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Have you ever wondered why there is an ever-increasing number of depressed people on our planet? Study after study shows this is the case. The World Health Organization (WHO) reports that nearly six percent of men and nearly ten percent of women worldwide suffer from depression sometime during the year.
Despite an increased standard of living, smartphones, vastly improved health care, self-driving cars and a vast mass transportation system, even devices that talk to us, people are becoming and remaining depressed. Today’s children experience depression nearly ten times the rate of their parents when they were the same age. This is truly epidemic.
Dangerous Misconceptions
Is the answer for increasing numbers of depressed beings buried in Dr. Melvin Lertner’s “Just-World Hypothesis:” – “that people are most comfortable when they have control over their own lives and that this is happening less and less every year;” “that people believe they live in a world where the good are rewarded and the bad aren’t,” “or the bad are punished; that people get what they deserve.” This is a dangerous misconception. “If someone is suffering or is being punished, we find it easier to believe that the person must have done something to deserve such treatment.” According to Dr. Lertner, although not all people who do wrong are punished, in his book “The Belief in a Just World: A Fundamental Delusion,” we ask children to “be good” and “promise they will be rewarded in the future.”
Unfulfilled Promise of Reward
Does the unfulfilled promise of a reward that never comes contribute somehow to a collective disillusionment? Very possibly. Do depressed people deserve to be depressed? Of course not. But do depressed people blame themselves for things that have happened to them? That could explain part of this epidemic. “Self-blame, guilt, helplessness and shame, irrationally arise when bad things happen and these can lead to depression” according to Australian Psychologist Dorothy Rowe.
Stop Blaming Ourselves
When we learn to realize that we create our own beliefs and perceptions, we can think more rationally about negative experiences. Bad things do happen but not because we deserve them to happen. We must learn to recover from any negatives and stop blaming ourselves, This will help reverse these alarming trends.
This report is not a diagnosis. We hope this information can guide you toward improving your life.
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