Many of us have lived with guilt, shame and regret for our past.  Until we got down to business – that is taken a moral inventory – did we desire that the  God of our understanding help us see what we needed to do to forgive our selves and get on with our lives.

As the Promises state in so simple a manner, this does not mean that “oh well  we made some mistakes so let’s just forget about everything that happened in the past.”  We can spend a lot of wasted time wallowing in the self-pity that occupies our addiction. We also might regret all the time we have spent staring  at a blank wall, alone and trying to figure out in the circling of our thought the  “whys” of our immobility, passivity and pain.

It is in Steps Four and Five where our past regrets are played out and dealt  with. Once we have made a list of all our resentments and fears and spoke of them to a trusted friend we can begin to feel a new sense of freedom.

When we suppress a negative emotion an refuse to deal with it, either consciously or unconsciously, it becomes one of those blocks that form the walls of our personal prison. This unexpressed emotions can foster and boil over so that our energy level is dissipated, scattered . We find ourselves and our will weakened. We discover that with the internal war raging  inside of us we,  can hardly find the energy to get to work and /or roll ourselves out of bed a morning. The pain from depression freezes all efforts at mobility.

We discover that our ability to make ourselves do something is now beyond our personal strength and power. We have become helpless. We also discover that we are powerless. Our will power has no control over our feeling depressed,

How do we know that this particular Promise will come true for me? The only thing that we can rely on is our own experience. Our experience tells us that the more we live non the  solution of the Promises of Depressed Anonymous that the  serenity and peace is ours for the moment.

We have discovered that it is when we begin to live in the solution that our solution focused program leads us past the fear of what might happen to the serenity of the present moment. Our freedom begins when we start to reflect consciously on what is happening now at this very moment, I have noticed that it is when I become conscious  about what I am feeling –  the direct result of my thinking –it is at that moment that I make conscious  decisions to bring myself back to the present. ”

(c) Depressed Anonymous, 3rd edition. (2011) Depressed Anonymous Publications. Louisville, KY.

(c) The Promises of Depressed Anonymous : Planting a seedbed of hope.(2002) Depressed Anonymous Publications. Louisville. KY.  40241.  # 3/12 Promises.