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This is kindly aimed at the religious people.
So I have an issue with myself. I have endured a major depression far too long to count on my fingers. Thinking for a while, I feel as if being abundantly passionate about someone or something will help reduce my depression. And the one being I love more than anyone or anything is Jesus. He's the first to come into mind when I asked myself, "What am I most passionate about?" I became passionate about Him when I had a vision of Him in a tan and red robe holding His hand out to me. He looked rather serious, but I feel it's because I was very suicidal at the time and He takes that seriously.
I was wondering if there's any super religious people here who could tell me how I could increase my passion. Like what all should I learn? What can I do to show Him more passion and love?
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Want to answer more questions in the Miscellaneous category?
Maybe give some free advice about: Spirituality?
It really is not about surface appearances or being or acting more religious than others or passionate or out in the open about it. It's about a personal one on one relationship and working 24/7 with those teachings and lessons to not only help others around you.
There's a lot of people who are about acting the part or looking religious but when it boils down to it aren't and are judgmental and not truly living or working with lessons laid out in Christ's teachings the rest of their week. It also isn't about being holier than someone else or having the right set of beliefs. I know you don't think that way.
It's about listening to God in my view and reflecting him and living your life with influence from Christ's teaching. As the poster below touched on the most important part is establishing a permanent relationship with God through these teachings or any others for that matter and never feeling separated or completely alone or hopeless ever again.
The best thing you can do is really understand Jesus's teaching and examples and how to apply lessons from them to your entire life. I am grateful you are still here and experienced something so strong that it acted in a healing way to change your life.
The other thing you could do is read about different interpretations of Jesus's teachings and religions and the history but what it all comes down to is commitment and living right. That right there should be your passion and for life too.
Incidentally, I'm not so sure Jesus would want us to be passionate about him or worship him for he gave credit to God and said "who callest me God?" It's not to nitpick but in the Bible itself he wanted others to see the works he did not as miracles but something we could do if we believed in them.
You may also want to read different books on spirituality and healing as you may find them helpful. When it comes to depression stay on top of it and be 100% forthcoming with doctor treating you and follow treatment and medication as that too will continue to improve your life minute by minute. You're in a good place now.
If you continue to express gratitude for where you are and what you overcame that's responding in a positive and passionate way. Take the new lease on life and do something amazing with it. That shows passion and gratitude for receiving help that transformed your life.
I am not part of any denomination or organized religion or promoting one but one book that may prove helpful and is all about healing to read is Science & Health. There are chapters in it from people whose lives transformed just from reading it. Anyways, getting your hands on any books or anything that enhances your life right now is a good thing.
Doing things for others too that uplifts their lives from random acts to whatever else is also a way to show gratitude every day for the transformation in your life and is showing passion. Live each day to spread love and you'll get it back like a boomerang.
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You have two issues listed, the depression you suffer from and wanting to find ways to show more passion and love to Jesus.
You only seemed to be asking the end one but if you don't mind, I will address both.
To answer the last, I must first describe in my own words what I feel the difference is between the descriptions 'religious or super religious' versus spiritual. I hope this helps you see how my experiences with religious vs spiritual may make the difference in you achieving what you are wishing for.
Religion, or religious to me is more about the structure, scaffolding of a building, like the church along with all its doctrines and beliefs and even the bible scolds longer established believers for still following the program for baby believers who are spoon fed, milk and cereal so to speak. Quite often, thats the case and no one grows past a certain point in their faith because what isn't being taught as much or in the right way is that God did not create religion and His goal is not for us to be religious but to have a personal relationship with him, and that to me is what is called being a spiritual person.
God is spirit, so we must interact with him on the spiritual level. All Jesus ever wanted was for us to have a personal relationship with him and His Father and of course Holy Spirit.
Lets go over the definition of passion: a strong feeling of enthusiasm or excitement for something or about doing something.
Here's where it gets hard for humans who really operate mostly on a physical level in our existence and really have no idea or little knowledge of how to operate on a spiritual level. We don't know what to do to get from the physical to the spiritual level let alone be excited about it to the point that all you ever think about, do or time flies cus you are so absorbed by it.
