In the early nineties my business was great. I had teamed with the best Internet training company I knew, was teaching and maintaining multi-day seminars. Had my best job to date. When I signed to develop a three day training program for a top communications providers, I thought I had arrived... until about a month into it when something strange happened. I became dysfunctional. Knew what I had to do. My mind was arranging the material, but I was unable to set down what I knew.

Unipolar depression was the diagnosis. With talk therapy, an anti-depressant, and radical behavior modification, I returned to my productive self... slowly at first, then more until I was my prior self. As one who had been a professional trainer, an explainer I called myself, this experience defied rational discourse. How is it my mind could form everything needed in the project, but I was unable to execute the idea?

The behavior modification came in talk therapy. We thought toxic thinking was part of the problem. I began writing them each morning. Some several pages, but as time passed, there was less writing and more productivity. Twenty five years later I still write every morning, with a café negro, of course, but my journaling has become more a celebration than toxic dumping, my creative thoughts for the coming day.

If someone you know is depressed, they don't need to cheer up, they need help.