Do you have a dissatisfaction of the spirit? Feeling depressed. The blues. Hopeless.

Life is a washed-out gray.

You’re slogging through the day. Day after day. It just seems to be getting harder and harder to take that next step.

• You feel like every day fades into a gray, washed out background.
• Celestial music isn’t sounding quite right. It sounds like the strings are out of tune. Way out of tune.
• You have a closet full of nothing to wear.
• Bookshelves full of nothing to read.

Whew! How awful is that?

You just don’t feel right. You’re out of kilter.

As my life ages into silver wisdom, I realize more clearly that the important thing is how I feel about myself, how I feel about my daily life, how I feel about my work/career. In essence, how I ‘feel.’

I’m sure that how you feel is important to you, too, and it should be. But life roles often push us into making someone else’s feelings, needs, and wants more important than taking care of ourselves.

I understand that. My daughters’ well-being has always been more important than me. That’s just how it is. My husband/partner/mate’s needs and wants were more often important than my own, too.

In fact, back in my 20s, I was such a deep empath that I didn’t even know what I wanted because my life was all about making the people in my family happy, about pleasing my mate, about pleasing my boss.

Which isn’t to say that I didn’t make choices for myself, because I certainly did.

If you’re like me (and since you’re reading this post, you probably are), then you’ve come to the phase III in life when you start wondering about what else there can be.

You may be suffering from a malaise of the spirit, a low-grade depression that may not seem to have a source.

I know how that goes because I’ve been there. Doubting myself. Wondering if I’ll keep making the same mistakes. Wondering if my life will bet better — brighter — happier.

Yes, it has and so can yours.

How to ease your malady of the spirit

There are so many things you can do that will help ease your unhappiness.

• Get out in nature. Gaze at trees. Listen to birds sing. Watch the weeds grow.
• Enjoy, really enjoy, your cuppa coffee, cuppa tea.
• A massage. Mani pedi. Hot bath.
• Call a friend. Meet at the coffee shop.

I’ve tried these and many of them helped.

What helped me most was talking it out with a counselor. Getting some objective feedback.

“You’re kinda depressed,” she said

I went to see my counselor because of a prolonged case of the ‘down in the dumps’ and low motivation. She reminded me that in the last two years, I’ve lost a long term love, my mom died, my dad died, my cats died, I had a health issue, and due to the pandemic, I “lost” part of my career, the work I do to support myself and help the world be a better place — one mindset at a time. That’s plenty to feel depressed about.

I was being too hard on myself, expecting to be a bouncy Pollyanna when I really needed to crawl into my cave and hibernate, letting myself heal.

It really helped to talk about how I feel with someone who isn’t family or friend, who could be objective and listen well.

CATS!!!

What else helped? Cats. Polly and Bunny, who rescued me. Polly is Bunny’s mother, so of course I had to adopt both of them. They had been separated for about 3 weeks when I picked up Bunny after her spay, so Bunny didn’t remember her mom (little bitty hissin’ and spittin’). In this pic, Bunny had just discovered mom’s fluffy tail.

Polly is a one year old sweetheart, a perfect little lap cat. She loves being loved. She’ll search for me when she needs a hug. She purrrrrls in my lap and hugs me.

Because I travel a bit, Polly needs a companion. She’s not a “I’m fine, I don’t want anyone. Just feed me” kind of cat. Polly needs a buddy. So, when the shelter called to say her kitten would be ready next week… how could I not?

Polly and I are still moaning, “What have we done?” Bunny, 2 pounds of trouble. Bunny the ninja kitty, Bunny the kamikaze cat. She’s never still unless it’s naptime. She’s always hopping and ambushing. She is so entertaining! Laughing is definitely good for me.

Push the Re-Set Button

COMING SOON. My four-part workshop, Push Re-Set Button! will be live in Durango CO in October and November. [An online version will be available in December, I hope. It’ll be new technology for me to learn, so I really appreciate your patience.] See you soon!!!

Let’s chat

In the meantime, my Intuitive Brainstorming Chat is open and ready to help you untangle that issue you’re struggling with. https://peggymcmahan.com/product/intuitive-brainstorming-chat-30/

Lotsa hugs,

Peg McMahan HHP CHt LMT

Be a Goddess! Spiritual Sage ♀ Wise Women Awakening

Originally published at https://peggymcmahan.com on September 17, 2022.