A radio/YouTube interview with life coach Rebeccah Silence about recognizing and overcoming depression. Rebeccah offers a reframed definition of depression (as depressing one’s truth and emotions), lists behavioral red flags (oversleeping, not wanting to get out of bed, appetite/fuse changes), shares her own history with clinical depression and treatment, and recommends concrete supports (therapy, coaching, her free Trigger & Trauma Release masterclass at rebeccasilence.com, YouTube videos, support groups, employer/insurance resources, and a paid healing retreat in Santa Fe). She emphasizes that diagnosis should not define identity and that recovery/healing is possible.
How do you know if you are depressed or have depression? What are some of the telltale signs of that? Or if you feel like maybe a loved one is. What are some telltale signs that they should look for?
Because often when we won't accept ourselves as we are, that's the beginning of depressing our spirit, our light and our joy.
Mix 102.5 the best mix from the 90s to now. Big pop in the afternoon Mental Wellness Wednesday. Life Coach Rebecca Silence. RebeccaSilence.com is the website you can get her emotional survival kit. She's also the host of Tough Together, a breakthrough podcast and her book coming out very, very soon. Coming back to life Rebecca, how are you?
I am very well. So good to see you today.
I agree. It's so good to see me. No, it's so good to see you as well. I don't know, I'm just. I'm in a funky mood today. What I figure we could talk about is, and this could be the easiest conversation we have or the most in depth conversation we ever have, and it's about. It's about depression. Okay, how do you know if you are depressed or have depression? What are some of the telltale signs of that? Or what are. If you feel like maybe a loved one is. What are some telltale signs that they should look for that kind of thing?
All right, this is a very important conversation. And I'll just say to start off, I am here for any of your moods, funky or not. And I think that really is something that if you're even wondering whether or not you're depressed is something to consider. Are you here for all of your flavors, all of your moods, all of your emotions? Because often when we won't accept ourselves as we are, that's the beginning of depressing our spirit, our light, and our joy. So when it comes to depression, I just want to speak to how I define it. And this might be a new definition for people and it might seem controversial. I want everyone listening to kind of take what you want and leave the rest because there's no. There's no right way to live. There's no wrong way to live. There's no right way to heal. There's no wrong way to heal. So I just want to make this heavy conversation that has a lot of stigma around it because basically the societal narrative is if you're depressed, you will have less of a life, period. That's it. We can help you manage. But if you are depressed or even anxious, you're going to have less Life, you're going to have less joy, you're going to have less fun than other people. And I refuse to believe that those standards have to be true. So when I'm defining depression, I am defining it as a depression of your truth and a depression of your emotions that are real, that are desperately trying to come out. Those emotions are anger, grief, fear, joy and excitement. So we are not depressed. We depress our truths and we shut down. Another word for depress, right, is shut down. So we shut down our anger because, oh my gosh, I can't be angry like my father was, or anger is bad, or the world can't handle my anger. Or we shut down our sadness, our grief, because we think if we start to cry we'll never stop, or whatever the reasons are. We shut down our fear because we think it'll kill us if we accept it and embrace it and move through it. And when we're depressing the darker emotions, there is no access to joy or excitement there. Just period, end of story. Isn't so? You have the power to not just manage your depression or pay attention to whether or not you're depressed, but to make sure you don't depress your truth. I just got off a coaching call with a gorgeous, powerful woman in a C suite executive type job who jumps when her husband says jump and wonders why she's just not feeling that fulfilled. She's catering to him, which is great, that's the type of wife she wants to be, but she hasn't even considered what she needs in decades. So she's depressed, her needs, right? Red flags to look for. And you've heard some of these before, maybe not all, but let's just say them anyway. You can't get out of bed in the morning. You want to be sleeping all the time. Big red flag that it's time for support. Because your spirit, your highest self, is just flatlining. You don't want to eat, you overeat, you have the shortest fuse and any little thing can take you to a 10 and set you off. These are some red flags that emotionally you are not, you're not sound, you're not emotionally strong in your foundation. And that doesn't mean you're a bad person or that anything's wrong. It's just if you're depressed, likely you backburnered what you need, what you want, how you feel, and you're not asking for your needs to be met and you're not taking responsibility for your needs being met. Another thing that can have people depressed is if they think their needs to be validated, valued, respected, not abandoned, whatever those needs are, are the job of the people