If Anyone Can Overcome Depression It’s You
If anyone can overcome depression, it’s you. Many have done it. Most of those in our current society, however, have been taught that overcoming depression isn’t possible. In an effort to refute this fallacy, Jennifer Stirling-Campbell stresses the importance of asking the honest question: Why NOT me?? If anyone can overcome depression (and many have!) it’s YOU! It’s YOUR turn to beat the odds, and begin creating odds in favor of this reality: ANYONE can beat depression! In an effort to make her point, Jennifer even compares life to a video game, and our false identity to a cheetah who doesn’t know he (or she) is a cheetah! Thomas Edison was said to quote: “If we all did the things we are really capable of doing, we would utterly astound ourselves.” This episode of the Overcome Depression Podcast empowers and encourages its listeners to do just that.
This episode is for you if you want to learn:
- How to start believing that YOU can beat depression!
- How you are uniquely equipped to beat depression.
- How to change my family patterns and search for ancestors, whose problems may still be unresolved in you.
- About Roger Bannister, the first person to get an under 4 minute mile.
- Why you are a like a cheetah in captivity.
- How to refute the lies you have been told about depression and how to beat it.
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Full Transcript: Episode #25: If Anyone Can Overcome Depression It’s You
Jennifer Stirling-Campbell (00:01)
Sometimes when I’ve been faced with excruciatingly difficult circumstances, my question has been, WHY ME?? And my question now that I tell myself when I start asking that question is, wait a minute, WHY NOT ME??
After I divorced the first time, I was drug back into court once my ex-husband got remarried. And the situation was pretty scary for me. I’d never been through anything like that before. And I remember a friend came over.
And I was very, very worked up and very worn out with just worry and grief and frustration and fear of what was ahead. I had to prepare to go fight in court. And I basically asked her, why couldn’t this situation, these people just bother someone else? Why couldn’t they just leave me alone?
And she said something very profound that I’ve never forgotten. She said, you know, Jennifer, you’ve been through a lot of really hard things up to this point. And I’m nodding my head and going, yes, I have. She says, and you’ve overcome a lot of them. Yes, I suppose I have. And she went on to say, “Life is a lot like a video game.” Who doesn’t like to play a fun video game where you get to
Challenge the bad guys and save the princess and triumph over all evil and then move up the next level. Basically what you’re doing, Jennifer, is you’ve leveled-up. You’re starting to fight bigger bad guys. It’s the next level of difficulty and that should be a compliment to you of where you’ve come from as well as where you’re going because after you get through this challenge, you’re probably going to be faced with–and more prepared–for bigger, badder bad guys. And not to say that my ex was evil in any way, shape, form, but this was a new challenge for me that I had never encountered, and it was terrifying to me. And I very much feared the outcome at the time. Everything turned out exactly as it should have been. It was all good.
But at the time, I was really upset, really complaining about it. Why me? Why me? Why do I have to go through this? I’m a good person. This isn’t fair. The truth is, life is fair. And I know I’ve said that before. It might not seem that way. But there are those here on the other side, if you feel like you’re alone, you’re never alone. There are those who have our backs that are trying to help us succeed.
And when we are given these challenges we probably contracted for them we probably said, “Yes I will take that challenge; I want to become that person; I want to become that confident, that brave, big of heart
I want to learn as much as I possibly can in one lifetime, which is probably what I said. Why did I ask you that? I had no idea what I was asking for, but yay, here I am achieving all of these things through trial and error and experiences that are really hard. And so now when I experience things or come up against things that are excruciatingly difficult, instead of saying, Why me? In a sense of
This isn’t fair. I don’t want this. I ask, Why me in the terms of what am I supposed to do with this? What am I learning from this? I believe this is a gift in disguise, but I need some help and I need some understanding. Even if it’s just a little bit of glimmer of hope to keep me going so that once I’m at the end of all of this, I can take a breather and it’ll be okay. Just
Tell me it’s gonna be okay that you know I can do this. Because it’s kind of like… we can’t possibly be an amazing athlete if we don’t go to the gym and lift weights or do the thing or work out of the way that we’re supposed to. Those things cause pain. But in the end, they bring us reward, joy, accomplishment, right? And I think that’s the same thing with life.
When we go through things that are hard, it is a compliment to our ability to handle it because I don’t believe that Source or God would ask us or require us or put us in situations, and sometimes we put ourselves in those situations, frankly, but nothing in this life that we won’t be able to handle as long as we are reaching for Source; reaching up to God and asking him to help us do those things. I think when we don’t do that, can be a crash-and-burn experience. I think we all tend to let our ego take over and try to just do what we want to by ourselves. I don’t need any help. I don’t want you.
….your fault I’m going through this anyway. Why would I ask for your help? It’s a gift. Take the help, run with it, learn what you can and kind of see it as a Sherlock Holmes: “What am I supposed to learn from this today?” I know that’s not always easy in the moment.
