Ask HN: What are the best hacks to fight depression? - <AUTHOR> <comment><USER4> \- Go to bed early and develop a regular sleep pattern, and don't fool yourself with the myth about being a "night person", you are not a cat, you have just offset your sleep/wake cycle from lacking proper routine.

\- Exercise regularly. Aerobic exercise(whatever that means for you) that you can maintain without develop injury or over-training will be your baseline. Endorphin is what you are after, since it provides a boost of immune system, better sleep, less anxiety and increased overall health.

\- Be outside in the sun everyday, take a walk or sit and read a book.

\- Cut out any consumption of large amount of drugs: alcohol, sugar, nicotine...

\- Talk to someone about your worries and sprinkle some Zen in your life.

\- Help someone else for no personal gain, but don't let it consume all your time.

\- Understand that all things are transient, nothing is static, and trying to be eternally happy is impossible and the quest for such a thing will make you unhappy.

<comment><USER5> As a person with DSPS, I don't agree with your first statement. Some people are night persons and can't help it.

<comment><USER6> 0.17% of the population have DSPS.

<comment><USER7> So, roughly one person out of 600? That's a lot. Especially online, you probably interact with such people a lot more often that you think.

<comment><USER6> I know how often I interact with such people precisely: 0.17% of the people I interact with have this, whether online or in real life.

<comment><USER8> > 0.17% of the people I interact with have this, whether online or in real > life.

I know it's pedantic, but that's not true. 0.17% of people have DSPS. It's entirely possible that you don't regularly interact with _anyone_ that has DSPS.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> If your depression is serious, and it's preventing you from living your life, or if you're feeling suicidal, see a doctor or call a hotline. Now.

If you have mild depression, or want to not get depressed in the first place, I'd recommend the following:

Do exercise, do it outside if at all possible. Even light exercise like going for a walk is better than none. Don't take your phone.

Turn off and shut away your electronic devices an hour before you go to bed. Under no circumstances have your phone by your bed. Buy an alarm clock if need be. Disrupting sleep is the best way to get depressed quickly.

Delete or neuter[1] your social media accounts. They are engineered to make you feel bad (so you click ads).

Get something to look after. A dog, or if you don't have time or space, a cat, or if you _really_ don't have time or space a plant or two.

Put effort into your relationships with friends. Even if you don't feel it's being reciprocated. No friends where you are now? Find local meetups and go to them regularly. e.g. Parkrun, reading group, musical group, dev meetups. Keep going every week.

Put effort into yourself. Tidy up your living space, dress and groom well every morning.

1: [https://blog.mamota.net/posts/solving- facebook/](https://blog.mamota.net/posts/solving-facebook/)

<comment><USER10> > _Under no circumstances have your phone by your bed. Buy an alarm clock if > need be. Disrupting sleep is the best way to get depressed quickly._

I hope a lot of people are making a correlation between their friends who have recently had young children, and why they often tend to look tired, miserable and depressed.

<comment><USER11> Which is caused by the western notion that it makes sense for a helpless infant to sleep away from its mother. We got rid of our bed frame (to prevent falling accidents) and cosleep. We all (including our daughter, who is now three with another on the way) sleep happily through the night.

<comment><USER10> No, it's caused by the fact that most very young children wake up regularly no matter where they sleep, since they usually need to eat fairly often. As they get older, they tend to start sleeping through the night - some with co- sleeping, some in their own room - but some will wake up repeatedly until they're much older no matter what you do with 'em.

I'm glad your specific approach with your specific child worked out great.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> For me:

Lift weights and perform intense physical activity to exhaustion.

Don't smoke tobacco or cannabis. Don't really drink either.

Meditation.

12-step work.

Wellbutrin (bupropion) has helped me out of holes.

Have close friends to confide in.

Say what you're thinking. Don't say what you're not thinking.

Follow pointless dreams in some measure. For me, being able to buy a legendary Husaberg FE 570 motorcycle was an impossible dream, until I tried going for it. Managed to do it on a startup salary over the course of a year. It has brought me deep spiritual satisfaction.

Help others.

Be humble. Ask to be humble. Ask for your ego to be smashed.

Read books. Listen to music. Make music.

<comment><USER13> A good list.

> _Say what you're thinking. Don't say what you're not thinking._

But I Love this one. :)

<comment><USER14> could you elaborate on what exactly it means?

<comment><USER12> I guess it's hard to pin down exactly :) I guess it's a variation of 'To thine own self be true'. For me, I think there tends to be a background process running which attempts to find the correct and socially acceptable thing to say. This is often not related to what I find to be true and important myself. It's kind of a simulation of a simulation: I-perceive-that-what-I-perceive- are-people's-intentions-is-answered-by-this-pattern-I-have-observed. It's a habit and it's a relief when it can be tuned down a bit.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Please, people, consider my advice: don't try to heal by yourself, look for medical help.

When I was a kid (7 years old), my mom got depressed being a teacher in public schools of Brazil. I took decades to understand what happened, and till now I don't understand by complete.

She was very religious and believed that she could heal by herself, using her faith. The result was that she got dived into a so strong depression (deep depression doctors called) that they friends just realized her problem when it aggravated, and she was observed having strange ideas and doing strange behaviors, like burning things. She was slowing entering into madness (I cry each time I remember this).

Depression was cured by doctors help, but the sequels of trying to "hack" or heal by herself...

Today she is not on depression anymore (she is not sad I mean), but has many sequels, all very difficult to treat and medicate, almost none improvements on this by decades. Strong headaches, labyrinthitis and other side effects all since this trauma. It's past 20 years already and it's not cured. Today, we don't have money to look for a good and paid doctor, and we are still trying the public hospitals of Brazil. I have a startup today, and I strive to monetize it, to be able to pay for high-quality treatments and travel with her to find good doctors and therapists despite her unprivileged location (small city), the kind of people that is really interested in deeply investigate the causes to heal her. I did not have concluded yet, if it's is so difficult and rare to threat it, or if we had just bad luck till now.

As many people with depression, she though on suicide many times during the old hard days, and her religiosity and beliefs stopped her and gave strength from doing that. The curious here is that at the same time her faith was one of the causes of aggravating of her problem, also saved her from doing an extreme action (suicide).

</comment><comment><USER16> Go and see a doctor. Seriously. Even without this, figure out how to do things you want in life even if you don't feel like it.

I don't know about some of the other advice. Eating habits don't seem to work for me, and following a strict diet makes things worse because I spend a lot of time worrying about food if I do that. Exercise? I've never found any exercise I enjoy when I'm content, let alone trying to get the energy up to actually follow through with it. The only way I can work that in is if I walk as my primary transportation.

Having a structured day helps me a little bit, but this is simply because it doesn't give my brain time to ruminate as much. Meditation seems unbearable if I'm depressed. The sessions themselves aren't so bad, but I obsess with it off and on through the day. Mindfulness just makes me feel anxious because I'm constantly worried that I'm not normal and I can't tell if that is true or not.

Now, the things that have helped keep depression away have been different. I couldn't do this stuff in the depths of depression, but making the changes changed my life outlook. I do get mild depression now, but it doesn't last as long nor feel as bad. I made life changes. I got in a stable, loving relationship after ending a bad one. I moved, which gave me a little more control over myself and how I acted because expectations changed. _I did MDMA_. Not that this is something for everyone nor actually legal, but it let me parse out some of the things in my head. The weeks after taking were an eye-opener.

<comment><USER17> Can you comment on your post-MDMA weeks? Why/how were they an eye opener? Any more detail would be interesting to learn about.

<comment><USER16> It was like someone massaged my thoughts or rinsed off my brain. Maybe it is more like a reboot. In any case, my brain felt good. So many thoughts that were negative just didn't have the same sort of affect on everything else. My worries had a different sort of framing on them. I could look at some of these things and make a reasonable decision about them. Some things, sure, I need to work on - but I was a bit more motivated to actually do so. Other things, I was able to make a decision not to be bothered by them. Since I had some time without so much mental stress, it wasn't so difficult to teach myself that those things were a bit ridiculous. I had a better sense of personal well- being and self-love that has stuck around.

I imagine doing this with an actual therapist would be even more helpful. I completely understand why it seems like a miracle for mental health in drug trials.

I've done other sorts of drugs in my life - lsd, for example. While they shaped some of my perception and thoughts about the world and life, nothing was quite like this. I couldn't describe myself as unhappy before, but now I'm really content with life.

I should now mention that I would urge folks to have caution. I can understand how folks would get addicted to it. And there is a risk of simply doing it too often and actually having the opposite effect. This is something to do occasionally, not every weekend or even once a month. The most profound change was the first time: I've done it since then, and it while (for me) it reinforces the things I learned the first time and still feel mentally refreshed the next day, it simply isn't as large of a change.

