Let's talk - Depression

Let's talk - Depression......(a nice piece by Ninad Vengurlekar...)

"I was pained to read about the suicide of the depressed kid who killed himself by jumping off a hotel building. In the world of social media, he assumed that everyone except him, was doing exceedingly well for themselves & he was the only loser on earth. He probably posted about his suicide on social media, hoping to taste some success & become famous. He longed for success, but had to kill himself for it. Sadly, he did not live to see how famous he has become. I was moved by the news. In a life connected to smartphones, I believe youngsters need a reality check about what real life is, what success is, & how it can be achieved. What happens on social media is virtual, but what you do with your life is real. Moving your fingers is far easier than rolling up your sleeves & getting to work. This difference needs to be understood. When youngsters are depressed & feel suicidal, they are thinking of their life in the short term. They believe that their life is going to end up being what it is today - forever. But that is far from truth. When you are depressed at 20, you forget that you will be alive for the next 60 years. If you lose 2 years to depression - what the heck! You still have 58 years to resurrect yourself. Here are 4 examples that come to mind, of people who resurrected themselves out of failure:
1). Remember the guy who was slapped by people on a railway station for picking Sunil Dutt's wallet in Munnabhai MBBS? That was Nawazuddin Siddiqui. Nawaz graduated from NSD & was forced to work as a cook & a security guard, because he had no work & no money. How many of you are willing to do that as a part of your struggle to succeed? Did he feel depressed about it then? So what did he do? And where is he today? Nawaaz kept trying. Trying hard. Finally a casting director suggested his name to Sujoy Ghosh, who was directing "Kahaani". Sujoy himself was battling two flops while making "Kahaani". He offered Nawaz an important role of an IB official. Nawaaz got a small opportunity to make it big in Bollywood. After years of failure, he precisely knew what that small opening could do for his career. And boy did he deliver? For his role in "Kahaani", Nawaaz walked away with a National Award. That was the beginning. Today he is perhaps the rare few actors in Bollywood who has worked with all the three Khans in a span of 3 years. He makes crores & lives like a King. "Failure was the foundation of Nawaz's success."
2). In the 2007 World Cup, when India was knocked out of the WC Qualifiers, Sachin Tendulkar cried in the dressing room. He announced to many of his fellow cricketers that he wanted to retire. Sachin lost his nerve when faced with such a colossal failure, for the first time in his life. He probably feared coming back to India & facing his fans, friends & family. Vivian Richards got to know about Sachin's state of mind. He called & spoke to him for an hour. An invigorated Sachin went back to his rigorous training. In the next 5 years, he reached 100 centuries, became the highest run getter in Test & ODIs, won the World Cup & had millions of people crying for him when he retired at the Wankhede. He got a send-off, no cricketer has ever had in the history of the game. He became a legend because he refused to bow down to failure. A chat with someone who Sachin respected & idolised, turned around his career & life.
3). Tony Hseih was 24, when he made $265 million selling his startup to Microsoft. He lived like a king & blew up all his money on parties, houses, cars & bad investments. He lost everything. One day with no money in his pocket, he was literally on the roads. That night he met a guy who told him about an idea of selling shoes online. Who buys shoes online? A bankrupt Tony Hseih loved the idea, took a loan & invested in the startup. They called it Zappos. Less than a decade later, Hseih sold the company for 1.2 billion dollars to Amazon. From $265 million, to bankruptcy, to $1.2 billion. He later wrote a book called "Delivering Happiness" & divided it into 3 chapters - "Profits", "Passion" & "Purpose". That is the sequence in which he discovered himself in life. Hseih proved that no money is not the end of life. It is a state of life from where the only way you go, is up.
4). As a struggler, music director Naushad, slept on the footpath opposite Broadway cinema. 16 years later, he stood there for the premiere of his movie "Baiju Bawra." Tears started flowing from his eyes, as he saw the footpath that he had slept on, from the other side. When asked why he was crying, a weeping Naushad said, "I can't believe it took me 16 years to cross this road." Persistence ultimately paid, even if it took 16 years.
Did these guys ever feel depressed? Probably they did. Did they cry over it? Yes. People cry when they fail. They feel anxious, lonely & sad, but did they continue to sit back & do nothing about it? They didn't! They picked up the pieces & stood up again. They refused to believe that because they failed now, they were destined to fail forever. They fought back hard until the time, destiny could no longer influence their future & because they did, they ended up writing their future, the way they wanted it to be.
The point is, life does not stop with failure. There is no successful person on earth, who has not seen failure or been depressed about it. The journey to success, begins with failure. Therefore, they say, failure is the best teacher, because it teaches you what not to do, so that you can focus on what to do. Failure happens because each one of us is different & life offers several opportunities for us to discover our personal formula of success, which is why they say, there is no magic formula for success. You have to earn it the hard way. Nobody else can do it for you. The problem is many of us are not ready for a long haul. We just give up.
Don't give up!!!"

Think about it...
Cheers...:)