The Valley Of Ennui, The Cliffs Of Depression, Or Maybe It Is Just Weltschmerz

I was out with friends on Wednesday night. I ran into another friend that I had seen just a few days before. She asked me, "How are you doing?" I started to answer her with my, "I am just fine.", reply. But the moment I said the word "I", the "am not doing so great", came our of my mouth. It was too late to take it back. So when she asked, "What is wrong?", I had to come clean.

I really didn't know how to describe what I am feeling. Depression seems to be too harsh and too neat. I don't feel sad, gloomy, or withdrawn or angry. In fact when I looked up the signs and symptoms of depression I fit very few of them. Same with the symptoms of ennui. I fit some but not many. So I guess that leaves me with Weltschmerz.

World pain. A feeling that comes from living in a world that you perceive to be one way, and then having to come to grips with how it really is.

I am guessing here, but I think there are others that are dealing with this situation, whatever it is. My friend said she too was feeling a lot of stress and depression, that it is so not like her. I decided to share this with ATS when my mother who is always the ray of sunshine for everyone, overheard me talking with my Brother and my Sister about how I was feeling, and they said they were feeling the same way. Spoke up and said, "Well since we are being honest here, I have been feeling the same way for a while".

I never thought I was alone, but it seems there are a lot more experiencing one of the three, something in between, or all three. It seems our numbers are many.

a reply to: NightSkyeB4Dawn

You touched on the proper term for what you're experiencing in your OP...'SITUATIONal' depression.

a reply to: NightSkyeB4Dawn
Or maybe angst?
That’s when you can’t count on being happy or being loved, but you can count on being able to terrify yourself at a moment’s notice. Resolve to mindfully observe the painful thoughts and emotions without feeding them with stress-filled commentary. Buddha practiced Metta which is the simple act of well-wishing toward oneself and others. Ans upekkha, or equanimity, which refers to feeling content and at ease with whatever life brings.
In the end, you control how you feel and no one else. My mom used to read the obituaries every morning so one day I asked her why. She said because all of those people woke up yesterday and none of them thought to live it like it was their last one. That stuck with me and anytime I would fell down or like the world was a wreck I would think about that and if this was my last day would the world being a wreck really matter to me. People are becoming to connected to all the problems in the world since we are constantly plugged in. So you have to unplug for awhile(a day or a week even) or it will drain you. I hope you and everyone around you find some inspiration to find happiness

originally posted by: IAMTAT
a reply to: NightSkyeB4Dawn

You touched on the proper term for what you're experiencing in your OP...'SITUATIONal' depression.

I like that term. But I can't think of one good reason to be depressed about the situation, my situation is in.

On a personal level, I am in the best place I have ever been in life. I can't even blame age, because I am blessed to be this old, when I consider the alternative.

I never realized just how important the freedom to come and go as I pleased really was, until covid hit. I've always preferred to stick close to home, and found shopping to be a chore- but it did get me out of the house.

I miss the freedom to come and go; grabbing a latte or having lunch out with friends. Seeing a movie with my granddaughter, or attending her sweet sixteen birthday in April. I miss the little things I most likely will never have in my life again. While it makes me sad, I still have too many blessings in my life to become depressed.

a reply to: NightSkyeB4Dawn


We used to live in a world where your day wasn't dominated by crazy coming at you from every angle.


We are constantly expecting the next thing to impact our lives in a negative way and our representatives keep delivering.


It's designed to wear you down until you just accede or crack.

It's incremental psychological torture delivered with a smile as if you are losing your mind.

Everything we have been conditioned to see as normal has now been thrown on the trash heap while we are being lectured by the rich and powerful how bad we are as human beings while they live it up and openly ridicule us.

While the declare a no holds barred open season on us we do our best to keep calm and act with restraint.






As if a total war on us haven't been declared by these insidious #s.



Ever seen the movie Misery?






ETA : The problem is not with you. It's the fact that we tell ourselves to remain civil when they are out to destroy us and turn a profit while they're at it.


Either they destroy everything we hold dear or there comes a time when good men are going to have to do very bad things to very bad people.

a reply to: mcsnacks77

People are becoming to connected to all the problems in the world since we are constantly plugged in. So you have to unplug for awhile(a day or a week even) or it will drain you. I hope you and everyone around you find some inspiration to find happiness.

That is were the confusion comes in. My sister calls it "the gray area". This is not about sadness or happiness. All of us admit that life is good, and we are not unhappy. That is why I don't use the word "depression" to describe the feeling. It is not boredom, that is why I don't like to call it ennui. There is more yearning than angst involved. It is more of a feeling of yearning for the impossible, while accepting what is.