But I’ve learned that even in the moment, that can bring me some hope, some perspective, and when I can’t see the reason behind it, some peace. Some amount of peace. Just help me to have faith in this. Faith in myself. That I am strong enough, that I’m good enough to do this.
So the next time you find yourself frustrated with life or people and saying, WHY ME?? Instead say, WHY NOT ME?? I can do this.
I am the perfect person for this situation. Clearly I was meant for this and I’m gonna move forward and I’m gonna figure this out.
With that said, I felt a lot of times during my life, especially the first 25 years, a lot of times that thought, ‘Why me? Why am I so sad? Why am I so depressed? Why am I so angry? I don’t want to feel this way. I don’t want to be this way. I don’t want to be me. Why me?’ And I was thinking, I’m trying the best I can. I’m a good person. Why? And I think a lot of people wonder that themselves. I imagine you do.
….that you see other people who don’t struggle with mental illness and think, ‘Why did they…why were they so lucky? Why Was I cursed with this thing? And I honestly feel on a perspective level, try to be open-minded here with me, but I think that when it’s inherited, when we come down here and we’re practically born with the thing, like I was, I don’t remember a day before 25 where I didn’t feel depressed.
I think that I like to think that There’s a loving God who sees families that are struggling generation after generation after generation because of choices that were made that may have caused some depression and a family that’s struggling to get out of this. A lot of baggage we’re carrying these days, a lot of generational things that have worked through into our DNA and our psyche and we live in tough times. That is a very massive truth. But what an honor and a privilege we have to live in these times that we were strong enough to basically take this and you might think, “No I’m not I’m falling apart!” But it’s your opportunity to take these things and turn them into gold. I know you can do it because others have done it I’ve met them personally and I have done it and there was a time when I didn’t think it was possible.
But I do believe that an all-loving God sends people to our special, we’re all special, but certain spirits, to families, to change the pattern of their posterity, to basically heal that line moving forward and backward. I think that goes both ways, that it’s not just us healing ourselves, that we have the ability to heal our posterity and our ancestors when we heal.
And that’s kind of a proxy thing, kind of like what the Christian Atonement believes Christ did for all of us, that we can do for our family.
So what I want to say is if anybody, if anyone can beat depression, it’s you. Because you’re here listening to this right now. And I think there’s a reason for that. There have been many people in the course of this planet’s history who have done quote unquote impossible things. And the story I want to bring up today and talk about is that of Roger Bannister. And if you know that name, he is the man who was the first to beat the four minute mile.
He got a 3:59.4, I think, and he was 25 years old. He was running on a day that wasn’t particularly good weather on a track that wasn’t particularly nice. And at the time, all of these experts were saying, no, no, the body cannot go under four minutes. It’s not humanly possible. It would damage the body and so forth.
And they were saying that even if it was possible, it would have to be under the right conditions. You would have to have a massive crowd and music playing and the athletes would have to be completely rested and have a really compacted track and zero wind and just all the things that would make it like barely maybe possibly you could maybe get close to four minutes. People had been trying to break the four minute mile actively since 1886 when in 1954 that Roger Bannister finally overcame this obstacle. Did the impossible! No one could believe it! And it wasn’t even, I think it was also on a day where it wasn’t a particularly big meet. It was just like kind of just the regular meet for college. It wasn’t any national or even regional event. And he did beat the four minute mile.
Now what’s interesting about Roger Bannister is that he did things differently. He trained differently than most of the other athletes or all of the other athletes as far as I know were training at the time and people called him the lone wolf. They kind of thought he was maybe a little odd. My dad told me that he would get up earlier than most of the other athletes running rain, snow, sleet. He was out there running when other people were asleep, but at least he would tell himself that that ‘I’m out here running training.
Other people are sleeping and that is going to make me win.’ and he would run on sand and do other other things; I haven’t done all the research about all of his methods but they were very different from those other athletes of the time who were long distance and I’m a long distance runner and so this story is very special to me. I love it. I was not able to beat the five minute mile I wanted to or at least get way down there.
I can attest that every millisecond as you get closer and closer to your goal becomes harder and harder to achieve because it’s pushing that limit to the point that your body has never gone before. When I first got started, I could get a best mile time, beat it by 10 seconds, 20 sometimes, and then it became 5 seconds, 4 seconds, 3 seconds, 2 seconds, and then it became if I can just beat it by half a second.
I will be so excited. I got down to 5:11. That was my personal best. And I’m proud of that. I would have liked to do better. I decided not to continue running after my first semester in college. I wasn’t enjoying it enough. I imagine Roger Bannister really loved running; loved what he did.
But I can sympathize with those runners at the time who had this psychological barrier of that’s just too too much. Even that one second of a 401 was just getting to that four minute mark just seemed unattainable.
And what happened next is incredible. Only 46 days after Bannister beat the record, another person beat the record. And it was by another whole second. I think he got a 3:58.
One year later, three runners in the same race beat the record.
Now as of June 2022, the four-minute mile has been broken by over 17,000 athletes.
And the fastest mile is a 3:43, which is what, between 16 and 17 faster than bannisters by a Moroccan runner.