Another small sidenote: I've done it with my spouse. It also strengthened our relationship as well simply because we basically sat and talked positively for hours.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> One option is to seek those who have safely used psychedelics, and have an experience.

It literally washes away anxiety, leaving you feel renewed, and refreshed, like the cobwebs of the mind have been cleared, like the fog has been lifted.

Of course I recommend being active (walking, working out, hiking), socializing, spending time in nature and the outdoors, eating healthy, eliminating addictions, detaching from social media and the Internet, and quiet mediation and reflection to nurture spirituality. Even psychotherapy is helpful at weeding out unhelpful personal narratives and properly contextualizing feelings and past memories.

But, psychedelics (LSD and mushrooms specifically) are an incredible catalyst for clearing life crushing mental illness like anxiety, depression, compulsive thoughts, and PTSD.

Find someone who understands its therapeutic value, who you can trust, who can guide you through the experience.

A single experience can be absolutely life changing.

<comment><USER19> Ayahuasca worked very well for me. I was in a pretty bad state when I started working with this plant... But after some time it really cured my depression and my anxiety.

If anyone decides to do it I would recommend finding a center with good reviews in Peru, and booking before you go. Don't just buy a ticket to Iquitos and hope to find a retreat or a shaman. Do some proper research and be prepared.

The amazon rainforest is a magical place, and just being there is a healing experience by itself.

<comment><USER20> I second that, Ayahuasca is great, it gets out a lot of emotional baggage you didn't even know you had there. totally recommended!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> There are conventional things that you're going to get a lot of comments about. My conventional thing is running. The hacky part is the endorphins you get.[1] Other than the hack, you constantly set goals and achieve them, it makes you feel good about yourself. Micro goals like "I'll make it to the end of the street without stopping," and larger goals like "I'll run 5 miles today." Positive reinforcement during the run, large feeling of accomplishment after.

[1][https://www.webmd.com/depression/guide/exercise- depression#1](https://www.webmd.com/depression/guide/exercise-depression#1)

<comment><USER22> "At every level, from the microcellular to the psychological, exercise not only wards off the ill effects of chronic stress; it can also reverse them. Studies show that if researchers exercise rats that have been chronically stressed, that activity makes the hippocampus grow back to its preshriveled state. The mechanisms by which exercise changes how we think and feel are so much more effective than donuts, medicines, and wine. When you say you feel less stressed out after you go for a swim, or even a fast walk, you are." -John J. Ratey, Spark: The Revolutionary New Science of Exercise and the Brain

And another

"we sometimes lose sight of the fact that the mind, brain, and body all influence one another. In addition to feeling good when you exercise, you feel good about yourself"

Reading this book opened a door out of depression for me using the prescribed medicine, which is exercise and definitely wasn't easy.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> Rigorous exercise seems to get me out of any ruts I'm in. I typically hike 5-6 miles x 3 days a week, and throw in a 11-12 mile over strenuous terrain. By the end of that, your mind will clear, your body is exhausted, and you'll rest easy that night.

Other than that, eating well, having plenty of great sex, and interacting with as many people as possible. OH most important, SLEEP, a full solid night of it. Naps are awesome too.

<comment><USER24> I can attest to this. I've struggled with anxiety/depression/insomnia/adhd for years, and over the past couple years I've learned that careful attention to exercise, diet, and sleep are the most reliable ways I can ensure a healthy baseline.

I used to run a couple miles in the morning and evenings, on streets, until I injured my leg. So I switched to hiking after my leg recovered. Short 2-3 mile hikes turned into 12 mile stretches, which turned into short trail runs, and now I'm running 5-6 miles of trails 2x a week and 12+ mile runs/hikes on weekends (I'm secretly training for an ultra). I'd always thought I'd hate running, because it was too strenuous or something, but I haven't looked back. Maybe I'm just literally running away from my problems, but, it's far more rewarding in any case.

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> Being consistent, healthy, and regular with a number of things.

Attending professional talk therapy and taking prescribed dosage of psychiatric medication.

In therapy they will probably mention the following as well:

Sleep schedule (same bedtime and wake up time each day, long enough, restful, no screens in bed)

Exercise (helps with sleep and stress management, almost any routine aerobic or strength done to exhaustion will work if done multiple times a week)

Socializing (hanging out with a group of close friends at least once a week socially is the goal)

Diet (veggies, whole fruits, possibly vitamin B supplements)

Moderation or abstinence from legal recreational drugs. Abstinence from illegal recreational drugs.

Meditation and other forms of metacognition aka thinking about what you are thinking, often right in the moment when you are thinking the original thought to help manage your emotion response to internal or external stress.

Moderation or abstinence from social media, news, and most ad driven media

<comment><USER26> This is so cart before the horse though. All of those things can keep you out of depression, but they don't address the underlying problems if other things are going on.

It seems like the advice is "just be healthy and do healthy habits". None of them are hacks - they're just what everyone tells you to do. If they worked and this was the advice that was needed, we wouldn't have an epidemic.

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> For me, it's following the 5x5 workout routine: [https://stronglifts.com/](https://stronglifts.com/)

It's 6am in Seattle right now. I woke up and I'm about to go to the gym and do my 5x5 workout. I do this 3 times a week and it changed my life ever since I started doing it two years ago.

<comment> murph-almighty 5x5 is super useful when you start out lifting (I used it) but as you get better it might make sense to shift to other workout programs. I also definitely had times where I skipped a few increments or stayed at the same weight for a set.

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> Lots of good stuff in this thread, but I'd like to emphasize seeing a therapist (not necessarily a doctor, who is probably a lot more trained in medical procedures than emotional well-being). From experience, there is something very powerful about working out your problems in relation to a person that cares about your well-being.

As for the stigma of therapy (which I think is thankfully starting to erode), don't worry about it. All a therapist is is someone you hire that is trained to help you see your life more clearly and really wants to help you. You can use reviews on Yelp or other review sites to find a good one.

Heck, if they can afford it or have insurance cover it, I think people that are already functioning okay can be even happier seeing a good therapist. It feels like adding another core to your CPU, adding more capacity for processing your life :)

</comment><comment><USER29> Depends on why you're depressed.

If you're depressed because of a chemical imbalance, medicine can help (though it can be fiddly to get right). A doctor is what you need here, or (perhaps better) a psychiatrist.

If you're depressed because of circumstances, then you need to either change your circumstances, or change the way you think about them. (I have heard that anger signals that you have a blocked goal, and depression signals that you have an impossible goal. This is almost certainly not true of all depressions for all people. But if it's true of yours, you need to figure out what the impossible goal is, and let go of it.) A counselor might be where to start here.

If it's just that you aren't happy, as others have said, sleep, exercise, and relationships.

If you're hungry for something, and you can't find what it is, then I am reminded of this quote from C.S. Lewis: "The Christian says, 'Creatures are not born with desires unless satisfaction for those desires exists. A baby feels hunger: well, there is such a thing as food. A duckling wants to swim: well, there is such a thing as water. Men feel sexual desire: well, there is such a thing as sex. If I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world. If none of my earthly pleasures satisfy it, that does not prove that the universe is a fraud. Probably earthly pleasures were never meant to satisfy it, but only to arouse it, to suggest the real thing. If that is so, I must take care, on the one hand, never to despise, or to be unthankful for, these earthly blessings, and on the other, never to mistake them for the something else of which they are only a kind of copy, or echo, or mirage. I must keep alive in myself the desire for my true country, which I shall not find till after death; I must never let it get snowed under or turned aside; I must make it the main object of life to press on to that country and to help others to do the same."

</comment><comment><USER30> There is no hacks to beat depression. This is what is so hard about depression.

You need the strength and courage to seek therapy and then stick to it. Sometimes therapy takes years and the result is not guaranteed. And when you're in the worst possible place mentally, trying to go to therapist and then trying to open up to him is incredibly tough. And then you have to keep doing it again and again and again.

<comment><USER31> My experience is very different. Yes, therapy is valuable. But the human mind is a very complex, poorly optimized system, so I've found my systems-hacking skills to be very useful.

In particular, one element of the hacker mindset is not wasting any time saying, "But it doesn't make sense!" It was very useful to me to accept that my body and brain was a meat-robot built by genes so they could get around in a hostile environment. My moods were just part of a poorly-balanced control system.

I didn't have to have a _narrative_ reason for feeling sad. It could just be, say, part of a system for keeping me indoors when the weather was bad. If refined sugar threw off my mood regulation, well no surprise. It wasn't part of my evolved diet. The only reason I was eating a lot of it was foods engineered to maximize purchase frequency while minimizing cost. If other people were hacking me, I certainly could hack back.