I also think that being plugged into the world may play some part for me, but my brother, sister, and mother, are about as unplugged as you can get. My mother and sister are retired. My sister spends the majority of her time on the road or on the lake. My brother is on the road a lot, and works from home. Neither of them watch the news, and spend very little time with the TV. My mother is a community elder, so she never watches the news and if she watches TV it is the oldie stations. So for them the media and the internet are not a factor.

I like IAMTAT's word "situational depression", though in my case it believe "situational weltschmerz", is a better description. I need to get back to my daily walk, and maybe after the coming time change, it will start to lift.

originally posted by: NightSkyeB4Dawn

originally posted by: IAMTAT
a reply to: NightSkyeB4Dawn

You touched on the proper term for what you're experiencing in your OP...'SITUATIONal' depression.

I like that term. But I can't think of one good reason to be depressed about the situation, my situation is in.

Situational Depression is like that.
It can occur cyclically...when triggers set it off.
Triggers can be certain times of the year...for example...if a loved one died this time of the year...even if it was several years ago...your subconscious will experience the sadness in real time without knowing the cause.

a reply to: NightSkyeB4Dawn

I know exactly how this is and have been feeling it for two years, though I've now got a side of disillusion with mine.

What is getting me is the extreme insensitivity of those who feel they are right purely because they are reinforced by the government/media. My family/friends wouldn't hear my concerns from the beginning. I'm not asking them to hold the same beliefs/values but when I'm clearly not the same any more and they ask why I'm not joyful anymore, I get lectures about what they saw on CBC etc., that I'm insensitive, not caring.

I'm not allowed to participate in events I've put over ten years of my life working toward, so I'm losing interest. That makes me super sad. My mom and dad shouted me down saying I'm selfish for not getting the vax despite my history of weird reactions to medication, don't want me at their home, and then my mom went so low as to invite me out for lunch for my birthday, knowing full well I can't go. I'm done with everything which is why I support the truckers but losing even more personal support as now the last few who agreed to disagree think I'm weak minded, siding with racist, white supremacists. FFs.

Sorry to rant. Feeling down today and your post is truly apt in it's description.

Much love to you and all on ATS. We are strong.

a reply to: NightSkyeB4Dawn

Angst is defined as emotional turmoil. Plugged in is not in the media sense. Plugged in is having your cell phone with you all the time. So we are never alone, no getting away from everything. I remember a time when you went on a vacation for a week and where you stayed at had no phones. Even if it did, no one was calling you.
People wonder why long ago a persons life span was 200-300 years, one reason was no artificial light and noise. Your body produces flavin in your blood which reacts with the melanin in your skin that alerts your body that it’s time to get up. Artificial light causes it to constantly tell your body it’s time to be awake. This causes our brains to never get any rest. When do we use the most artificial light? The winter.

originally posted by: IAMTAT

originally posted by: NightSkyeB4Dawn

originally posted by: IAMTAT
a reply to: NightSkyeB4Dawn

You touched on the proper term for what you're experiencing in your OP...'SITUATIONal' depression.

I like that term. But I can't think of one good reason to be depressed about the situation, my situation is in.

Situational Depression is like that.
It can occur cyclically...when triggers set it off.
Triggers can be certain times of the year...for example...if a loved one died this time of the year...even if it was several years ago...your subconscious will experience the sadness in real time without knowing the cause.

I understand situational depression. The big dis-qualifier is that I am not sad, I am not unhappy. It is more of a blue funk. A gray atmosphere were something seems off, but you can't pinpoint it. I start out happily motivated, and my enthusiasm dies off quickly. This leads me to have 20 different tasks going at the same time. All started enthusiastically, then it fades off, and another project takes its place. I seem to be distracted easier, and it is harder for me to stay focused or on task.

I seem to be way too content with doing nothing. Something that is very foreign to me.

a reply to: igloo

Find likeminded people in your community to restore some balance.

Human beings are not meant to go it alone.

a reply to: NightSkyeB4Dawn

Don't know it this will help, or hurt.

Sometimes it can be useful to look at a situation from a different, even "opposite" perspective; to focus on, and allow the "white space" of the picture to define the image.

In that regard,

Like many on this site, many of whom have subsequently left this site, I felt/sensed a "Big Change" in the offing prior to the onset of the pandemic; back then this "feeling of impending doom" was attributed to the start of WWIII, or the arrival/invasion of aliens from space, or maybe the imposition of a "New World Order" economy. Whatever it was to be, it was to be The Ultimate BAD, and "preppers" had spent years rehearsing for it.

