Battling with Depression

I read an interview with Lars von Trier about his recently released movie Antichrist. Another thing that has interested me in him and his film ouevre is that he is a person battling severe clinical depression and anxiety. I feel I can relate to his experience. I myself have experienced mental illness and still fight battles with it on a daily basis. Medication and therapy help to varying degrees, but a person still has to deal with the memories and cycles that his/her emotions go through. Lars von Trier made Antichrist while in the low of his depressive state. Making art while depressed is one of the most difficult endeavors. There is no energy to be had, no ability to focus, no ability to think. In this state one does not care about anything, not even oneself.

Watching the movie is like feeling that again, but it is a relief it is outside of myself. It is also a relief that deeply personal state is felt by others and put out there for others to share. Many people maybe never will or ever want to feel that way, but if you survive it, there is great lesson to be learned. I cannot say what that lesson is, but you have dug a deeper well for joy to inhabit.

The sense of control that one has over their life, if you have a mental illness, is not very palpable. Maybe that is a lesson that is better learned sooner in life than later. I believe things should not be forced because in that way they lose their genuineness. If you are living with a mental illness, you learn to wait. You don't take things for granted. This unpredictable entity that your life seems to have to sacrifice its efficiency to serves as a reminder that you are not in control. No one is.