Meta-Depression and Meta-Anxiety: When Mental Illness Turns on Itself

Meta-depression and meta-anxiety are phenomena that are rarely discussed in conversations surrounding mental illness. Yet they are common experiences for depressed and anxious people. These terms refer to the fact that one’s own depression or anxiety can itself become a contributing factor in – or aspect of – the mental health condition in question. In…

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The Phenomenology of Depression: What It’s Like When the ‘Dark Fog’ Descends

Phenomenology is a philosophical movement, founded by Edmund Husserl (1859 ­– 1938), which concerns itself with direct experiences. Phenomenologists study the nature of consciousness as it is experienced subjectively in the first person. Through systematic reflection on experiences from the first-person point of view, Husserl believed we could better understand the structures of consciousness and…

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Book Review: The Spell of the Sensuous by David Abram

I really do consider this a truly paradigm-shifting book even though I didn’t buy into all of the assumptions written here. Author David Abram admits that even though there might not be any ‘literal truth’ to the animistic claims of indigenous cultures, he says this is irrelevant because for Abram truths can be ‘literal’ only…

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