There's a Blog called "But You Don't Look Sick", written by a woman with Lupus. She uses it as a medium to spread awareness of what it's like for people with a chronic illness. Probably her most famous post is called "The Spoon Theory":
http://www.butyoudontlooksick.com/wpress/articles/written-by-christine/the-spoon-theory/
I highly recommend reading the entire post. But in short, to explain to her best friend what it's really like to have a chronic illness, she grabbed a bunch of spoons from off the table, handed them to her friend, & said that it's like having a finite number of "spoons" that you have to give up bit by bit through the day. Most people have a seemingly limitless number of spoons, but for those with a chronic illness, there's a set number. Everyday tasks are more difficult, & at some point you have to give up on doing some things so that you'll have enough "spoons" to do the more important things.
It's a really powerful analogy. It also struck me as being a really good analogy for depression, or even for anyone's everyday emotional needs & costs. But I don't want to hijack the analogy. And I don't want to marginalize chronic illness---because chronic illness brings both physical and emotional pain & distress. And there's more perspective I could give using a different analogy. So for depression & emotions, I'm going to use the analogy of "Emotional Currency":
Every day, each of us wakes up with a bag of coins, which we use throughout the day whenever we "spend" our emotional energy on anything. It "costs" coins to do tedious, boring, or aggrevating chores. It "costs" coins to deal with stressful interactions with family, co-workers, customers, or other people. It "costs" coins to have to deal with lousy traffic, crazy pets, illness, bad weather, or anything else you can think of that takes an emotional toll on you, big or small.
Most of the time, most of us start the day with a nice-sized bag of shiny gold coins, that tends to be enough to get us through the day, even if we don't end up with whole lot of coins by bedtime. But sometimes things don't go so smoothly. Sometimes you find yourself having to spend a whole lot more coins than normal. Sometimes more stresses, more frustrations, or more negative factors suddenly means you have a lot more emotional "errands" to run that day, leaving you with fewer coins at the end of the day than normal...
Sometimes you get the normal "amount" of stresses, but they're a lot more stressful, a lot more frustrating, or a lot more difficult---it's like the price has gone up, & you have to spend a lot more to get the same result. Sometimes nothing external is different, but suddenly your ability to put emotional energy into things has been diminished---it's like inflation has happened, or like your currency has been devalued, & instead of shiny gold coins, you've got a bag of less-shiny silver coins, or even dull copper ones.
And you don't always start out with the same amount of coins each day. One day you might wake up with 2 bags' worth of coins---or only half a bag's worth of coins. This can be affected by the previous day or days. If things have been going well---if you've been "investing" your emotional currency well, & been getting good returns---you find yourself with a lot more than you had before. If this happens very often, you can start "saving up for the future".
But if things go badly---if you invest poorly, if you waste your previous profits, if prices go up, or if inflation or devaluing happens, suddenly you have a lot fewer coins to get through the day with. Sometimes you can "take out a loan", borrowing money from the next day or two, to get yourself through today---but that just means that, barring any sudden & unexpected gains, you'll just have that much less to spend tomorrow. And sometimes you even get emotionally mugged. A sudden, huge, horrible circumstance comes out of nowhere & forces you to deal with it---forces you to give up a giant handful of coins to get through it safely. And you find yourself suddenly much poorer than you were before, for no good reason...
Now, imagine what it's like for somone who suffers from chronic depression. Whether it's medical "clinical depression" that can be medicated, someone who's life is a complete disaster, or even just someone who, for whatever reason or reasons, is constatly finding themselves down & discouraged, it all ends up pretty much the same. All those lousy circumstances I just described? For depressed people, it's like that all the time. All the time. People like that rarely go about their day of "spending" normally. They often don't wake up with a full bag of coins. Or they often don't have gold coins. Or they often find the prices are always higher for them. Everything is harder. And it's often not ever clear why, even to them. It's just harder.
Positive thinking can only taking you so far. Telling people to "cheer up" or that "things will get better" is like saying "money isn't everything" or "you'll find a better job soon". They may be true, but that's hardly the point. It doesn't affect how things are now. And there's no guarantee of progress or improvement. Things don't just magically get better---things have to be done to change circumstances. And when your efforts aren't working, the though of things never improving is one of the most discouraging things imaginable...
And it feels worse when things seem to be going well for so many people around them. It's especially worse when people make a point of saying how amazing things are going for them. When people go on about "I'm loving life, things are going so great, life is amazing...", those who suffer from depression are thinking "That's really great for you, but you know what? Quit bragging...some of us aren't so lucky..." It's like someone is going on about "My business is going so well, I'm getting all kinds of sales, I'm making so much money, & I get to buy all these cool, fancy things, it's awesome!" That's really great for you, but you know what? Quit bragging...some of us aren't so lucky...
Some people aren't even "getting by", emotionally. Some people are constantly finding themself short on coins. Some people have to spend so much, & get so few results. Some people have dig to the bottom of their bag to find coins to pay for things. Sometimes only halfway through the day, they find themselves near-broke, desperately clinging to their last coin, absolutely terrified that someone will ask or force them to give it up before they get their bag refilled the next day. And once they're out of coins, the next "cost" they're forced to deal with is the breaking point. They can't afford it. No matter how much they need it, they can't buy it. All they can do is break down, collapse, melt...and that will definately severely affect either their starting amount or value the next day, or the prices the next day...or both...
Some people just can't catch a break with emotional currency. Whatever the reason they're depressed, everything is harder & more taxing. They're constantly finding themselves short on coins. They're constantly having to let things (even important things) fall by the wayside, so they can spend their coins on the most important things---which is often simple emotional survival. And helping them is tricky to do. You very often can't just offer them some of your coins---no one wants anyone's pity...no one wants to be anyone's charity-case...it just makes them feel pathetic & incapable... You can't give them your coins, & you can't spend your coins for them.
One option is that you can spend your coins on them. Those who are constantly strapped for coins understand best how much it means when someone chooses to spend their coins on them instead of on something else. Another option is to help them spend or invest their coins well. Help them make sure that the things they're spending their energy on don't end up wasted---or end up draining them of even more coins... Sometimes the best thing to do is simply understand when they can't spend coins on things with the rest of you---understand when people don't have the emotional currency to deal with something right now. But never just "accept" that someone is simply emotionally "poorer" than you, & that "that's just the way it is". Because that doesn't do anyone any good...
"That's the thing about depression: A human being can survive almost anything, as long as she sees the end in sight. But depression is so insidious, and it compounds daily, that it's impossible to ever see the end. The fog is like a cage without a key."
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