Once I gave up the expectation of narrative sense, it became just another experiment-driven systems-tuning exercise. And hackers are good at that.

<comment><USER30> Did you have clinically diagnosed depression?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> 1\. Exercise - Doesn't have to be much, just enough to raise your heartbeat for 20 minutes every day. You don't even have to go outside to do it.

2\. Vitamin D - if you dislike being outside, or have anxiety and can't go outside, then take Vitamin D supplements. If you live somewhere where the Weather is never great, take the supplements anyway.

3\. Mindful Thinking - A lot of people say 'Meditation' but for many people starting out, that's a big ask. So start with something easier. Being Mindful is focusing on where you are for 5-10 minutes. Close your eyes and listen to all your senses. The sounds around you, the smells, the warmth of the sun etc. After a few goes you'll be able to feel the benefits of this simple exercise.

4\. Invest in friendships. Making new friends is hard when you feel like you have nothing to offer, so work on the friendships you already have. Spend more time with your friends. Explain to them (be frank!) about how you are feeling, and ask them to help a bit. Say if you are feeling low you might reach out to them for a chat. They know what you are struggling with, but are unsure how to actively help - by giving them pointers, they'll be all too pleased to support you.

5\. Look at the things in your life that make you sad or angry, and remove them if possible. These toxic things can be anything; a Job, a Person you know, Where you live, What you Eat - anything. If it's your Job, change Jobs - _no_ job is important enough to wreck your health over. Don't be afraid to reboot everything and anything until you start feeling better.

6\. Therapy. You can't do this alone. Not having a professional on tap is one of the most common mistakes most people do. A good therapist will guide you through the above steps and also teach you how to deal with how you are feeling, and how it affects your everyday life.

7\. Drugs. Don't accept or live with the first SSRIs/SNRIs you try if they don't seem to work. It can take several goes with different types before you find one that works. There's no such thing as 'the drugs don't work'.

I could go on, but I'm also on this Journey so I don't have all the answers yet.

Source: Me. Depression for most of my life (I'm mid-40s), also suffering from Generalised Anxiety Disorder. All stemming from an abusive childhood and exacerbated by a nasty divorce which left deep emotional scars.

</comment><comment><USER32> Learn to get out of your head.

Learn to observe thoughts instead of getting lost in them.

Recognize your brain is having a mood, not that you _are_ that mood.

A lot of stuff from meditation/mindfulness can be quite helpful. There's a book called _The Zen Path through Depression_ that's kind of interesting.

I don't view it as a "fight" rather just a "thing". Depression is normal. Not fun, but normal.

 _Serious_ depression may require professional assistance. If whatever it is you're doing isn't working, get that assistance. Reach out to people. In general they care.

</comment><comment><USER33> Mindfulness. In canada you can get into a program 100% covered by OHIP called Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) If you can't get into a program, read the book: [https://www.amazon.ca/Full-Catastrophe-Living-Revised- Illnes...](https://www.amazon.ca/Full-Catastrophe-Living-Revised- Illness/dp/0345536932)

Lots of new research kicking around. That's a science-backed approach.

</comment><comment><USER34> For me, my struggle with depression has been mostly due to a lack of a work/life balance and the resulting loneliness that has brought. I've had the tendency to double-down and increase my work hours to compensate for an ever increasing work load.

Increasing exercise has been a big help. I have a routine I go through every morning for the last month or so. I find I have a focus I don't have otherwise and it's important to start my day off with that focus.

I've made a point to leave work no more than one hour later than normal (unless the situation truly warrants it) and I do not look at email outside of work hours (my employer certainly knows how to reach me if needed). Its been very tempting at times, but the feelings of guilt around not looking at email throughout the evening have largely gone away. Home is no longer that extension of work and has become a place I can chill and relax. After about a month of this I really do feel genuinely relaxed at some point in the evening and I start the day more refreshed and ready to tackle what comes my way.

Lastly, talking with a therapist. My first visits weren't great because I really wasn't present or willing to really open up. Differences between what I think and what I feel and other issues along those lines. Several months later I tried again and was willing to discuss how I feel and hold nothing back (wasn't afraid of looking weak, etc.). I'm learning coping mechanisms that have lead to more awareness and that awareness in turn has increased my ability to cope with whatever comes my way. For example, I recognize patterns I'd fall into far sooner.

These steps have provided a forward momentum that I'm working to maintain. Step by step.

</comment><comment><USER35> I have made my only available mode of transportation to work (which takes me approximately 50 minutes at a fair clip) a bicycle. The regular exercise helps a lot.

Another big one is taking the time to figure out what triggers your depression. If it's seasonal, try some lights. If it's stress-related, try one of the well-established ways of combating that: If you're very energetic some kind of combat sport works well, otherwise something more calm like meditation. Try anything that sounds like it might work, and try not to worry too much if it doesn't. There's plenty of other options.

If you're a worrier, having a reasonably rigid schedule could work well. Go to sleep at the same time, eat at the same time, have lunch at the same time.

Edit: Another thing that works well is setting (very) small goals for yourself and accepting that that can be the only thing you do that day (eg "I'm going to take the laundry out of the hamper and put it in the washer"). If it's really bad, I've found that is literally the only thing that will help.

</comment><comment><USER36> You need to break the habit loop of this emotion by breaking the habit loop of thought. Priming the mind in the morning really helps me fight my depression daily. Unfortunately for me it's chronic since I was a little kid, but it doesn't mean I will let it control my life. Here's a free resource. [https://getmotivateapp.com](https://getmotivateapp.com)

Another thing that really helps is paying attention to others and giving. When you do that you increase dopamine levels and take your attention off of yourself as you enter the world of another person. This doesn't have to be anything like volunteering once a week, but just small acts of kindness that all compound into your life. Start with your family and friends and then you will gain awareness for everyone else. It's a bit weird when I tell people I use "giving to others" to deal with depression, but if you combine that with priming your mind, you can get it through it. You can.

</comment><comment><USER37> Fluoxetine aka Prozac.

Surely, a lot of people are afraid of medication and the stigma of mental illness that comes with it. Prozac made wonders for me, I am where I am thanks to this well researched and safe "selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor".

With hindsight, I realize no exercise or lifestyle change could get me out of the dark place that sucked me in. Depression is like a broken leg - you better go see a doctor.

After the first couple of weeks of treatment, my level of serotonin stabilized (so I think) and the darkest thoughts and panic attacks receded. It did not magically solve any of my problems but it gave me back my strength to fight with them over time. There were no severe side effects, maybe a lower libido in the first months. Actually, one side effect surprised me - I started to be talkative again. I totally forgot I knew how to talk to people and enjoyed company around me. Now I am a mild extrovert again, I manage people, I quit weed and booze and I take the lowest dose (20mg) of Fluoxetine every evening.

</comment><comment><USER38> I've seen SSRIs (Prozac etc) make a life changing difference for my daughter, my brother and my ex. But not my son. My 2p, etc...

<comment><USER39> To get the best results from SSRIs it is just a bit more than showing up at the doc once and getting a prescription.

Most people will need to adjust the dose and probably try a few different meds. So your doc should prescribe you some pills and have you call back in two weeks to see how you are doing and decide if you want to change the dose or switch meds. While you are there you should also have your thyroid hormone levels checked and any other physical problems which could be associated with depression.

In terms of mainstream meds that are available as a generic and easy to get, the one that stands out as different is Venlafaxine, which binds to norephinephrine transporters as it does to serotonin transporters. It works better in more people, but it also makes some people get a blood pressure reading like 200/110\. Thus you should be working with a doc, checking your vitals, etc. There are also non-SSRI antidepressants, some of them are very effective, but they tend to have more side effects, some of which can be dangerous. (For instance, tricyclic antidepressants can cause QT prolongation, a change your heartbeat that can lead to death.)

All that said, the great thing about antidepressants is that they are inexpensive and easy to try in conjunction with "everything else", of which I would rank exercise as #1 and then talk therapy at a distant #2.

</comment></comment><comment><USER40> To see a doctor ?

<comment><USER41> This is the only reasonable response in any thread on mental illness. Depression is too much of an important issue to not see a doctor, and unless we know OP's full history, any number of things could work or not work.

<comment><USER39> It is more complex than that.

For one thing, "which doctor?"

Primary care physicians prescribe SSRIs all the time. You probably want to see a primary care physician anyway and get a thorough checkup and blood work to rule out physical causes. Your family doc or internist should also be able to refer you to a psychiatrist (who will usually offer more complex drug therapy) or to a talk therapist or both.

<comment> gm-conspiracy Do you think GPs should be prescribing SSRIs after a 15-minute exam?

