Yoga is Not a Cure For Depression

~ sophienaylor1

I’m so tired of seeing people, even some professionals, sending people away to ‘try yoga’, ‘go for a walk’ or even ‘get some fresh air’ when revealing their struggles. Yes, these things can help, but they are not a sustainable cure for mental illness. Depression is a chemical imbalance, and I’m not too sure going for a walk can cure that.

It was a Tweet I saw that triggered this blog post. Below is an image of the tweet I’m referring to so you’re aware of what I’m talking about:

Honestly, I’m not sure where to start with this. There’s so many things I want to say about this spread of misinformation concerning mental illness.

First of all, if you’re not a doctor, don’t tell someone their depression isn’t legitimate unless they have tried going for a walk. Second of all, depression is a mental ILLNESS – a disease of the brain – just like diabetes is a physical illness. The brain is an organ, so to make out depression is just a ‘low mood’ rather than an actual illness is wrong on so many levels. It’s a dangerous message to send, and is simply not true.

Don’t get me wrong! Yes, going for a walk and doing yoga is a great thing to do to try to lessen some of the symptoms of depression, but it is NOT a cure. Depression is often what prevents people from doing these things. Getting enough sleep may sometimes seem impossible when someone’s thoughts are surrounded by negativity. Eating nutritious foods is hard when you don’t even want to live. Exercising is often out of the question when you can’t even bring yourself to get out of bed.

To act like a sufferer who isn’t doing the things listed isn’t helping themselves isn’t helpful whatsoever. All it does is make the sufferer feel more guilty about their illness. Believe me, it’s so incredibly hard to help yourself when you’re suffering from a mental illness, and if you don’t realise that you need to do some vigorous research before sending out such a dangerous message to a mass audience. You’re not a professional, so don’t act like one.

Depression isn’t a mood; it’s an illness.

Let’s start treating it as such.

Published by sophienaylor1

9 thoughts on “Yoga is Not a Cure For Depression”

  2. Hi Sophie ! I wont agree with this post. Hope you dont mind. I would say its not a mental illness. Mental illness word will portray this BIG. Can we say this is just a diesease. I disagree with the tweet also. Proper medication is required for curing depression, just like curing a fever. Physical activity is also an option to cure, But depression is not cured 100% by physical activity, they think a fever geta cured by joggingb? no way! . Medication is required at the same time physical activity will help you brain to stay balanced with the chemicals that causes depression. Good Post. Hope you get my points as well. Lets Portray every little things *✨Positively✨”😉👍

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  3. Good afternoon Sophie, I think that, good diet and physical activities can have positive effect on depression or mood, because specific foods has a lot of serotonin inside, which is the hormone of happiness, but it wont teat depression for sure. I think some people also dont understand when it is just bad mood from time to time and when its the real depression, these are two different things, which shouldnt be mixed.
    I had depression myself, twice, but pills did very huge negative effect on me, so i had to stop, and eating healthy and exercising helps me to survive the day, but i still have depression, now i subscribe for therapy, i hope it will get better soon💚after all experience and information what i know, i can agree that it can’t heal depression, it may help you to live it, but it wont heal you, great post, let me know what do you think about my comment💛

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    1. I completely agree! I think healthy lifestyle changes are great and do help but they don’t eradicate the problem/illness. Also agree with it being difficult to differentiate between a bad mood and depression – most people mistake bad moods for depression, but sometimes I think my depression is just a bad mood and downplay it. It’s definitely something I need to work on! Thank you so much for the comment x

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      1. You are welcome, love your content, yes depression is illness, and treatment is long, medication needed, i hope, that one day we all will heal from it💜

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