You might want to put the benefits and detriments of feeling hopeless and then the benefits and detriments of actually doing what you thought you coudn't.
I had a girlfriend who had a long history of problems with severe depression. We talked about it on several occassions. At one point I asked her, "Did the therapists ever ask you, 'If one day you woke up and found out that you were completely cured of your depression, what would that be like?'" She said no, they hadn't. And then we had a long discussion about the consequences of living without depression.
She told me that the thought scared her. "I've lived so long with depression," she said, "that I don't know who I'd be without it. I am afraid that I would no longer be me, that I'd lose myself." "Do you think," I asked, "that this has kept you from getting over it?" "I think it's part of it," she answered.
I am not saying that this is the case for you, but these issues are not always so simple and cut and dried. The therapists saw depression as merely something bad and something to get rid of. Their thinking process was notably superficial as were their results. None of them discussed the consequences of the therapy being successful with the client, which was a big mistake.
A good thing about the natural brilliance method is that this form of ecology check is integral to the process.
[This message has been edited by babayada (edited September 19, 2004).]