<comment><USER39> That is better than nothing; really you should have a relationship with your PCP, I think I did have a 15 minute exam when I got an SSRI prescription, but I had seen that doc for three years and had talked about SSRIs for a while. I chose to take them because I know my life was about to get turned upside down and wanted to be proactive about dealing with it.

The main SSRI counterindication is that people with psychosis, bipolar, schizophrenia, and schizoaffective disorder are likely to get worse (manic) with SSRI treatment. A GP can screen for this and be right most of the time.

Unfortunately this is a disease like Diabetes that gets progressively worse, treatment with antipsychotic drugs might slow this. Psychotics tend to hate antipsychotic drugs and putting that together with it being almost impossible to force people take them many people don't get treated. They shouldn't get a script from a GP, they should see a psychiatrist.

The key to SSRI success is not the length of the first appointment, but the followup. You should have at least one and maybe several followup appointments to adjust dosage, medication, also consider a psych referral.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER42> Ask HN: What are the best hacks to fight <insert illness that can kill you or ruin your life>.

Start from trusted resource like: [https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/stress- anxiety-depression/low-...](https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/stress-anxiety- depression/low-mood-and-depression/)

It is possible that you will need to work with therapist who has spent decades debugging and solving problems like yours. If you can't afford therapy try to talk to real people with years of life experience outside of hacker forum.

At the end of the day you will need to understand what is the cause of your problem. Start thinking about it right away.

</comment><comment><USER43> In addition to many of the other great answers here, I would say cleaning your room/house and rearranging the furniture. One of the best things I've found for combating depression is changing my environment. Usually that means getting outside, but the reality is that life keeps most of us inside and at our homes for a non-trivial amount of time. Rearranging the furniture makes your home environment feel new and fresh. Its the first thing I try if I feel depressed.

</comment><comment><USER44> The biggest one that hasn't been mentioned yet:

Practice gratitude. Get a pen and paper and start writing down things in your life that you're grateful for. It can be something as simple as being grateful for food, water, and shelter (which gets taken for granted so often).

Do this for 15 minutes a day (preferably as soon you wake up) and you will notice your outlook on life improve. Religious people do this in the form of prayer, and it has been scientifically proven to increase your happiness.

</comment><comment><USER45> If you have been feeling depressed for a long time, I recommend consulting a professional.

I think I entered depression a few months ago after a hard breakup and a difficult personal, professional situation. I could not do my daily activities, I just wanted to stay in the corner of a room and cry out my pain. It was physically painful, too. I am still recovering and it takes a lot of time to.

One thing that helped me is to read self-development books. I read two, it has literally saved me from sinking. If you like philosophy, I highly recommend it.

Florence Scovel Shinn, The Game of Life and How To Play It:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SUcnJrqKcSI](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SUcnJrqKcSI)

Just takes ~3 hours of your life and gives some good reason to get your faith in yourself back.

Louise L. Hay, You Can Heal Your Life:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E81XAYvmWfI](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E81XAYvmWfI)

1 hour of your life. I like some parts of this book a lot. Some are weird to me, but once you sort things out, I concluded that it helped me a lot.

Oh and one last thing, from experience, _IT GETS BETTER_. It might sound silly or something you've heard 1000 times, but it does. I've been there.

Hope this helps. And feel free to reach out if you want to rant.

Cheers

</comment><comment><USER46> Exercise. That's it. Get outside and walk/run/jog/bike everyday and get healthy, it will change everything. Sounds too simplistic, but it works.

<comment><USER47> I was doing that for years. I was riding my bike huge distances (400km in a day for example), I followed a solid lifting schedule and managed to reach a 370lb deadlift, and I ran far and relatively fast when I wasn't cycling. I kept that up for years and really loved it. In fact I miss it still.

But it didn't keep depression from getting to me. These days I'm in alright shape still, but getting back on that wagon is hard as hell when you feel like trash. I've done it before, I'll do it again, but I think for some of us it unfortunately takes more than exercise.

I still also highly recommend exercise as part of any effort against depression. If you're able bodied, chances are it will only be able to help.

</comment></comment><comment><USER48> Fighting depression is a holistic process. No shortcuts.

</comment><comment><USER49> Get out in the sun every morning for 20 mins Drink lots of water Stop jerking off incessantly Do this for a week. Let me know how things go.

<comment><USER50> I like this list, it addresses something most don't.

<comment><USER51> >Stop jerking off incessantly ?

yeah. there is even this entire #nofap thing. I find it helps with energy level.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER52> I would not do prescription drugs (only after honestly trying everything else.)

Supplement magnesium (so key to health and so neglected). Try it, you won't regret it, unless you have some psychological barrier to supplementation.

Supplement gelatin before sleep (which contains a lot of glycine, there are studies showing it regulates serotonin and dopamine. In my family's experience it is amazing for helping you sleep. Also it is the reason why in my country broth's are seen as relaxing before sleep: they contain lots of glycine)

Look into lifting weights, I took it up after being depressed for months after my last breakup and it has been life changing. It has so many benefits from increased metabolism, growth hormone, testosterone.

Spend time in the sun frequently

Do something that makes you afraid/thrill. For example, I took motorcycle riding this year, hard to be depressed when your heart rate goes up. It might seem temporary but it sets the beginning for change.

</comment><comment><USER53> If it's mild, you can do the following:

\- Go to sleep and wake up at regular times.

\- Make sure you eat sufficiently (dont skip breakfast).

\- Make sure you have people to talk to on a regular basis. Isolation makes things worse.

If you are so deep in depression you can hardly function, you probably need to see a specialist ASAP and get professional counsel first before trying to hack anything.

</comment><comment><USER54> Go see a professional.

If, for some reason, you can't do that (money or time) talk to someone in the meat world. Find a good friend and lay it out there. Don't hint at it - <USER2> it. This is not a thing to be coy about.

\---

For me, joining a church has helped. Not because I found God or spiritual enlightenment, but because it's a community that doesn't care what I do for a living. They care about my wellbeing and how I am doing. They're always glad to see me no matter what shape I look like I'm in.

It's good to have at least one group of people that are glad to see you, no matter what six kinds of ass you look or feel like at the moment.

It's not easy to find a group of people like that. You might have to hunt around a bit.

If you're in Austin, I'll happily introduce you to them. Might be the right group, might not. That's up to you.

</comment><comment><USER55> I don't know if this helps _fight_ depression per se, but all of the below has helped me:

\- Getting at least 6-7 hours of sleep every night consistently

\- Reading a book for at least 10 minutes a day

\- Going for a 20-30 minute walk outside alone (day, night, doesn't matter, as long as you feel safe)

\- Weightlifting a couple of times a week

\- Eating right

\- Trying to not box myself into restrictive thinking about all of the above (like, if I want to eat a donut, I can eat a donut, I just should be conscious of portion control)

\- Going to therapy every week. This can be an expensive option, but hopefully you can find someone in network for your health insurance or find people who do group therapy. Regardless, I find it very healthy to be able to talk about my week with someone who isn't a close friend. They typically give me clarity on what it is that I'm sometimes feeling.

</comment><comment><USER56> I think best advice would be to see a doctor. Depression is not a game and not something to take lightly!

While I agree with a lot of the other commenters, it seems like they would be more appropriate in a "Healthy lifeStyle choices for programmers" thread. .02

</comment><comment><USER57> A preacher once told a story when he was sitting next to the bed of a dying from anorexia girl. She had given up. He told her: \- You have two choices. First choice is to be a rotting corpse by tomorrow, making everybody's life miserable. The second choice to get up and fight, and next year you to be sitting next to a girl like you and help her live.

Depression sucks. In order to take your mind off of it, find a goal and pursue it. Helping others is one of the most universal methods. No matter how bad are you, there are people in worse condition than you. These people will see an angel in you if you show some care. "Be the person you needed when you needed someone"

</comment><comment><USER58> It's only been mentioned once so I'll restate it: Gratitude practice. Do more than one if you want. 5 minute journal app is a great start.

I use the app and also do a gratitude practice with my children at the end of the day. Interestingly, no matter how bad my day went, if I end it doing gratitude with my children my recollection of the day is positive. I can be having a day where everything seems to be going wrong and I see no point in even trying to win at life. If I end the day with gratitude and look back on it the next day I feel like "oh, I remember I had some setbacks but it was a good day." Only happens if I do the practice, otherwise I ruminate for days.

</comment><comment><USER59> Keep your fingers busy, and life will probably sort itself out. Lather, rinse repeat.

I turned out in a pretty cool place by simply wrapping my head around things about computers all day. Having access to read and understand all levels of what the machine does is fascinating and had me hooked with free operating systems and free / open source software long ago.

IRC probably helped a lot with loneliness, both me being able to ask my own questions and responding to and researching other people's questions. I can't tell where I would be without Freenode. It's such an uplifting experience reaping and resowing one's own understanding in the various communities.

