Are depressed people more realistic?

[naimless]

The total perspective vortex

In 1988, psychologists Shelley Taylor and Jonathon Brown published an article making the somewhat disturbing claim that positive self-deception is a normal and beneficial part of most people’s everyday outlook. They suggested that average people hold cognitive biases in three key areas: a) viewing themselves in unrealistically positive terms; b) believing they have more control over their environment than they actually do; and c) holding views about the future that are more positive than the evidence can justify. The typical person, it seems, depends on these happy delusions for the self-esteem needed to function through a normal day...

Studies into clinical depression have yielded similar findings, leading to the development of an intriguing, but still controversial, concept known as depressive realism. This theory puts forward the notion that depressed individuals actually have more realistic perceptions of their own image, importance, and abilities than the average person. While it’s still generally accepted that depressed people can be negatively biased in their interpretation of events and information, depressive realism suggests that they are often merely responding rationally to realities that the average person cheerfully denies.

...These problems put therapists in the curious position of teaching patients to develop irrational patterns of thinking—patterns that help them view the world as a rosier place than it really is. Counter-intuitive as it sounds, it's justified because what defines a mental disorder is not unreasonable or illogical thought, but abnormal behaviour that causes significant distress and impairs normal functioning in society. Treatment is about restoring a person to that level of normal functioning and satisfaction, even if it means building cognitions that aren’t precisely “rational” or “realistic.”

[Faith No More]

I've always thought so, yes. I have never been able to delude myself from the unsavory aspects my life and life in general. A bunch of my friends from high school were the same way, and each one of us suffered from depression.

[thesummerqueen]

What happens if you're an optimistic realist?

I don't think I suffer any delusions about my control over my situation, and I don't suffer from an inflated sense of self-worth, no matter how much I joke about it. I get sad every day over situations that happen the world over, and angry over suffering that's needless because of greed or religion, but it doesn't stop me from thinking that the problems can and will be solved (even if 'eventually').

But having gone through a year or so of depression and knowing what that was like, and being back to my normal irrepressible self, I don't think in terms of wishing situations away, but that no matter how bad something is realistically, there's always some sort of way back up. I guess I consider myself a cheerful pragmatist.

I never went through therapy, so I don't know what therapists tell their patients in order to get them to better function.

[Something completely different]

Yeah I am a realist due to my depression problem.

I am a miserable drunk fuck who hates this shithole of a so called falting civilisation he wasted his meaningless existance in.

[junkyardboy]

What happens if you're an optimistic realist?

I don't think I suffer any delusions about my control over my situation, and I don't suffer from an inflated sense of self-worth, no matter how much I joke about it. I get sad every day over situations that happen the world over, and angry over suffering that's needless because of greed or religion, but it doesn't stop me from thinking that the problems can and will be solved (even if 'eventually').

But having gone through a year or so of depression and knowing what that was like, and being back to my normal irrepressible self, I don't think in terms of wishing situations away, but that no matter how bad something is realistically, there's always some sort of way back up. I guess I consider myself a cheerful pragmatist.

I never went through therapy, so I don't know what therapists tell their patients in order to get them to better function.

whats to be optimistic about?
your life will end in death
cheerful pragmatist?
the end thereof is death

[Anomalocaris]

I would say if people in comparable situations but who are not depressed do not on average end up worse off then depressed people, then depression is a reflection of a more fundamental lack of realism in ones objectives and measures.

[junkyardboy]

I would say if people in comparable situations but who are not depressed do not on average end up worse off then depressed people, then depression is a reflection of a more fundamental lack of realism in ones objectives and measures.

depressed or optimistic, your end is death

[Anomalocaris]

I would say if people in comparable situations but who are not depressed do not on average end up worse off then depressed people, then depression is a reflection of a more fundamental lack of realism in ones objectives and measures.

depressed or optimistic, your end is death

Then of what value is depression?

[thesummerqueen]

whats to be optimistic about?
your life will end in death
cheerful pragmatist?
the end thereof is death

I'm alive thanks to human brains that came before me who thought about future generations, building up medical sciences so that I could be delivered safely in a hospital to doctors who did everything they could to make sure my mother and I were safe. Since then, I have been taken care of by similar doctors on similar principles.

I live because somehow a patch of slime turned into life that evolved into humans - flawed, magnificent, and future-looking. Life persisted despite incredible odds.

I'm optimistic because when I die, life will still persist. It's what it does. I'm okay with the fact that I won't live forever to see it. I understand that this depresses some people. It doesn't depress me. I will live as best I can, enjoying as much as I can, and I will hopefully live long enough to see a quiet, graceful death, where I want to, like Neil deGrasse Tyson said, be cremated or laid into the earth to nourish things that gave me such pleasure while I lived.

I'm optimistic because things adapt and change - we CAN adapt and change. We have these huge brains capable of imagining and creating whatever we want - even despite bureaucracy and greed and religious stagnation.

I'm optimistic because, as Pablo Neruda said, you can cut down all the flowers but you can't stop the spring from coming.

I'm optimistic because it isn't all about me and the fact that I will die. Others will come after, and they will be better than me and my generation, and they will explore and discover and create, as my generation did better than the one before it.

I'm optimistic because no skydaddy tells me what I do and don't deserve. I belong here, and the universe is mine. It will roll on after me as it did before me, and there will be beauty and death and life and destruction and creation regardless of my part in it, and that is awesome and fascinating and beauty in itself.

[junkyardboy]

whats to be optimistic about?
your life will end in death
cheerful pragmatist?
the end thereof is death

I'm alive thanks to human brains that came before me who thought about future generations, building up medical sciences so that I could be delivered safely in a hospital to doctors who did everything they could to make sure my mother and I were safe. Since then, I have been taken care of by similar doctors on similar principles.

I live because somehow a patch of slime turned into life that evolved into humans - flawed, magnificent, and future-looking. Life persisted despite incredible odds.

I'm optimistic because when I die, life will still persist. It's what it does. I'm okay with the fact that I won't live forever to see it. I understand that this depresses some people. It doesn't depress me. I will live as best I can, enjoying as much as I can, and I will hopefully live long enough to see a quiet, graceful death, where I want to, like Neil deGrasse Tyson said, be cremated or laid into the earth to nourish things that gave me such pleasure while I lived.

I'm optimistic because things adapt and change - we CAN adapt and change. We have these huge brains capable of imagining and creating whatever we want - even despite bureaucracy and greed and religious stagnation.

I'm optimistic because, as Pablo Neruda said, you can cut down all the flowers but you can't stop the spring from coming.

I'm optimistic because it isn't all about me and the fact that I will die. Others will come after, and they will be better than me and my generation, and they will explore and discover and create, as my generation did better than the one before it.

I'm optimistic because no skydaddy tells me what I do and don't deserve. I belong here, and the universe is mine. It will roll on after me as it did before me, and there will be beauty and death and life and destruction and creation regardless of my part in it, and that is awesome and fascinating and beauty in itself.

LOL
what contradictory nonsense.
you live a meaningless life ending in meaningless death in a meaningless universe
surrender to the truth of your atheistic nihilism