Depression in a Sane World

I recently started working at the place that greets you with a smile and have been introduced to the mind-numbing process of stacking boxes after taking them off a conveyor. That is basically the entire job description, that is, until I get a bump in the responsibilities I'm allowed to handle. Then we can add pushing boxes in different directions, and taking piles of boxes to designated outbound areas.

I wish it were as simple as saying I'm depressed because of my job, but I've been depressed for a while now, and even antidepressants can't hold back the dull mellow flow of tar that seeps into my every joint. I do, however, take another medication that makes me feel slow and sticky. No, it's not really any of that. I think I'm at a point in life where I'm desperately searching for meaning in everything I do, which is why I need to write, to exist, otherwise I'm just alive, stacking boxes. Maybe a shot at Human Resources would give me the edge I need to feel something, but for now I need to bide my time and stack those boxes. This feeling I get when I look out at the horizon of normality in the world, where everything is the way it should be for us, the way we've been told we must accept things to be, is something else entirely. I see people at work every day I go, and they all seem to be caught up in their own little sane world, same as me. They don't look like they have anything but the purpose of stacking and pushing boxes, but I bet there's a world inside them I cannot see, and won't be able to no matter how hard I try to budge the gates to their hidden lands. Meanwhile, a building can be full of people, and here I am alone with nothing to do but journal my thoughts. I began to realize that many people out there live following the norm without a clue of meaning in their lives, without knowing they can strive for greater things. I wonder sometimes whether or not they secretly hold a dream they latch on to and hope to behold someday. I honestly don't know - people are alien to me no matter how much I study them.

What brings meaning to your life? What do you do, what can you do? Are you lacking something to make you feel alive? The truth is there are many people out there suffering of depression, and a lot of these people hold regular jobs, doing what they can to survive. And so many of these people end up killing themselves. Have you ever thought of killing yourself? I have, many times before. As I feel the multitude of people falling into depression this very moment, I get a sense of purpose myself, to try and become a beacon of light to those who've lost themselves. I know you are feeling similar to me, that you might be wounded, bleeding out as you walk the path of sanity. There is nothing wrong with you. Society is broken in many different ways. The world we live in is an artificial world we've created, one we're not adapted to because we haven't evolved to accept it naturally. This pain that you feel, is nothing other than your discontent, your anger, the anger you can't let go, because it can't find a place to fall on. It is a feeling of being nothing, and going nowhere. But you know the answer, of what you need to get past this, of what it is that you've lost so long ago. What did you ever want to be as a child? Or what does the child in you still want? You want to be a super hero? Save people's lives? Or maybe you want bring justice to those who are deserving? Guess what; you still have time to change your life around and strive for something meaningful. But you're going to have to suffer for what you want.

I believe, however, that the way our lives are structured, socially, things can't work out the way they should for our benefit. The truth is that there are jobs that no one dreams of doing, nevertheless need doing. At least it is hard to picture someone dreaming of being a box pusher or selling burgers at someone else's franchise. The system already favors the pooling of the working class so that there is never a lack of people to fill out the basic structure of our society. If the government really cared, there would be a lifetime plan set out to give everyone a shot at their dreams. But everyone is set up to fail, because that is what benefits everyone higher up, so the economy won't implode. That's reason enough for you to shove it in their faces, that they're wrong to say you've already failed. That is reason enough for you to try extra hard to become something great, and make something of yourself, even if it is only to your standards. It's all that matters - what you want - not them. A little every day, that's all it takes.