Also keep in mind that a relating to Jesus is much the same as how we relate to people. However we need to 'discover' exactly what that relationship should look like and feel like. The church has a set 'recipe' or 'one size fits all' teaching on how to have a relationship with Jesus that doesn't work for all because we as souls are all at different levels in our spiritual walk so what applies to one doesnt work for another. Who knows you better than anyone else but the Creator. So this is what I suggest you do. Ask Jesus. You can get what worked for me but you and I may be two very different individuals. I once told God that I wanted to know I was pleasing him and doing whatever it is he gave me to do. It didnt have to be grand in the churchs eyes, like a missionary. Maybe all you do is make sack lunches and hand them out to the homeless. Is that any less important? None of my kids have the same natural talents but I am no less pleased or happy with receiving a fancy stored bought gift or a thoughtful deed or kind words. All of it is part of the love language. There are 5 basic types, written about originally by Gary Chapman a Christian writer and though originally it was written to help Marriage relationships, it applies just as well to any relationships, kids too and God too although it that context, its more about ideas of how you can show God you love him. I'd look for it at local library or go to a bookstore, its a wonderful, insightful book. Heres one link to look up.
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Basically hon, we can't have a relationship with anyone, person or God if we don't spend any time with them. My style and character is such that I don't like praying wish lists to God or talking in King James or just praying in one sitting...that would be like speaking to my husband only once every day in the morning or at night for a designated amount of time and never again at all for the rest of the day. That would not be the healthiest relationship.
The biggest problem that I see here is most people pray to God but don't hear back so they give up on talking to Him.
So you can have more than just the vision of Him holding his hand out to you, you will need to develop the ability to Hear him as well, cus a one sided conversation doesn't cut it. He is always talking to us, we just don't hear. A pastor once said that in our brain is something like a spiritual muscle that need to be exercised regularly to get strong enough to be able to pull in the 'signals' or conversations from God just the same like a radio. If not tuned to the exact station, you either hear nothing or lots of crackle and static or weak sounding speech barely discernible. Its not easy at first and you will spend much time feeling like you're doing all the talking but its worth it in the end.
An example from my life: remember me saying I want to please Him, much like King David did, a man after Gods own heart, just that I was a woman.
Twice, total strangers praying at two Christian events I attended told me they had a message for me but they didn't understand it and told me,
"He is pleased with you." I told them it made perfect sense as that was what I was always asking God myself. ONce I got halfway good at hearing gods voice, He gave me assignments like, "See that guy at the back of church, he's got a bad headache and needs it gone. Go pray for HIm.
Heck that was scary....what if I heard wrong. It took years after able to hear God to get the confidence that I was truly hearing correctly and not doubting myself, from going thru countless little assignments like that from God. And then came the morning the relationship felt very real when a new CHristian song came on the car radio as I drove to work. I talk out loud to myself often and it was really a terrible song so I just spoke out loud, "That song doesnt do anything for me!" and Immediately in my head I heard Gods comment as my own voice, "It doesnt do anything for me either!" And I laughed all the way to work knowing God is real, has a sense of humor and really does have lots of informal communication like that with me. It isn't all instructions and such. You could study too. Ask at your local Christian bookstore for what you are
looking for. But do work on the personal relationship as far as learning to really be able to hear HIm and then get your instruction straight from Him.
As for your depression, I do not not how bad or if you've been seen and diagnosed or even tried anything for your situation. But if you didn't have to suffer from depression, would you be willing to do whatever it is to be okay?
HOw else can I explain...hmmm. A car when its tank is out of gas will not perform for you at all. Your brain too can run out of 'gas', only its called neuro-transmitters in this case, (NTs)
And when the level of neuro-transmitters which are responsible for your keeping a healthy mind that in turn keeps your emotions on a good happy level runs too low or totally runs out, you are depressed. Depressed is another term for being too low on something so now you know why the condition is called depression.
The good thing is only a small percent of people still require man made meds that resemble NTs to help you feel better. Tests done have revealed that the greater amount of people simply run out of NT's cus their body can't produce them fast enough. And we use up NTs to deal with the stresses in life. If you didnt refill a gas tank, your car would eventually not work. So, there are things that even psychologists know of that work although not all Drs are on the same page or have explored the non medical help.
