Uncovering Happiness

Bouts of depression range from the mild and infrequent to the severe and chronic. For serious depression, you should seek qualified help. But for any level of depression, it helps to know that underlying the darkness is happiness—and our brain is equipped with the means to uncover it.

Illustration by Mindful, with files from Andromina/DollarPhotoClub and Tets/DollarPhotoClub

When I was living in San Francisco during my twenties, I built a successful career in sales. At night, I lived fast and partied recklessly, abusing drugs and alcohol with a like-minded group of drifting souls. Eventually my despair and shame grew so deep that I isolated myself from my family and friends and lost myself in my addictive behaviors.

Occasionally, in some of the seedier bars I frequented, I would come across a mess of a man who was so strung out that he repulsed me. I remember saying to my friends, “God help me if I ever turn out like him.” I thought, since I was managing to succeed at work, I was in control of my self-abusive behavior. But one night, after many hours of partying, I saw the truth of who I had become. When I found myself slumped beside that man and his equally dazed companion in the back of a broken-down limousine, I saw my own reflection in his wasted face and realized I was throwing away my life. I jumped out of the limousine, determined to transform myself.

As for so many others, it was mindfulness practice that turned things around for me.…