit the basketball team, and the basketball team think i should leave my girlfriend.
I'm moving away from the friends i have who associate with mr national front, and i think that only two of them were worth it anyway (who i do keep in contact with). New friends is working out quite well.
The basketball - i'll probably cut it down, but i don't really think i could quit completely, it's kind of like therapy - getting away from everything in the same way as some of my friends use drink or (soft) drugs. Also, it's been keeping me in good shape, especially so recently and i've been noticing a lot more female attention (women are so shallow!), and they haven't all been mingers! Also, the team is a lot more social this year, hence a source of replacement friends (?!), and this year we have cheerleaders (enough said!)

The girlfriend? See how it goes. Don't you find that whenever you're single you really want a woman, but it's never as good as you'd expected? But you never learn! Maybe the new-found potential for less meaningful relationships is one i should pursue further...

So the basketball stays (it was that that picked me up from my slump in the end), though taking up less time, the work is under control, the friends are 'improved', the girlfriend - we'll see...
I'd really like to thank you guys for your help too. The Doctor is back in the house

HAHAHAHAHAHAHHA!

The old "Calculator in GRAD mode instead of DEG", eh?

Don't worry mate, it's happened to all of us.

At least it happened to you in class, and not in an exam....

Well, I'm not so worried about my maths anymore, anyway.

Going utterly mad over it in my lesson, I finally packed in, stood in front of the class, and wrote out what I had done on the board. Everyone said it was right... but the answer was wrong.

"Have you got your calculator in the right mode?" A girl asked.

"Oh. Crap."

So for the past two weeks I've been going out of my mind because I can't get the right answers, because my sodding calcuatlor is in the WRONG SODDING MODE.

Not that I'm angry about it, quite pleased actually. At least I know that I'm getting somewhere now.

:0)

By the way, Wonderboys rules.

Somedays i feel depressed cos of some things in life, sometimes i think life is crap for me :\

Well DD, i suggest u try and make new friends, racists are one thing you want to veer far away from, especially in college. And before you ditch your girl, remember this: at least you got one. Dont throw that relationship away unless you're sure its a dead stick.

I'd quit B-ball as well. you can do better things with ur time.

Work hard, Drink hard, and have fun. Thats what uni is about.

(My bro has been there for years, hes doing a doctorate now. I see how uni works, so i got a small idea. Sorry if a seem a bit pretentious)

Dr Duck, by the sounds of things you should ditch the girlfriend and quit the basketball team.

When you've done that you'll have more spare time, you can "take stock" of you like, see how things go from there.

I have finished my second year of uni (on a placement year now) and the second year is harder than the first. An example:

In the first year we did 8 modules, I got mainly A's and B's. In the second year we did 8 modules, I put in the same amount of effort as the first year, and got practically 1 of every grade from D+ to A. And I had a part time job.

Basically, I think Venom (?) got it right. Don't worry about it. If you worry about it, it gets you down. And you don't want that. I know parents say school days are the best of your life, but I honestly think that university days are the best of your life.

Don't spend time worrying about stuff that, to be honest, doesn't really matter.

Throughout your education, you only have as much work as you want to do.

Primary school. optional homework in class two - you're kidding right?

Primary school, final years. Homeowrk, generally a couple of maths Q's, some spellings, or a 'short story'. You can spend hours if you want to. I chose to spend miniutes.

Secondary school. No 'real' work till you reach year ten. Till then, do HW on the bus, in breaktimes, whenever.

Same rule applies. If you leave it till the last miniute, you don't waste time thinking about it, you spend ALL that time doing it.

GCSE years. I got suckered here. Actually started doing work so as not to get terrible reports. Got put in dual award science instead of separates because I was lazy. Still got double A* at the end of it.

Sixth form. Again. If you do it when you have to, you'll find you actually do it, instead of thinking about doing it.

Uni. First year.
Lots of coursework - but only about 10 hours a week of lectures (varies on course). This gives you a LOT of spare time every week. Work between lectures. Keep your eveings free easily enough. When you set aside time to do work, actually do it instead of faffing around. You never have as much work as you think you do.

Uni, seocnd year.
Where I am now. Only three weeks in, but getting set plenty of work. Still only 10 hours a week of lectures. I now keep 17 hour waking days (8am till 1am on average). I still have every evening free from work of any kind.


In other words, I'm spending no more time working now than I ever used to at school. Other commitments do build up, but there are plenty of hours in the day for it all.

That's what I find, at least.