Depression as a Spiritual Journey
By Stephanie Sorrell

When I was 17 years old I had my first experience of depression.
There was no reason for this as, before, I was an active sporty teenager who had just left school and was looking forward to a career in nursing. This bout of debilitating depression was severe and relentless; lasting 3-4 months where I couldn’t sleep or eat, and where my strong will was eclipsed by a sense of powerlessness. I was plagued by suicidal thoughts and felt unable to continue working. Consequently, I left my career, thinking the depression was due to making a wrong choice and found a certain amount of relief in writing. As depression made me feel cut off from the strong sense of the Divine I had always experienced, being creative and in touch with nature gave my life some sort of meaning and purpose. By mid summer that same year I experienced a sense of euphoria and union with that spiritual presence that seemed to have abandoned me. Additionally, I experienced a deep sense of oneness with all life. This is when I applied for another career. But after twenty months into it, I plunged into a depression that was so severe I was forced to abandon that too and resort to a medication that made me feel like a zombie so I couldn’t continue with it.
This descent into annual ‘darkness’ greatly compromised my ability to
develop any career or even to be able to work. But as time went by one thing I was sure of was that the Divine never left me, and especially in the times when I was too ill to sleep or drink. In fact the Divine suffered with me. And I realise now, looking back at the age of 52, that the suffering itself has been the spiritual matrix for my writing career.
For those of you familiar with depression, in psychological terms, these swings between high and low episodes is often referred to as Bipolar Disorder. Through the lens of my training in Psychosynthesis psychology I have come to understand that the euphoria experienced in Bipolar Disorder is a direct contact with the Transpersonal, but often becomes interpreted on the level of the personality rather than the level of soul and spirit which can it can give rise to grandiosity and narcissism.
In the UK especially in the spiritual ‘new age’ milieu there is a lot of shame around being depressed or taking medication that can alleviate the emotional and mental anguish. Because of this I struggled with a sense of guilt when I was to try medication again in my late 40s. I was to encounter a similar mindset when I entered the field of psychology.
.A few years ago, in the midst of my training to be a Psychosynthesis Guide, I made a decision to end my life as I felt I was becoming too much of a burden to my partner.
The level of inner anguish I was suffering was worsening to such a degree that I could no longer carry on. I remember saying to God “If you really want me to do something useful in the world, you have to show me… I can’t continue in this pain any more”
Even in my darkness I was aware of the presence of the Divine, the deep love and compassion. I had written my Will and those around me who had stood by me through my process, supported me in this, even my therapist. This might seem a negative thing to do, but somehow this was the turning point. My partner persuaded me one last time to go to the doctor and seek another medication as nothing had really worked that well for me. The result was I was put on one of the SSRI’s which really worked for me, and although I have made several adjustments since and I still experience descents, medication seems to work well for me. I acknowledge I have a serious illness that has run through my family for generations and driven many to suicide, but I also accept that at the moment I am living in a state of ‘Grace’
Despite all my former resistance to this genetic flaw in my make-up, it has also been the training school I have had to attend on earth. I do see that depression is a spiritual journey and that we need to be less concerned with how to overcome it, than how to extricate the gifts that it can give us in the form of creativity, empathy, humility together with a love that will not let us go. God really suffers with us and how can there be shame in this? Suffering of any nature is a learning opportunity and if we can connect with the nucleus of our suffering, we learn God is suffering with us.
I wrote my last book, Depression as a Spiritual Journey after this became the
subject of my thesis. It was my tutor who suggested I write a book about it in the hope of reaching a wider audience.

I would like to end here with a poem that I wrote in my late 20s when I seemed to be at the bottom of a well of darkness and which brought me in touch with the light that can be held in this darkness.




MAY I EVER BE THANKFUL

May my heart be too full of love to allow
fear and judgement admission.
Instead of feeling inadequate,
may I bear my lantern with pride.
Out of my inner pain, may I learn
to touch my fellow creatures with
healing fingers of compassion and understanding.
May the silent tears I have shed cleanse me
of all bitterness

Oh-Nameless One
Whose breath colours the dawn
and whose music spins liquid chords
across the most desolate heart.
May I ever be thankful...