Put Down the Razorblade and Take a Vacation...Across the Street or into a Sack Lunch...

Here I am sitting in my office, staring blankly at my monitor, waiting, waiting some more, and to top it off I've decided to wait a bit. For what? I'm not sure. But I have every confidence that when, whatever it is comes along I'll recognize it as what I'm waiting for.
It's not friends, got those. It's not money, don't have enough of it but I'm doin' alright. It's not religion, I've had that for awhile.

Maybe it's something as small as good weather? It's been bleak and dreary here, as it has been all over the East Coast. Down in the fair and beautiful state of North Carolina we've had a bunch of rain, cold weather, and overcast skies. If you were to travel in a northernly fashion away from Eastern North Carolina, you'd end up seeing some snow, which if it's not still snowing, is now mush and slush.

I mentioned all of that to mention an article that I was forwarded by ITE, yesterday:

Evidently yesterday was 'clinically' proven to be the most depressing day of the year. When Initially heard/read that I thought 'wow!'. I would have thought that the most depressing day would be everyday considering that everyday in 2001, 84 people committed suicide. (According to the National Center forInjury Prevention and Control) So making the blanket statment that any one day is more depressing than any other has, at least in 2001, 84 people disagreeing with you. According to, psychologist, Cliff Arnell who at the time of this epiphany was a part-time lecturer at the University of Cardiff Centre for Lifelong Learning in Wales, he has devised a method, nay a formula, to calculate something as seemingly intangible as depression. It reads as follows:
[W + (D-d)] x TQM x NA.
All of the letters and symbols apparently represent a sort of mathematical code to track the following:
W: How bad the weather is at this time of year.
D: Amount of debt accumulated over the holidays minus how much is paid off.
T: The time since the holidays.
Q: Amount of time passed since New Year’s resolutions have gone south.
M: Our general motivation levels.
NA: The need to take action.

I'm about to attribute the fact that I'm taking snippets, word for word out of the article found on MSN.com in the Health and Fitness section. If you would like to read the article in it's entirety here's the link: Good Day to Stay in Bed?.

Evidently his formula was born out of a need to sell more winter getaways for a company called Sky Travel. Who in a moment of marketing genius decided that if they brought science to the plate, people would respond better. Thus be more likely to spend their money with a company that cares so much about their customers that, they took the initiative to research the inner workings of their minds. After delving into the dark canyons of their minds they've concluded that if they took a vacation after the new year they would be better equiped to ward off feelings of inadequacy.

Here's what one person had to say about his theory:

“It’s based on no science, no research and it’s incredibly gimmicky,” says Ellen McGrath, Ph.D., president and founder of Bridge Coaching Institute in New York City. “But as a marketing strategy, it’s brilliant.”

I'm an alumnus of the school of thought that promotes surrounding yourself with positive people, maybe renewing your faith, or even shooting for the stars and accomplishing something this year that isn't as trivial and quiting smoking or losing weight. Those things are good and they are certainly fantastic goals to have for improving your exsistance but all of those have selfish motivation. I pose a challenge: instead of looking "IN" at your problems, look "OUT" and help someone through one or all of their issues. I have found that whenever I'm feeling down and out, looking at why I'm stuck in a rut, doesn't help. Re-aligning your focus exclusively on yourself, blots out the people in your life and I believe leads to a type of depression that is total and close it inescapable. Most often people get depressed because they feel that their lives lack purpose or the purpose they thought they were fulfilling ends up being diminutive and moot. If your purpose is the people around you then you've got a constant, actual purpose, because there will always be people around you that need someone to talk to or need someone to act as a sounding board for ideas or issues that they are facing in their; personal, professional, spiritual, or any other aspect of their lives that may be in a state of upheaval.

Where vacations are a good way to get away and clearing your head, I find that focusing on a different problem often helps or not focusing on anything. You can take a vacation everyday, by talking to someone that you've never talked to before, taking a different route home, stepping back and looking at your routine and figuring out how you can mix it up a bit, eat lunch somewhere else, bring your lunch with you. I'm glad that people have all this time on their hands to do "...gimicky..." un-research, research but ultimately you've got the power to be depressed or not.

There's what I was waiting for... I hope that it's helps...if it doesn't I'm here for you....

Piece Out...