</comment><comment><USER60> Mindfulness and Rational Emotive Behavioral Therapy did it for me. You need a framework for challenging your wrong thinking. Learn to take a universal perspective, root out the self pity and resentment, and foster responsibility for yourself. I found a therapist who worked me through REBT and connected me to a fantastic meditation teacher. Obviously you need to take care of your body too, with diet, exercise and above all, the most stringent of sleep hygiene habits (probably no drugs or alcohol either, sorry). Put me 5 hours of bad sleep a night and I'll be suicidally upset about "everything" at the end of the week.

</comment><comment><USER61> Change things up.

In my experience, being depressed takes less effort than not being depressed.

I live in a small city and I would spend most of my days working then going home to play games and watch Netflix while slowly becoming a hoarder living in garbage.

Then I started walking everywhere, to coffee shops, to music venues, etc. Every place that I walked to was an excuse to get out of the house and be active. Whenever I had those walks, I had time for a lot of self reflection and exposure to meaningful experiences and people that I would have never had if I stayed inside bingeing on Netflix. I still get bummed out at times, but I don't daydream about suicide anymore.

</comment><comment><USER62> Therapy.

Anecdotally: plenty of sunlight, a vitamin D pill, enjoyable sex with your partner, frequent bouts of intense exercise, plenty of vegetables, few processed foods, a probiotic supplement, and healthy bowel movements 1-2 times a day.

</comment><comment><USER63> Things that worked for me:

\- Run. Blood circulation and fresh air can do wonders. These days I bike to work than run. But the idea is the same. Start your day with cardio and fresh oxygen.

\- Watch your diet. Sleep a bit hungry. Eat foods that exit your system within 24 hours.

\- Abstain from sex (including DIV) for 10 days, and see how you feel on the 11th. After which find your formula, similar to intermittent fasting but with sex.

\- Meditation and Yoga. I practice Hatha Yoga as taught here ([http://www.ishayoga.org/](http://www.ishayoga.org/)). This is ridiculously powerful if practiced with intensity.

<comment><USER64> What is DIV?

</comment></comment><comment><USER65> Just to add. I suggest journaling and keeping track of things. Like even 10 to 15 minutes per say of how the day went, what you felt. This is a cure but also a prevention thing. Meaning what were the days and trends of what you were doing before the big bad monster came. For me its usually when I havent exercised, ate junk food or didnt eat my veggies, sometimes when I havent gone out of the house (remote work). I dont think this will work for clinical depression but I'm not a doctor. Just a tip. Gather data and figure out how to reverse engineer the suck. Good luck!

</comment><comment><USER66> 8000IU of Vitamin D3 per day, and 300mg magnesium as amino acid chelate at every meal fixed me.

Now taking less of each, cycling my dosage up and down as required. Sometimes taking neither for up to about a week.

<comment><USER67> Where do you get those? I was thinking Amazon but I fear those are just placebos. You know, all they sell is fake…

<comment><USER68> Look for "USP Certified". NatureMade is a popular brand that tends to have this. Costco brand (Kirkland) also often does - note that Kirkland prices are cheap in Costco but not so much on Amazon (resold or something). If you have a Costco near you, it is a very cost effective way to get fresh food and supplements. It's silly but it really helped me become healthier, because I stopped being hesitant about the price (I was raised in a not-well-off household... the mental barrier can be pretty strong even though it's irrational vs wastes of money that are neutral or harm health, while nutrition is very helpful and a pretty good bang for buck)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER69> Get medical help. I had very bad OCD symptoms 8 years ago and citalopram has completely eliminated all symptoms, no side effects. By medical help I mean both a psychiatrist and a psychologist. And keep in mind that you should try a few professionals until you find someone who can treat you, psychologists and doctors can be extremely different, do not give up too soon if you find it awkward.

</comment><comment><USER70> Sometimes depression comes because we're suppressing other emotions. That has been my experience. I used to seriously suffer from depression, but now that I've learned to recognize and deal directly with the underlying emotions, my depression has disappeared.

I'm not implying at all that this is the cause of all depression, merely that it was in my case.

</comment><comment><USER31> Given the audience here, I encourage you to think of it as an ongoing experimental process. As with software, don't expect immediate, dramatic progress. It feels to me like picking locks: a few apparently tiny improvements can suddenly add up to something larger.

What has helped me, in rough order of importance:

A very regular sleep schedule. I used to be all over the place, but hacking on this has really paid off.

Lots of sunlight. I got rid of my bedroom blinds, try to make it outdoors daily, and have an elaborate automated lighting system that gives me a more summer-ish lighting cycle the year round. [1] I used to use a blue light panel, and would probably still use it if I were living in a darker climate.

Regular cardio. Running, cycling, hiking, long walks. At a minimum I'll do a 30-20-10 cycle [2], which takes only a few minutes. But I find mood benefit in much longer things, possibly because of the sunlight.

Minimal refined carbs. At this point I'll have something with sugar or flour maybe once a week, and my moods are much more stable.

Meditation. I know the traditional practice is daily long blocks of time, but I find more use in more frequent short ones. One way to think about meditation is in terms of learning awareness and control over the flow of one's thoughts. Basically, I think of serenity (and specifically non-reactivity) as a skill, and it's a skill worth practicing often. That can be as little for me as one conscious breath, or a 5-minute meditation break.

Therapy. Find a professional you like. It make take going through a few. Mine is great. Her experience with many different people helps her spot patterns and suggest changes in ways I can't do on my own. She's also good at spotting my bullshit and getting me to debug it.

A quiet environment. I have a top-floor apartment on a quiet street, one that only shares one wall with neighbors. It's very restful. At work, I also find ways to minimize environmental stress.

Yoga. The way my body remembers to be stressed is in muscle tension. Learning to stretch and relax both those muscles and my mind helps, and also helps me diagnose other issues, as it helps me notice what is making me tense (and therefore reducing my resiliency.

Minimal drug use. My average day includes no alcohol or caffeine. When I have them now, I'll notice a mild increase in mood instability for a day or two, so I almost never have them two days in a row.

</comment><comment><USER71> If you're looking for a "hack," i found the tricks in this book very helpful:

[https://www.amazon.com/How-Good-bye-Depression-Constrict- Eve...](https://www.amazon.com/How-Good-bye-Depression-Constrict- Everyday/dp/0595094724)

</comment><comment><USER72> Sometimes it's more illustrative to look at what you can do to ensure you'll be depressed.

7 Ways to Maximize Misery: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LO1mTELoj6o](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LO1mTELoj6o)

</comment><comment><USER73> There's a great post at Slate Star Codex : [http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/06/16/things-that- sometimes-h...](http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/06/16/things-that-sometimes- help-if-youre-depressed/)

It contains a lot of advice on how to choose a therapist and how to behave with them and what you can otherwise do if you won't go to a therapist.

</comment><comment><USER74> A lot of recommendations to see a doctor. I would strongly advise seeing a therapist or councilor first and follow the tips in this thread.

If you go to a doctor expecting compassion instead of drugs you will be sorely mistaken.

</comment><comment><USER75> Hoping these will help you.

[https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLBh- iYJ1Q_hTyzGEesN8b...](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLBh- iYJ1Q_hTyzGEesN8bG200V7xyskJZ)

</comment><comment><USER76> Travel. If you don't have a lot of time, book multiple short trips. Book tickets well in advance, so that when you are depressed all you have to do is take Uber and show up for your flight.

</comment><comment><USER77> Hard outdoor physical labor where you are up before dawn, work flat out all day, and fall asleep exhausted shortly after dusk. Do this 7 days a week and you won't have time to be depressed.

<comment><USER78> Do you have personal experience doing this?

<comment><USER77> I have personal experience of working this hard, but having never been depressed I have never had to use this approach. I have worked with people who have used it successfully and if I were to get depressed it is exactly what I would do.

It seems to be important that it is both hard physical labor and outdoors in the sun.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER79> What works for me:

\- Getting lost in games/books with imaginative worlds.

\- Traveling.

\- Hooking up with random people without any strings/hopes/expectations.

\- Making stuff.

\- Helping someone feel better without it being at your expense.

\- and of course, music.

</comment><comment><USER80> There are many people here who say, see a doctor.

But, how do you find a doctor? What kind of doctor is appropriate? How do I even know what sort of doctor I could afford?

<comment><USER81> You want to look for psychotherapist (talk therapy) and a psychatrist (medication therapy). If and how you can afford that depends on your country. For me, I haven't paid a single cent for the last two years seeing both and getting medication. I feel way way better and probably wouldn't do so good without both of them.

</comment></comment><comment><USER82> Seek professional help.

Threads like these are typically filled with unverified claims, anecdotes, well-meaning tips and what others think helped them or someone they know in what they believe are similar circumstances.

