(May 21, 2014 at 6:58 pm)Mozart Link Wrote: I have chronic depression and I feel that since this is the only life of enjoyment you have and pleasure is the very reason we live, depression is what takes away this only life of enjoyment you have. Since this is the only life of enjoyment you have, I feel that this life should be fully enjoyed (perfect) in the sense of there being no depression to hold any of your pleasure back. Of course, you could ignore any problems in your life (even a problem in this case that takes away your very reason of living) and choose to focus on the bit of pleasure and other things you already have in this life.
But take, for example, someone who has severe chronic depression that lasts their entire life and they can't hardly enjoy anything, just for this person to know that there is an afterlife in which they can experience full joy for all eternity would be of severe benefit and would severely benefit me in my case because not only would they experience full joy for all eternity, but this would also make up for everything that they lost in this life. The last thing that such a person would ever want to hear would be "make the best of this life" when they hardly even have this ability at all. Even that ability itself has been almost completely taken away by depression as well.
Sorry about your depression. It seemed, when I experienced that, like the comparisons sure didn't help. I found actually doing projects without expectation helpful. At some point, I decided not to be a whore for pleasure. No jumping through hoops in order to elicit some hoped for positive subjective state. Now of course there is medication so perhaps you needn't be prepared to throw the pursuit of pleasure away altogether. But for me, it was only when I let that go that it gradually came back.
