The opposite of depression isn't feeling happy but being fully alive, however painful

The wordlessness of depression is a galling experience. You can't phone your friends, writing an e-mail is beyond you, you can't put pen to paper. The disease is a crash course in meaninglessness, lack of structure, the collapse of form.

When you're in the middle of your depression, pay good attention to it, because, tended carefully, you never know where it might lead you.