Some people aren't diagnosed, but make their own assumptions. Others don't differentiate between a mood (sadness) and pathology (clinical depression).

TLDR: There are too many variables, unknowns and right-sounding wrongs out there. A professional third party is better suited to interpret your situation than anyone else - including yourself.

<comment><USER83> You did not understand the question. OP requested a "hack", which is, by definition, an unverified claim, anecdote, well-meaning tip etc.

And anyway, your absolute faith in professionals is unwarranted.

Psychiatry and psychology remain largely unsupported by good science. There is no verified and widely-accepted predictive model of overall brain function.

Many therapists operate entirely on personal bias and superstition; at least one major university touts their M.Div. program as a preferred gateway to clinical psychology.

The evidence in support of pharmacological treatment is polluted by the fact that almost all large-scale clinical studies of psychoactive drugs are underwritten by those who intend to profit from them. Double-blinding is not an absolute guarantee against manipulation if you fund multiple studies and simply drop the results you don't like.

Truly endogenous depression, meaning that which has no legitimate external factors underlying it, may be a mythical beast. All the drugs and therapy in the world will not resolve a bad situation, particularly when that bad situation happens to be a social norm like working at a meaningless job.

SSRIs may get you functional again, but is that really a positive outcome when all they are doing is revving you up to feel good about wasting your life as a corporate cog? Stimulating you to participate gamely in the destruction of the planet through mindless consumption? Convincing you to squeeze out more little consumers to propagate the system?

Evolution has not prepared animals to live in zoos; they often develop symptoms analogous to human depression. Neither has it prepared us to sit around all day in offices doing shit jobs for the primary enrichment of those at the top.

Here's my hack: if you find yourself depressed, have a look at your situation. It probably sucks. Get up, walk out, don't come back. But realize that you cannot easily escape our shitty system that constrains you to participate in economic slavery in order to afford basic shelter and minimal health care. Good luck.

<comment><USER82> My point is that there may not be an obvious hack for complicated issues like depression.

I don't have absolute faith in professionals; Don't know what gave you that idea. I'm saying they're better than the alternatives, and that expertise is worth something.

I agree with some of your criticisms of the status quo, but it seems to me like you're conflating your own views of society with an objective view that serves as a legitimate basis for a depressive reaction/sadness.

As for your claims regarding endogenous depression: I don't know what you base them on. I've seen nothing to support this position, at least.

There might be psychologically unhealthy sides to modern society, but what you and others present as alternatives is, in my opinion, glorified guesswork - <USER3> opposed to a somewhat systematic search for knowledge (flawed as it is).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER84> A few mental tricks I've mentioned here before that help me:

1\. I once heard Sam Harris talking about this process. Most people sort of are their thoughts. That is -- this is tough to describe plainly -- their thoughts and feelings are primary, driving their actions as if mechanically linked. But you can in a certain sense become aware of your thoughts and view them as an outsider, as something that's happening independent of you, that you can see and choose how you react to. It's not just about self-assessment (although it _is_ about that). It works during acute "attacks" too.

It's crazy, but hearing him say that made a huge impact on an anxiety problem that had been getting worse for me. Thinking of it this way has without exaggeration changed my life.

2\. A second sort of ridiculous trick that works for me, for some reason:

There may be a billion universes in which I die this week, but it can't be this one, because I am subjectively alive and experiencing this one. I can only experience the timeline in which I live. There may be other timelines, but I wouldn't know about them, because I'm alive in this one. I can only experience living.

I don't experience the timelines where I do/did die, by definition. I can only enjoy the one in which I don't/didn't.

</comment><comment><USER85> Drastically limit the use of your phone. Sleep with it plugged in in another room.

</comment><comment><USER86> Vitamin D/sunlight, HIIT, deep sleep, no sugar, good diet, throwing parties.

</comment><comment><USER87> First, I would like to clarify that when I say "depression" I am _not_ referring to the kind of clinical depression that you need to see a doctor for. I am referring to the more mild depression that many (most?) of us experience at some point in our lives.

I'd also like to say that I'm not trying to give advice. Depression is a very personal experience and I think sharing our stories will do far more than trying to distill them into universal advice.

A lot of people in this thread, and all threads like this, are recommending exercise. I think there are actual studies that show exercise being a good way to fight depression, so this is good advice, but for me personally it was not the right answer.

I tried exercise as a fix and it did very little to help me. It created another obligation in my life. Something else on the endless list of things that needed to be done between 6PM and 11PM on the weekdays or on the weekends. It felt like my entire life was being consumed by having to do things and the pressure to be doing more things. Learning things, writing code, making music, making video games, woodworking, photography, learning to cook, etc. The key point here is that I felt no intrinsic motivation to do those things - I just felt unending pressure to do _something_ productive all the time so that I could get that next job, make millions of dollars, become internet famous, or at least finally like the person I was.

In the end what helped me more than anything was learning to let myself off the hook. Yes, there are people out there who work 10 hours a day and contribute to fifteen different open source projects in their free time. There are people my age touring the world as masters of their chosen instrument.

It's okay that I'm not one of them. I have redeeming qualities that those people don't have. My perspective and experience are just as valuable as theirs. My life is just as valuable as theirs.

There are a good many things that I should improve in my life. I'm overweight and don't exercise much. I should walk my dogs more often. I drink too much soda. I stay up too late. If there is a pizza present, I will eat too much of it. I don't have any productive hobbies at the moment. I should save more money and play less video games. I should call my Mom more often.

Thinking about all of those things, and especially trying to fix them all at once or too fast, will bring me back into depression and anxiety. Instead, I need to balance my thoughts and give myself credit for slow, incremental progress.

I don't beat my wife or my dogs. I'm not addicted to meth, tobacco, cocaine, heroin, or alcohol. I pay my taxes. I put money into my retirement account every month. I don't steal. I do good things for other people. I donate to my local NPR station.

There are so many good things about me that get lost when I only think about the bad things. I will never become a famous musician, prodigious coder, or Nobel prize winning scientist. Accepting that and trying to love the person I am now has been the best fix for me.

I hope that this story is helpful to anyone who takes the time to read it, and if anyone else is willing, I'd love to hear your stories about depression.

</comment><comment><USER88> Cut off Facebook and alike. Excercise and take sleep pill. Find a hobby.

</comment><comment><USER89> There aren't really a lot of shortcuts. Start with therapy.

</comment><comment><USER90> Some personal strategies / ideas (no advise of course):

\- Sport (for me it's mostly HIIT Training and bike commuting at the moment), check out [https://darebee.com](https://darebee.com) for free workout plans and nutrition advise

\- 1 tab LSD per season

\- some Kratom once in a while

\- Vitamin D3 + K2

\- definately no alcohol

\- getting educated in basic psychology

\- a regulated daily routine (early to bed, fixed times for eating if possible)

\- drinking enough water

\- not hoarding too much stuff (minimalism)

\- making my bed in the morning ([https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KgzLzbd- zT4](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KgzLzbd-zT4))

\- socialising (cooking with friends, doing sport together)

\- GTD for organization of work and personal life (it's pretty much all about writing down stuff to have a clear mind)

</comment><comment><USER91> Exercise. CBT. But you should really go see a doctor.

</comment><comment><USER92> Walking and any kind of physical activity.

</comment><comment><USER93> Internal Family Systems therapy.

</comment><comment><USER94> Professionally prescribed anti-depressants. Depression is serious. Seek medical help.

</comment><comment><USER95> A dose of LSD.

</comment><comment><USER96> what worked for me,

1\. disable social media, even netflix 2\. running, swimming, and weight lifting (make new friends ) 3\. lower my expectations in life, 4\. socialise more with family and friends 5\. explore new stuff (fishing, gardening, cooking) 6\. meditation (or prayers since i am a muslim) 7\. smile more, and care less about technology

</comment><comment><USER97> After massive dispute with my partners I went into depression.

I started sharing my penthouse with economically challenged students.

We all go on hiking, fishing etc.. together. This is helped me come out of depression and now i am starting my new company with the same guys.

</comment><comment><USER98> Fix what is causing the depression.

<comment><USER99> This is really the only solution. Hacks will only give a very minor benefit. Look at your life, relationships and job and ask yourself if its what you really want.

<comment><USER7> You two are describing solutions for "feeling depressed". Clinical depression is very different.

You could bathe in diamonds every day, have the best lover, the most supporting circle of friends, be at the peak of your health and still be depressed. Depression is out of your control.

You can reduce triggers by living better but that's it. Even while living the happiest moments of your life you can still have depression lurk in the back of your head, probing you with negative thoughts.

<comment><USER99> >You two are describing solutions for "feeling depressed". Clinical depression is very different.

