Hello beloved child of God, I hope you’re fine by God’s grace and I hope you’ve had an awesome week.
We’re coming to the end of our series on depression. Through out this series, we’ve talked about so many things:
- The origins of depression
- Our internal dialogue
- Choosing our thoughts
- Changing our life-lenses
- Defeating our fears
- Receiving healing from depression
Right now, we’re going to talk about preventing depression relapse.
I’m assuming by now that all what has been shared these previous weeks had helped you, and that God has set you free from depression.
Nevertheless, as we said in the beginning, depression has everything to do with deep sadness, and anyone can be sad anytime. Many things will happen in someone’s life even after they’ve been healed from depression. Pain, heartbreak, grief, job loss, any of these things may cause sadness and depression relapse.
How can you prevent depression relapse then?
Here below are a few tips to prevent depression relapse
1. Don’t Be Too Self Confident
Proverbs 3:5-6 NIV
Trust in The Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to Him, and He will make your paths straight.
Excessive self-confidence can make you stop watching out for signs of relapse.
When you’re overly convinced that you’re unable to get depressed again, you may not watch out for signs of relapse and you may not realize when you’re stepping back little by little into depression; starting back to have sleepless nights, getting back to avoiding people, having dark thoughts, losing appetite, avoiding physical activity.
When you’re overly self-confident, you’ll think “I’m okay now, I have it altogether” it becomes easier for you to not pay attention to the little signs of relapse.
What you need to do is not to have confidence in yourself but to have confidence in God to preserve you from falling back into Depression.
Also, you need to check on your feelings every week. You have to be consistent.
Every week you have to study your feelings, and make sure that you’re not falling back into depression. You’ll have to make a checkup and ask relevant questions to know what’s going on in your mind. You’ll have to document it and work on your emotions and on your thoughts. Every exercise which was given through out this series, you have to apply it in your daily life to prevent relapse.
2. Don’t Go Through Life Unprepared
You probably have a faint idea of what would normally make you fall back into depression. For example
- The death of a loved one
- Losing a huge amount of money
- Losing your job
- A broken relationship
- Failing at exams
Since you already know that this would potentially make you depressed you have to try to prevent it from happening and/or prepare a plan so that even if it happens you won’t relapse into depression.
This would imply developing prayer strategies, and also working hard at your own level on preventing some of those things.
It will also imply preparing yourself and knowing what you will do if any of those things happen, and keeping in mind that God will never let you down and that you’ll be able to find refuge in Him whatever happens.
Proverbs 18:10 NIV
The Name of the Lord is a fortified tower; the righteous run to it and are safe.
3. Cultivating Gratitude
1 Thessalonians 5:16-18 NIV
Rejoice always, pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.
Last tip I’ll give for preventing relapse is cultivating gratitude.
I know I’ve already asked you to have many diaries but it would be nice to have a gratitude diary. Every night before going to bed, record the things throughout the day which made you happy and which gave you satisfaction. Thank God for all those things. Praise Him for what He does for you everyday.
Keeping your mind focused on the positive will prevent you from being focused on what’s negative.
Conclusion
Depression is kind of like flu. You can catch in many times throughout your life due to seasons of sadness, grief, loss, and pain.
With the strategies developed through out this series on depression, you’ll be able to prevent relapse as you keep trusting God, being grateful to Him and preparing yourself for life.
Prayer
Father Lord God Almighty I thank You because Jesus Christ was wounded for me to be healed from depression. By His stripes I have been healed from depression, in Jesus Christ’s Name. Amen.
It’s Now Your Turn
What are you grateful for today? Do you consider yourself free from depression?
Please let us know in the comments section.
Please don’t forget to share this blog post on your social media accounts and to invite your friends and family members to join us as we’re ending our series on depression. You may save a life by sharing.
If you’ve not done it yet, subscribe to my Newsletter so as not to miss any post on depression and also, make sure to invite anyone whom you know is suffering from depression.
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Invitation
Click here if you’re looking for a church. I recommend Elevation Church to you. A wonderful Christ-centered Church in which you aren’t limited by your location and in which you can see what God can do through you.
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God bless you
Victoria Eyog
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