Nietzsche said, “He who has a why to live for can bear almost any how.” A year ago this week I tested that theory. I’ve always been depressed. I must have emerged from my mother’s womb with an overactive amygdala and a deficient prefrontal cortex–creative brain wiring that generates panic and sadness. I was almost...

I spent this morning looking for a beautiful quote I read about a month ago, something along the lines of what motivational speaker John Bradshaw said: “I define a ‘good person’ as somebody who is fully conscious of their own limitations. They know their strengths, but they also know their ‘shadow’ – they know their...

Nietzsche said, “He who has a why to live for can bear almost any how.” A year ago this week I tested that theory. I’ve always been depressed. I must have emerged from my mother’s womb with an overactive amygdala and a deficient prefrontal cortex–creative brain wiring that generates panic and sadness. I was almost...

According to renowned psychiatrist Peter Kramer, happiness isn’t the opposite of depression. Resilience is. I’ve always loved that reminder because the word “happiness” makes me uneasy. It’s not that I want to be unhappy, or I don’t want to be happy. It’s that every time I make happiness my goal, I become very unhappy. Like...

In the fall of 2007 Mother Teresa graced the cover of Time magazine when her private writings were published, many of the excerpts filled with surprising doubt, despair, and a kind of spiritual anguish. Some journalists questioned whether or not she was clinically depressed. Did this modern saint have an untreated mood disorder or did her pain...