No, I'm talking about clinical depression. But it's interesting that this viewpoint seems to be quite prevalent on HN.

>Depression is out of your control.

Perhaps in some cases, but in many cases there are things you can change that will improve it.

You seem to be making an assumption that clinical depression can't be due to lifestyle factors. This is an incorrect assumption, based on my own experience, that of family members, and research looking into psychological stress and neuroinflammation (for example).

>Even while living the happiest moments of your life you can still have depression lurk in the back of your head, probing you with negative thoughts.

The triggers for depression aren't "moments". It builds up over a long time, and isn't due to short-term factors. So while you might have a "happy moment" during depression, that isn't likely to cure it (and that isn't what I'm saying at all).</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Infosys may hire more in US or buy local firm - <AUTHOR> http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/2010/10/05/stories/2010100554520100.htm <comment><USER2> _In a recent interview, a top Infosys official told Business Line that the company would hire more laterals in the US, and expects no cutbacks on tech spending there even as stimulus funding tapers off._

I've worked with Indian oursourcing companies before but I wasn't aware the term "laterals" is common vocabulary. Does this mean hiring more US citizens/perm residents to work laterally with the offshore workers? I thought that meant they would place more Indian workers in lateral positions on H1b visas to work with offshore teams.

<comment><USER3> When they say "laterals", they mean non-freshers

<comment><USER4> And when they say "freshers" they mean novices.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Infosys make only 2% money from selling software. 98% money they made by selling consulting viz bribing clients, exploiting engineers and manipulating stock prices.

<comment><AUTHOR> [Citation needed]

I wonder why they don't make all of the money this way.

<comment><USER5> Revenue from selling software aka Finacle = $200 million <http://goo.gl/WBl7>

Revenue from selling _consulting_ = $4.67 billion <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infosys>

Indians (not just Infosys) among most corrupt while doing business abroad <http://goo.gl/QaDI>

Infosys is a _chop shop_ <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infosys#Controversy></comment></comment></comment>


A sealed bottle garden thriving after 40 years without fresh air or water - <AUTHOR> http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2267504/The-sealed-bottle-garden-thriving-40-years-fresh-air-water.html <comment><USER2> So in a symbiotic bacteria/fungi/plant ecosystem, I can understand why CO2, H2O, and O2 _might_ be able to remain in balance. But decomposition produces not only CO2, but CO, CH4, nitrate chemistry... I have trouble understanding why this cycle isn't at least a little bit leaky, since it seems like some of the trace gasses wouldn't automatically have all of the biological, solar, and marine sinks available in nature. I would be interested to know how the internal pressure of this experiment fluctuates due to phase transitions, especially chemical reactions which could potentially produce phase transitions that are not thermally or biologically reversible in the vicinity of STP.

<comment><USER3> It really depends on the bacterial flora present in the container. Bacteria are incredibly diverse, and just as one decomposer may be a methanogen [1], a different species of bacteria present may be a methanotroph [2]. So given the right bacterial "mixture," a self-sustaining CH4 cycle is not unreasonable.

Additionally, CO is a metabolite for some methanogenic bacteria, specifically in production of acetyl CoA [3].

My point is, as long as enough diversity has survived in the ecosystem, it is quite possible that not only CO2/H20/O2 are able to maintain a balance, but _most_ common molecules would be able to remain at nontoxic levels for the plant.

[1]: [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methanogen](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methanogen) [2]: [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methanotroph](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methanotroph) [3]: [http://textbookofbacteriology.net/metabolism_7.html](http://textbookofbacteriology.net/metabolism_7.html)

<comment><USER4> In other words, the secret to having a viable sealed terrarium is in the compost. Get the right compost, with the right population of bacteria, and the whole thing will run forever.

<comment><USER5> I am interested in the idea of synthetic soils. Arriving on Mars and creating the right mix of sand, silt, and clay is easy enough. But it's the organic matter and biomass that makes soil what it is. Research on this might also have impacts on some parts of developing world where soil quity can be very poor. (Although that's often because anything that could go into the ground to improve soil has other uses).

<comment><USER6> One idea I've toyed with is building a "terrarium" (marsium?) with Mars imitation soil and atmosphere, and attempt to bootstrap some life in there.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> What I'm more amused by is the level of scepticism over an self contained eco- system. In order for any eco-system, either contained or not contained, there has to be much greater tolerances to extreme conditions that we generally acknowledge. In truth, outside of absolute extremes where organic life is simply impossible because or either denaturing or absolute destruction of organic material, life will exist. It's also entirely possible that this bottle now contains bacteria, fungi, or other organisms that are much more efficient at breaking down the organic material left by the dying plant mater.

<comment> matt-attack > now contains bacteria, fungi, or other organisms

Whichever types it contains _now_ , surely it started out with :)

<comment><USER8> Not necessarily. The bacteria might have evolved inside the bottle.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> As someone who keeps both fresh water and salt water aquariums, it makes perfect sense that this is completely plausible. I think most aquarist are well aware that bacteria are the most powerful thing in keeping our aquarium ecosystems in balance.

By mass, that vast majority of living material in that bottle is almost certainly bacteria, some nitrifying, others denitrifying. All otherwise decomposing, consuming, and recycling the various chemistry within.

Think about the earth as a sealed globe within space, and you start to understand how good a job bacteria does at balancing the chemistry of life.

I've actually seen something similar to this at a local museum called an "Ecosphere", which includes tiny shrimp living inside. They've been known to last for over ten years.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ecosphere_(aquarium)](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ecosphere_\(aquarium\))

Carl Sagan's review of an Ecosphere: [http://www.eco- sphere.com/sagan.html](http://www.eco-sphere.com/sagan.html)

</comment><comment><USER10> Oh, hell, how did a Daily Mail link get to the front page? This is a british tabloid. You may as well be debating the veracity of a story about a wolf boy discovered in the wild.

<comment><USER11> Would you prefer an article from the times?

[http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/science/biology/article3667780...](http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/science/biology/article3667780.ece)

<comment><USER12> Yes, atleast the Times is a respected paper.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> A clear balloon containing an ecosystem would heat up due to the greenhouse effect. If it's sufficiently large and allowed to slightly expand it could float freely in the air. Imagine closed gardens flying freely around the world.

<comment><USER14> I don't think you could get them to be consistently warm on Earth. But the atmosphere on Venus is so thick you could have a bunch of these floating above the clouds.

<comment><USER15> Maybe you could replace some of the nitrogen with helium to achieve positive buoyancy without a temperature difference.

<comment><USER16> Wouldn't that leak out from .. basically anything solid?

<comment><USER13> We're not talking superfluidic Helium here... Glass or BPA should be fine... In that case the envelop is rigid and we might at well just suck out enough air to get buoyancy.

<comment><USER17> When I was reading about Sterling engines, people talked about H2 leaking straight through the steel walls of the container. I can't find a similar reference for helium, but it's conceivable, to a non-expert anyway. No superfluidity required.

<comment><USER18> Big difference between H2 and He. Leakage is a problem, but not so nasty a problem. (Hydrogen leaks through solid metal. Yes you read that right.)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> I used to love making those things with pickle jars:

[https://www.google.com/search?q=pickle+jar+terrarium&es_sm=1...](https://www.google.com/search?q=pickle+jar+terrarium&es_sm=106&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ei=zr6RU-7dM- Hb0QXk8IHIBA&ved=0CCMQsAQ&biw=1920&bih=961)

I don't suppose my parents have any of them left though... they tended to get kind of crusty with something growing on the glass and blotting out the light.

</comment><comment><USER20> Compare the EcoSphere: [http://www.eco-sphere.com](http://www.eco-sphere.com)

I had one; amusing, though seemed finicky about lighting.

<comment><USER21> > EcoSpheres have an average life expectancy of two years.

Very interesting, I had thought they were sustainable for much longer than that. I suppose even the most tightly controlled starting conditions will lead to unpredictable results when you have organisms reproducing.

<comment><USER22> I still have one. The shrimp were alive for about 2 years. Now there are other organisms...

I think these are more about the incredible toughness of the shrimp involved. Their native habitat consists of rainwater puddles held in volcanic rock, so the shrimposphere is probably fairly luxurious.

<comment><USER23> > I think these are more about the incredible toughness of the shrimp > involved.

Pretty much; this guy[1] claims that basically, the shrimp slowly starve over the course of a couple years, shrinking after each molt.

[1]: [http://www.petshrimp.com/opaeinfo.php](http://www.petshrimp.com/opaeinfo.php)

<comment><USER24> I'd have to doubt his claim, given this comment which shows they must be breeding:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7858130](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7858130)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> I can't figure out what would be providing more CO2. The container is near full of greenery; where does it get air exchange? Maybe the cork leaks just enough is all I can figure.