When "IT" seemed to turn out to be a global-economy stopping pandemic, and not a video game-inspired nuclear holocaust/alien harvesting invasion/zombie apocalypse, there seemed to be a general sense of...annoyed disappointment. A sort of "Is that all there is?" resignation that settled like a wet, uncomfortably scratchy blanket over a large segment of society.

Especially, it appears, with regard to those who it could be claimed saw themselves as the righteous would be hero survivors of any Apocalypse. For them, the "Call of Duty" video game heroics and glory turned out to be little more than trying to devise endless strategies to avoid cabin-fever crazy kids and spouses.

This was NOT the Apocalypse they were Promised, Dagnabbit!


Meanwhile, I, and I hope at least some like me, have thrived. The "New Normal" has presented new opportunities and a new-found confidence I could never had imagined.

Even now, as much of the world watches what appears to be "pissing match" (with potentially massive implications) over Ukraine, I find it exciting, but not terribly worrisome; if pressed, I'd say I feel like I "know where my Towel is" and my "Guide" is in my pocket, and yes, the fish were lovely.

Beyond this, I can't really explain why I'm not more perturbed, suffice to say that I am as surprised by the fact as anyone could be, and extremely grateful as well, of course.

a reply to: Mantiss2021

When "IT" seemed to turn out to be a global-economy stopping pandemic, and not a video game-inspired nuclear holocaust/alien harvesting invasion/zombie apocalypse, there seemed to be a general sense of...annoyed disappointment. A sort of "Is that all there is?" resignation that settled like a wet, uncomfortably scratchy blanket over a large segment of society. Especially, it appears, with regard to those who it could be claimed saw themselves as the righteous would be hero survivors of any Apocalypse. For them, the "Call of Duty" video game heroics and glory turned out to be little more than trying to devise endless strategies to avoid cabin-fever crazy kids and spouses. This was NOT the Apocalypse they were Promised, Dagnabbit!

I don't for a second think that this is the end. I don't even think this is the beginning. It is more like the prequel.

I don't think it will be a Call of Duty Apocalypse, I think it will be closer to a more Biblical one.

I still believed the one that was promised, is on the horizon, but that does not make me depressed. I don't think I will be alive to see the climax, but I do believe that something wicked this way is coming.

I have already made my peace with that.

a reply to: Mantiss2021

Except this isn't the Apocalypse, not even close. At best, this is a slow roll to it. We were told there would be birth pangs.

a reply to: NightSkyeB4Dawn

... Weltschmerz.

World pain. A feeling that comes from living in a world that you perceive to be one way, and then having to come to grips with how it really is. ...

Been feeling this, observing this, and contemplating it for a few months.

Have been calling it : " Depression : not depression. "

Seems to me any sensitive soul must feel it, to some degree.

It's more than palpable now.

Weltschmerz.

The world does feel different now.

We held on for a little while with the hope that everything was going to go back to normal, but it's slowly dawning on us that it's never going back to normal. The world that we were most familiar with is gone. It is kind of disorienting and deeply unsettling at times.

originally posted by: geezlouise
Weltschmerz.

The world does feel different now.

We held on for a little while with the hope that everything was going to go back to normal, but it's slowly dawning on us that it's never going back to normal. The world that we were most familiar with is gone. It is kind of disorienting and deeply unsettling at times.

You are right. Too many are in a state of uncertainty. Last week I got an email from the county stating that the face covering policy has been repealed. It sort of took me by surprise because masks are something that had already been dying off, but I also noticed a decrease in the number of news reports and conversations about COVID.

It is slowly leaving our lives, but the toxic atmosphere it generated, seems to be just as strong and long lingering.

a reply to: NightSkyeB4Dawn
Weltschmerz

World pain. A feeling that comes from living in a world that you perceive to be one way, and then having to come to grips with how it really is.

Wow. You just defined exactly how I have felt, and still do at certain points. I'll be reading into this more.

originally posted by: BodhisattvaStyle
a reply to: NightSkyeB4Dawn
Weltschmerz

World pain. A feeling that comes from living in a world that you perceive to be one way, and then having to come to grips with how it really is.

Wow. You just defined exactly how I have felt, and still do at certain points. I'll be reading into this more.

Though a little over a year has passed it still has that SSDD vibe. I feel guilty saying that because I have had many blessings in this past year, some so great they lean toward the divine.

I guess the only way up, is one step at a time, and to give myself the oomph I need, I should start each day by counting my blessings.

If nothing else, I will be starting my day on the good foot.