"... and therein lies the genius of my teacher, my mother's mother, who fulfilled herself completely by always forgetting herself in the joy of the welfare of all those around her. This is the only real cure for depression.
It is the prescription that would come from any authentic spiritual physician. If you dwell upon yourself and your own private satisfactions, the first disappointment will throw you into a depression.
If you can train to think more and more of the needs of all those around you, to work with people around you even if they are not always pleasant, you will be making yourself immune to depression, and you will be helping others to do the same."
From
THE PROPHET, Kahlil Gibran