<comment><USER26> Exactly, where is the plant mass coming from? Can bacteria break soil down into carbon that the plant can use to build more leaves/stems/roots?

<comment><USER25> The Daily Fail version claims so, but that doesn't seem sufficient. Nonetheless, its clearly working. It'd be interesting to insert a probe through the cork and run a real-time analysis of the air composition.

<comment><USER27> I don't think we can say it's clearly working... This seems like an extraordinary claim and it's hard to know if there's any truth fudging.

<comment><USER28> Another puzzling factor is the clarity of the glass. When I've seen bottle gardens, they all develop a thick scum from minerals in condensation, algae, and bacterial plaques.

<comment><USER29> This is a great GREAT point.

It would be nice to hear an explanation.

<comment><USER30> Magnetic scrubbing brushes. They're commonly used in aquariums.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> My coworker had a smaller version of this in his cube. His son had made it in middle school and it had been going for 10+ years. I think his was sealed with wax or something.

It's an easy experiment to reproduce and works great if you have enough time to wait around.

<comment><USER5> There are a variety of "Instructibles" for these. They're of variable quality and I have no idea how to select the instructible with most chance of sucess.

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> Absolutely fascinating. The greatest Bio- / Hardware hack I've seen yet. Congrats to the gardener.

(Just assuming it's true)

</comment><comment><USER33> Most aquarium plants grow excellent in this way, better than when they are submerged in an aquarium. Aquarium plants have two distinct forms, submerged or emerged, and the foilage can look completely different. The emerged form does better, since it doesn't need to compete with algae and co2 is more available. To grow your own plants, fill a pickle jar with damp miracle grow organic potting soil, and plant what ever aquarium plants you can get your hand on, seal the jar, than enjoy.

</comment><comment><USER34> Assume the garden is somehow provably what it is claimed to be. Further assume that it is not cleaned manually because the usual culprits for blackening the inside, by pure chance, happened to be absent or long dead.

I am curious how one might go about reproducing this exact ecosystem in other bottles by cloning the original, without adding contaminants. Under these assumptions selling clones could become a commercial proposition.

</comment><comment><USER35> This is motivation to try to repeat the experiment, in my opinion .. would be a great Instructable, with the last step: wait 50 years or so .. ;)

</comment><comment><USER36> StackExchange Skeptics addressed this last year:

 _Can a plant survive bottled in its own ecosystem for 50 years?_

[http://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/15838/can-a- plan...](http://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/15838/can-a-plant- survive-bottled-in-its-own-ecosystem-for-50-years)

<comment><USER37> It's not exactly addressed. They just say it might work.

</comment></comment><comment><USER38> So it has had water and presumably some atmosphere was exchanged when it was watered in 1972, 40 years ago. The title is somewhat misleading but 40 years is still a long time.

The stopper doesn't look like its particularly well fastened and could potentially pop up and allow leaks. Impressive but without closer inspection it looks like a slightly flawed execution to me. Maybe I'm just being pedantic. A picture of the starting point would be nice.

<comment><USER39> from the nollywoodone.com version:

"[he] has only watered the plant twice, the last time in 1972 when he oiled the plastic stopper so that it wedged so tightly it hasn't been out since."

</comment></comment><comment><USER40> I've just been reading Verner Vinge's A Deepness in the Sky where the space- dwellers consider these the highest art form.

</comment><comment><USER41> Hah! I can't read this because ... provisional military junta in Thailand not happy with Daily Mail?

Some kind of breakdown here: [http://www.andrew-drummond.com/2014/05/daily- mail-and-mail-o...](http://www.andrew-drummond.com/2014/05/daily-mail-and- mail-on-sunday-online.html)

</comment><comment><USER42> "A good software project is never answered. It is not a bolt to be tightened into place but a tendril seed to be planted and to bear more seed toward the hope of enfoliating among the world wide landscapes."

                    -- John C Hardy

</comment><comment><USER43> What if we build a huge sealed bottle garden and send to Mars, can humans live in it!

<comment><USER44> No. First, every kilogram we send to Mars will be _hugely_ expensive, so low mass will be prioritized over long-term sustainability for research and exploration missions.

Second, the plants chosen for bottle gardens are very sturdy and tolerant of non-optimal environments. Humans are a lot more sensitive.

If you're interested in the topic, read "The Martian" by Any Weird, a very well-researched SF story about an astronaut who gets left behind during a Mars mission and has to survive for several years using equipment that was only specced to sustain the expedition for a month.

<comment><USER45> Thanks for the recommendation, looks like a good read. Although I was a little disappointed when I found out his name was actually Andy Weir, not Any Weird :P

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER46> I was wondering how easy/difficult this phenomenon is to study in depth. If I wanted to examine any organisms in the jar, I would have trouble doing it while simultaneously maintaining the ecosystem's independence.

</comment><comment><USER47> > The only external input needed to keep the plant going is light, since this > provides it with the energy it needs to create its own food and continue to > grow.

Future of clean energy ?

</comment><comment><USER48> How long will it last? Will the plant eventually get a mutation and die?

</comment><comment><USER49> Blogspam, original at

[http://www.nollywoodone.com/latest-additions/8934-the- sealed...](http://www.nollywoodone.com/latest-additions/8934-the-sealed- bottle-garden-still-thriving-after-40-years-without-fresh-air-or-water.html)

<comment><USER50> 'The Internet Movie Database for Africa' is the original?

For that article it's probably the Daily Mail: [http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2267504/The-s...](http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2267504/The- sealed-bottle-garden-thriving-40-years-fresh-air-water.html)

He started it in 1960 with 'about a quarter of a pint of water', then added water in 1972.

<comment><USER51> it is indeed originally from the daily fail. that's their watermark bottom left.

<comment><USER52> The Daily Mail, and others just picked this up too. It was first covered in a Q&A style gardening radio show touring the UK.

You can hear David asking at 35:20 in the BBC Radio 4 program _Gardeners Question Time_ first broadcasted Friday 18 January 2013.

[http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b01pw5sd](http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b01pw5sd)

The original copy text is under all these 10 orginal photographs taken by Phil Yeomans/BNPS published 21 Jan 2013: [http://bnps.photoshelter.com/gallery/52-year-old-sealed- gard...](http://bnps.photoshelter.com/gallery/52-year-old-sealed-garden-in-a- bottle/G0000109R_kZmtl4/)

There is also a close up of the seal: [http://bnps.photoshelter.com/gallery- image/52-year-old-seale...](http://bnps.photoshelter.com/gallery- image/52-year-old-sealed-garden-in-a-bottle/G0000109R_kZmtl4/I0000taYoN9ZzXJs)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER53> The headline should read: "53-year-old Sealed Bottle Garden..."

I see this more and more even in edited publications. It's especially irksome here since the article contains almost no actual writing.

</comment><comment><USER54> Maybe I'm being nit-picky, but it's not "entirely self-sufficient," as it still needs light from an external source.

<comment><USER55> Earth isn't entirely self sufficient and needs light from an external source....

It's working in the same constraints the origins ed evolved for... Just smaller

</comment></comment><comment><USER56> doesn't the plan die? or it's producing seeds itself?

</comment><comment><USER57> Reminds me of the movie: "the journey to the center of the earth"

</comment><comment><USER58> Hmm can we open the bottle and test if the water is indeed from 1972?

I mean how can we actually test that this guy isn't just making things up, and wasn't opening the bottle to water the ecosystem?

<comment> mark-r Water recycles itself naturally. I'd be more curious to know how the oxygen converts back to carbon dioxide.

<comment><USER59> Respiration. Microorganisms use oxygen, and so does the plant when it's not under sunlight.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER60> And plant-rights activists aren't all over this? No thank you, my plants like to be cage-free.

</comment><comment><USER61> Perhaps not as exiting, but I have aquarium which requires maintenance only 4x a year. Feeder, filters, lights, water exchange etc operate automatically.

</comment><comment><USER62> Easiest explanation: they're fibbing. Somebody opens the bottle regularly. There's no reason to take every extraordinary claim posted on the internet at face value. Next we'll see bigfoot photos?

<comment><USER63> You're assuming it's an extraordinary claim. However, it seems as though it's a claim that is grounded in science and repeatable.

<comment><USER62> Its an outrageous stretch that a sealed bottle could support an ecosystem for decades; previous experiments achieved only months or a year or two.</comment></comment></comment>


Pennies From Heaven - <AUTHOR> http://www.newsweek.com/2010/11/18/angel-investors-are-going-where-vcs-fear-to-tread.html

<comment><USER2> Mainstream media hyperbole in full effect.

</comment><comment><USER3> 10,000,000 pennies for kicking the devil in the ass. -- congrats Daniel</comment>