Some of the quickest ways to raise your level of NTs is to subject yourself to certain things or conditions which help you to naturally begin producing more of what you need for your mind to be able to handle stresses. We can't get rid of stress but there are things that may help. If not, then I would suggest after trying the list and no feeling better, to seek out a Dr.
Laughter: Yes, theres a reason its called the best medicine. So try to watch some comedies or hang out with an extremely funny person for a couple hours and laugh yourself silly.
Movement: Some people claim to feel better after exercise like a jog or a run. For those who don't like that type of exercise, skipping or bike riding, or dancing can do the same. Pretty much as long as you are doing the exercise long enough.
Hugs: NOt talking about weak quick side ways hugs, those are useless in my experience. HUgs are one of the fasteset ways for me to feel immediately better, like a rush of NTs were just manufactured. Talking about full front on big bear hugs, the kind that last more than 3 seconds which is most common. People seem to be afraid to touch longer. I mean 10 to 15 sec to start and on occasion see if you can go for longer. You need someone really willing to help who cares about you...a family member, best friend and what you'd hopefully feel is what I feel in this case, my heart feeling really light and like a helium balloon feels like it is just floating right up out of my chest. It is I suppose this feeling that scares off some who have never been raised in a hugging family and so they are missing out on one of the best ways to feel better.
Songs: You may have lots of styles of music and songs you really like and like to dance or move to. But what I am talking about here is not the words, just the melody and chords used in a particular combo that give you the same reaction of your heart feeling lighter and floating. For example, There are about 5 songs I rotate and use for this setting the song on repeat and I'll listen to it until I feel better. A song that does this for me is the melody of "Clocks" by Coldplay. Everyone is different here in what actual melodys will work for them so start now to check out the music you have, figure it out ahead of time. PUt the best ones on your computer and use headset if it would disturb people otherwise and just listen til you feel a change after 2 or 3 times, maybe it'll take 6 or so on a really bad day.
This basics list is the same thing a psychologist gave my daughter when she was d epressed after a bad break up and wasn't getting back to normal. SHe used her one free visit thru her job to go see him and since she couldn't afford further appts. he gave her this list and told her to use it. It wasn't as fully explained as mine but the same things I just mentioned were on it. I had already told her about these things but she didn't try them...after all, I'm just Mom, what do I know? Hehehe, and then when she got that list she was shocked and did follow the advice and it worked for her. Now hers was not clinical depression, neither is mine. HOwever, there are people who have suffered every day year in year out for ages with no relief who were helped and not by medications, simply from reading books by a psychologist who chose to teach the average person rather than more psychologists that there is a good alternative for most people and I would have to guess it was high like 80, 90% of people,
and that author Drs name is David D. Burns, and he has a website. I've read "Feeling good, the new mood therapy" focused more on depression and "When Anxiety Attacks" more on anxieties but depression and anxieties do tend to work hand in hand so there seems to be overlap in the same kinds of things that work for one works for the other. Here's His site and I hope this helps you dear. If you need any more convincing to check into the type of treatments he does which is CBT cognitive behavioral therapy and another with the acronym of T.E.A.M. that he personally came up with, heres a quick story of my past. I used to have extreme social anxieties as a kid growing up, couldn't even look people in the eyes, it scared me. So in my Sr. yr of HS I was finally sick and tired of being this way and I asked Jesus for help, how to get over this and healed. He gave me one instruction at a time to master until I was ready for the next and decades later, I read When Anxiety Attacks and was amazed to find that the exact treatment given for that particular anxiety in his book was the exact things that Jesus told me long ago that healed me. So I am serious when I mention these books. I loved the videos of the Dr. explaining how he got started in this and the comments from readers who had suffered all their life, some in old age, who were finally healed as soon as using his material. There are mores Dr.s everywhere using CBT and thats what you look for if you need to or ask on the website for referrals if reading the book isn't enough. It truly is quite overwhelming a read and hard to interpret yourself and exactlty which set of things is causing your issues cus it can be more than one.
HEres the site and do write back to let me know how any of this works for you.
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