His name is Hitcham El Gweroui and he was 24.
Now want you to think of all of the times that you have heard the information that ‘Once you have depression, it’s just kind of there, you just kind of have to manage it, it’s a permanent part of your life, and here’s a pill, good luck.’ Or that this is just who you are.
Or that beating depression is impossible.
Now, I’m not saying that every single person alive today would absolutely overcome depression because it really does have to come down to a choice and somewhat of a miracle. And if you’re not ready for each, it’s probably not going to happen. However, I do believe that healing is incredible, it’s possible, and it’s possible for you. And I believe that you can overcome depression, as I have.
Because there are people out there who haven’t beat it and because maybe your doctor said it’s not possible or because people have told you maybe that’s just how you are or maybe it’s your chemical makeup. You just inherited this. It’s in your genes. I don’t believe it means that it’s a death sentence for your happiness because you can and you will overcome depression if you believe you can.
And you’re willing to surrender your will, your ego, for truth that is waiting for you over here.
We don’t remember who we are. I don’t think most of us do, in fact. I don’t remember what happened exactly before I was born or what my characteristics were. people will look at an astrology chart and say, hey, you have these qualities or you have these strengths. Cool. But ultimately, my memory is pretty thin when it comes to the premortal realm.
But when you stop to think that maybe you’re more than you think you are, or maybe you’re more than you’re feeling, or maybe you had incredible identity, an incredible purpose, and an incredible purpose here, tasks you were given, people you were supposed to help, that you just don’t remember. There was a story I actually heard at Lindsey Stirling’s concert last week, and I really liked it, so I’m gonna recount it here. I tried to find it online so I could find the source, and I couldn’t do it so if you want to leave in the comments if you know where this came from, awesome! Otherwise, it’s a great story. So basically this woman was observing a cheetah at the zoo and he was in a rather small enclosure, being that he couldn’t necessarily run and achieve the 80 miles per hour speed that a cheetah could do in the wild. The enclosure was too small for that.
So every morning they would feed this cheetah by putting this little mechanical rabbit with meat on it and sending it into the enclosure. And then the cheetah would trot after it and get the meat and eat it. But the point of this story was that this cheetah clearly did not know he was a cheetah or what he was capable of or what he might do if he was let free. He just trotted around and ate his food and was just kind of his needs were taken care of and is good enough. But I think that cheetah would probably achieve a fullness of joy if he could actually run the way his legs were made to carry him. And I think we’re a lot the same way, where we are not fully aware of what we are capable of, what our talents are, what we can do, and we’re trotting around cheetah who doesn’t know he’s a cheetah.
Here is a picture of a dog with three legs. On the other hand, this dog doesn’t seem to know that he has three legs, only he’s running like a champ. Pretty cool. Could we be a three legged dog that runs like we have four legs?
Kids are similar. My child is very brave, very daring, scares me sometimes. I was actually milking my goats yesterday and he likes to come out with me and play with the goats and suddenly I hear this bang bang bang bang on top of the roof of my enclosure and it’s pretty high, like it’s like almost roof height of like a regular house. So first I’m like, gosh what is that? And then I go out and I see him hopping up and down on top of this me going, what the? ⁓ Like, he trips, he falls, it’s bad doo-doo.
So I was pretty upset, got him down, tried to make an impression not to do that again, but he clearly doesn’t understand what it would feel like if he fell 10 feet, and kids do seem to have this innate confidence before they learn what pain feels like, and protect themselves, and we tend to sometimes experience pain and then protect ourselves a little too much. creeps in. We don’t want to jump on the roof anymore for fear that we might fall. We don’t go on a roof at all because of fear we might fall. Maybe we need to go on the roof. Maybe we there’s fireworks and it would be a great place to sit but we’re too scared.
I want to leave you with a quote, and it says, “If we all did the things we are really capable of doing, we would utterly astound ourselves.” And that is by Thomas Edison, the man who invented the light bulb, or some say he invented the light bulb. found about a million and one ways the light bulb didn’t work, and he called that a success. There’s also some who say the man who or woman who fails the most wins because they get the most experiences. They learn the most. They learn all the things not to do so that they can not do it again. So I want to leave you these things and thank you so much for being here. Thank you for tuning in every week. I really work hard to put this content out for you. Honestly, today I didn’t feel like recording. I thought I’ll just wait a week. I’m tired. It’s been a rough couple days.
I just haven’t felt myself. And then my, I felt like my inner voice, the Lord was just telling me, Jen just, just do it. Just record. Just bring me your best. I’ll take care of the rest. You take care of the quantity. I will take care of the quality. And, I hope He will. We all need that kind of help. Let me tell you, I sure do. So thank you for being here, even though my presentation, may not always be 100% perfect; I may not always say the right things. But my goal is to bring you hope, to bring you to a place where you can start to inch your way towards change and become an entirely new version of yourself, free of depression and mental illness.
Last of all, please like and subscribe. It really does make a difference. Until next time.
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