Depression is a physical, mental, spiritual, and hormonal imbalance. It affects your mind, your body, your actions, and self-esteem. You feel worthless, helpless, or guilty without knowing why. You feel restless at night, having trouble to sleep or wake up.

You no longer feel the pleasure of doing certain things that you normally do happily. You constantly feel irritable for no reason. You can’t even imagine that anything will improve for you. That is just how it feels and believe me it is an illness that needs serious attention both medically, physically, and spiritually.

Depression comes to steal your joy, happiness, confidence, and anything good in your life. Treating depression is like treating your whole body, mind, and soul in order to feel better. As far as I am concerned, depression is a spirit and an evil one at that. It has killed teenagers, adults, and many great people. You may look sound on the outside but slowly you are rotting away inside.

Psychologically, it’s been proven that treating soul-sickness may mean you treating your mind first. Because our thinking shapes who we are and how we feel, due to how the human brain responds fast to what’s on the mind. I personally believe that depression is a problem of negative reaction to our situations or circumstances, and we must start from the inside to tackle it. You will also need to learn how to maintain a positive and Godly attitude towards this disorder.

The secret is refocusing your mind on the positive, i.e. taking your mind off that which is depressing you and putting it on that which makes you feel good about yourself. There is what is called the ‘Laws of Attraction’ and our mind (the conscious and subconscious mind) are like magnets, they draw towards us what we think about, whether sorrow or joy, evil or good.

You can’t attract what you don’t think about. – Naomi Destiny.

If depression comes knocking at your door as it did to me last week, you can push him or her out by doing any of the following.

• Meditating on all the good things God has done for you. If he hasn’t done you any good, at least being alive is a good thing. Always remember that when we allow His perfect love to flood our hearts, fear and other negative depressive thoughts won’t find a place in us.

• Record your joys. This attitude of keeping a gratitude journal is a good thing to do, and it can as well increase your energy and relieve you of the pain you feel. I went through my 2015 gratitude journal yesterday and I was amazed by all the incredible and joyful moments I had experienced.

• Avoid too much sugar. Studies have shown that a diet that is low in carbohydrates, high in fat and sugar may improve symptoms of depression. Exercise, eat well, and stay healthy.

• Pray. Prayer and meditation are two different things. Prayer is a chat session with God, while meditation is a mental health exercise that keeps you in the present while you breathe or think. Don’t allow depression to take away what you deserve. Pray and fight for your inner peace.

Finally, the journey of life is not easy but can be made easy and though many times it gets hard, your body will eventually get tired and your mind will become exhausted but, you must keep pushing forward. Don’t give up, you are stronger than this.