that are in their lives. Like, if it's your spouse's job to make sure you're happy, that's a losing job for your spouse. And you're never actually going to be happy because you're putting all that power in other people's hands and then just replace happy with whatever the truth is for you. And then the most important point maybe I can make in this conversation today is do not whether you've been diagnosed with depression or not. I have been depressed. I have been suicidal. I spent a year on antidepressants and in therapy three days a week while I was an undergrad so that I didn't go into a mental hospital because it was either meds, an ongoing regular therapy, or a mental hospital. That is how bad it was for me at the time. So I'm not sitting here as the coach that life is grand. I've never felt this way. I just help other people who feel this way. Oh, my God. I have been there. And it is different for all of us. But what I can tell you is don't let a diagnosis define you. I'm a cancer survivor. I was diagnosed with clinical depression and other diagnoses along the way. But that diagnosis is there to help you take responsibility for how you're living. And if how you're living isn't working for you, you get support, Find a coach, find a therapist, find a mentor, find YouTube videos to watch. I don't care what it is, but get some help. But the second you let a diagnosis define you, you've depressed possibility for yourself, you've depressed your dreams and hopes and wishes for your life. And it won't end well. It'll feel terrible. So a diagnosis can be information that you decide what to do with. And what I'm begging us all to really pay attention to is don't let a diagnosis define you. I've got a client that was in residential treatment. Fast forward, this was a lost cause case. She's on the board now for the residential treatment facility that she used to live in in her own apartment, wrote a book. I mean, healing is freaking possible. And our families have people that are depressed. And then we can easily slip into, oh, it's genetic. So I got the hand and this is just going to be my life. And I'm saying, regardless of evidence or circumstance, you get your life. And you don't have to depress your truth, your needs, or your future because of how it feels or looks right now.
Rebecca, you touched on it a little bit. I just want to dive a little bit deeper on if you feel like you are and you want to try to pull yourself out of it. You, you talked real quick about getting help. What other things can people do as like a, as like a step one to help pull themselves out of the dumps?
Absolutely. So I created a free masterclass on rebeccasilence.com that I call the Trigger and trauma release method. So if you're suffering in any way, shape or stressed, stuck or even just feeling often it's really subtle. One thing you can do for yourself right now is go to rebeccasilence.com click on courses, go to free Trauma Trigger release masterclass and I will walk you through moving that energy in less than 20 minutes and give you a one on one session for free that you can take over and over and over again. That's one thing that you can do. Also, you can reach out to, to your insurance companies and find out what mental health support is available. You can reach out to your employer, what employee assistance programs are available. You can join my free healing as possible Facebook group. You can go to my YouTube channel and watch more long episodes breaking down how you can heal and help yourself than you would ever even have time for. There's hundreds of videos on my YouTube channel. Or at the very least just find some someone that aligns with you. A personal growth expert, a coach. It could be Brendan Burchard, it could be Mel Robbins, it could be Tony Robbins. I don't care who it is, just find someone.
Baskin Robin, that brings.
Well, yes, it could be Baskin Robbins. Sure. Mark used to say to me, my husband, ice cream solves everything. Every time there's an issue, ice cream can solve it, Right? But the point is for you to get to a place where you are hopeful again and where you are seeing the possibility of life on the other side of your pain. And if you really, really want like the best gift you could give yourself, come live with me for three days in Santa Fe, New Mexico, September 16th, 17th and 18th. We have a healing as possible weekend retreat. Last one where there's only 20 living with me. And I take you through how to get happier than you've ever been. And it sticks if you stick with what you've learned. So you can also see more about the retreat@rebeccasilens.com but bottom line, depression isn't a life sentence. I don't care what the statistics say. And you have resources and support available to you. Find a book to read. I don't care what it is that calls to you. Go and get yourself brave enough to hope again and brave enough to live fully in the face of whatever you're feel feeling. Those feelings are temporary and there's a big difference between your feelings about what's happening in your life versus the emotions inside of you that when you have no resistance to, you're free.
It is a mental wellness. Wednesday Life Coach Rebecca Silence. Lots of details@rebeccasilence.com Rebecca I think we helped a lot of people this week, so thank you so much for the time. We'll talk to you next week.
I love you all so much. The Mastery of Love is a great book. If you want a book book, you could start there. It's about self love. Bye everyone.
