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Darkness Visible is a fairly bleak, but honest traversal into the mind of someone with chronic depression. While a fairly short book, it’s also very dense but well written. I’ll be honest, depression isn’t something I know a lot about. I got this book from an amazon deal of the day, and I’ll admit the title sounded interesting. In short – do I recommend others read this book? The answer would be an undoubtedly “yes”. The reason is, as the author mentions, depression can hit anyone (and in varying amounts, it does hit everyone). Being aware of what he encountered can help to identify “warning signs” early. With that said, this book isn’t a “happy book” – very little joy, and very little answers. It’s an autobiographical account of William Styron’s depression episode.

The autobiography starts at the late age of 60, for William. He discusses how his life turned from being an adventure, to being near total bleak – where even eating is out of necessity and little else. I found the description of his social relationships during his depression to be the most interesting. The reason for this was he sound seclude himself from everyone – friends, family, the whole bit. One such encounter was when he’s sitting by the fire. His wife went to bed, but he’s still up. His depression took a very bad turn for the worse, where he was deciding to end his life. This account is pretty scary. The fact he didn’t rely on his wife, or family, was pretty interesting. The book ends fairly quickly, where he mentions that most people with Depression will get over it…kinda sudden, and kinda empty in my opinion. Some ideas about how to avoid Depression would have been nice.

The most interesting portion of the book I found, at least that resonated well with me, was the following portion:

“A tough job, this; calling “Chin up!” from the safety of the shore to a drowning person is tantamount to insult, but it has been shown over and over again that if the encouragement is dogged enough – and the support equally committed and passionate – the endangered one can nearly always be saved”

This is the crux of the book, and where I think some lessons can be learned from. I really wish he would have elaborated on this gem a little further…but oh well. The lessons, though, are simple. Depression and loneliness can go hand in hand..if we separate ourselves from those we love, those we should rely on, then finding help when we need it is difficult. After reading this book, I see Depression as avoidable with two simple measures.

The first measure is to treat the mind like one treats the body. We exercise to keep the body strong, we watch what we eat to keep the body strong. Eating and exercising impact our mind too – but so do stress, the feeling of loneliness, and so on. With that said, looking for warning signs – signs where our mind may not be in tip top condition, and trying to mindfully analyze the sign may help in preventing depression. The idea is that we take care of the mind as much, if not more, than the body itself…and to be mindful that things in the mind can go wrong, just like things in the body, and to try and prevent them from happening.

The second measure is not to alienate ourselves from each other. One pattern I felt that William went through was not relying on his friends and family – and instead on a “professional” and things didn’t work out. In his very account, above, he mentions having support, both committed and passionate, are important in healing. That comes from those we love.

In conclusion, I strongly recommend reading the book. It’s short, but a very passionate account. Depression has a very negative connotation, that seems to be the ghost in the closet. I feel that exposing the fact that the mind is not impervious to having its own set of issues is important.