 Hi everyone, welcome to Ask an Expert, an interview series where we talk about topics around mental health with experts, ranging from clinicians to people with lived expertise. My name is Monica and I am a neuroscience postgraduate student at the University of Oxford. Here I study depression, a disabling, debilitating mental health challenge that is the leading cause of mental health disease related burden worldwide. And so it's especially important for us to talk about it, to talk about ways to cope and what potential treatments could be like. And so I feel especially honored to be joined by Scott today, someone who brings on lived experience and expertise. His story is incredible. You'll get to hear from him in just a few moments. Welcome Scott. Hi Monica, thanks for having me. Thank you so much for joining. It's great to be able to chat today about living with depression and what's that like for you? Oh gosh, what a question. You know when people describe depression we have to use metaphors. Because if you just say I'm sad, I'm low, the world's a little dark, it doesn't encapsulate what it actually feels like and feelings are impossible to describe. Like how do I describe beauty or well-being? How do we describe even happiness? When you're happy you just know you're happy, right? So depression for me wasn't like a black cloud over my head and it's not like the world is losing saturation and the colors aren't as bright. This was far more serious for me. This was, I asked people to imagine waking up every morning and every morning you get a phone call and your cell phone's right by your bed, right? And it's a phone call. And you pick it up, you say hello, good morning. And someone says, hi Scott. We just like to let you know that everybody you know has died. Your family, your friends, and now you're completely alone. Okay, goodbye. Click. And you have to go through the day in this grieving and sense of aloneness. Like you're nobody in the world anymore and there's an alienation and an isolation. And you don't know how to make sense of it because you're like, it's not my fault. I didn't know what I did, but I still feel responsible for that. And you go to bed and the next morning you kind of wake up okay. And then you get the phone call and you're like, oh, I remember what this is going to be about. And we have to go through the day like that. Depression for me is it was a sense of grieving for a life that didn't exist. And this is a lot of people kind of resonate with this and it's that heaviness of existence. It's a heaviness of life. And through practice and what we'll talk about today a little bit, Monica is and everyone watching is how can we wear the world lightly? Because depression really makes us wear this heavy robe and it's wet and it's like it's totally heavy on us. How can we wear something a little lighter? What tools can we practice to really just feel some levity and lightness in our lives? And it's very difficult with depression, but I hope we can get to the bottom of things. But that's how I describe it. Yeah. Thank you. It's, you know, I'm reading the chat right now. Blake is saying, oh my goodness, God, you are so right. Sometimes it feels like the world has just abandoned you. It's such a difficult thing to go through every day, essentially. Yeah. Yeah. And Blake's not wrong and everybody has their own experiences with depression, right? Like, listen, I was diagnosed in 2008 and it's been a journey, man, 14 years. And I've had amazing moments in the last two years have been very, very interesting for me as far as growth and seeing depression in a new way. But I still get low. Like people say, Scott, did you beat it? Did you cure yourself? And I don't even know what that really means. I still have really tough days. And the world sometimes is too much for me to handle. It's all too much. Every making my bed is too much. Showering is too much. The feeling that work is part of the day. Sometimes these things are just too much. And that's where compassion can come in a little later on. But if people feel this way and Blake knows and people in the comments know you're not alone in that feeling, man. No, it's very real. And I empathize with that and I understand that. And you need to find people that can relate to that. It helps us feel not so alienated and that the world has left us behind. That's the sense sometimes that everything else is moving on. Everyone's doing this. Everyone's smiling. Everything's happening. But I'm left behind. What's that? Why is that happening? What does that mean? Did I do something wrong? Am I going to feel like this forever? What is this feeling telling me? And what can I do about it? These are the kind of questions that cycle through our mind. Right. Because everyone experiences something very different. It could be useful to talk about different ways that people cope. And coping can come in many different stages and I think forms to whether it's hearing that one has been diagnosed with the depression or hearing that a friend has been diagnosed with depression or hearing if oneself has been diagnosed with depression. And so it might be useful to kind of share a bit about what that might look like for you in terms of coping. Yeah. So like any diagnosis, right? It's like, yeah, I remember I fractured my tibia and tore my PCL in my left knee. Monica knows all about anatomy. She's going to medical school. She knows exactly where those tendons are in ligaments. So I was given that diagnosis. I'm like, okay, well, what's the plan? Like, okay, so I got that fracture. Okay, we're going to put the cast on. This is what your rehab is going to be like. This is when you've got to get the cane. The crutches, all I see with a mental health diagnosis like that, depression, anxiety is, you know, we tend to put ourselves in the boxes and then that's not all you are. That's just what's happening right now. So I saw a diagnosis and I see it now as it's a launch pad. And we need these launch pads in a solid foundation. If you're going up to space, you're not taken off on the rocket in a desert in Dubai. With no concrete padding and out of the sand. The rocket ships, it's going to tip over. A diagnosis can be a foundation and a launch pad. So then we can move towards something better, something a little higher. Something that's for our best selves, right? Something that'll be good for us. But a foundation of, okay, this is what's happening right now. Now I can put a little label on it. Because what is a diagnosis anyways? We get cluster of symptoms and then we're just laying out, okay, this is what it could be for sure. And now we can go into different streams of what would be good for you. Okay, you're feeling this way. This is what we think it is. Okay. What would be good for you then? Because of that, let's try that and let's see how that goes. Okay. Let's tweak that. It didn't do too well. Let's try this with you. So for me, it was, it wasn't as intimidating as I thought because it allowed me to create that launch pad and now I can almost rest on that diagnosis a little bit. Be like, oh, that's what's going on. Okay. Now let's go for some solutions, but you can make a plan on that launch pad. You can take a nap on that launch pad, right? You can rest on it. You can set up camp for a bit. If you're like, I don't want to do anything about it right now. Okay. Well, at least you got a little place to nap, set up camp, start a fire, chill out a little bit. It's like right when we get the diagnosis, we think, oh, now everything has to change everything. No, it's sometimes it's up to you too to be like, yeah. Okay. I got it. Now I take my time. Now there are options. Options are good with depression. You're not just confined to one thing options choice. Okay. I can do something about it when I feel maybe I'm ready. But I say, I like to think of the, think of that launch pad idea. That really helped me. That's amazing. So what I really hear is just kind of reframing the whole, the whole kind of scary daunting feeling of a diagnosis as something that you can take as an information source. You can sit with it. You can do something about it. You have ultimately choice. Yeah. I think that's a great way. Yeah. The doctor, they're there to help you. The diagnosis is there to help. And I know it's daunting sometimes, right? But like you, I don't know. I went, it was like a cheap H&M shirt, but I went to the store and I'm like, I got to look for them. They have the tags on it for sizes. I'm like, I'm looking for the label that's a medium. Okay. I used to be a small, I'm getting bigger, but I am a medium now because this helps me make the right choice for me and thing to fit me the best way. So a diagnosis, it's just finding something at this point in your life. It's not a forever thing. It doesn't have to be at this point in my life. I'm looking for medium t-shirts. We go through another pandemic. I'm going to be looking for large t-shirts, something a little more room in the gut. Okay. So it depends what stage you're at in your life and what's going to fit you best in a diagnosis. That's all it has to be. It doesn't have to be bigger than that. I love how you use this reframing tool. You know, in the idea of cognitive behavioral therapy, CBT, reframing is also one of the many different tools that a therapist or even a friend might recommend someone else to try. So I'm really glad that we brought this up. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And what has it been like for you on kind of a day-to-day basis? Because we mentioned more like the time before hearing about the diagnosis. And I thought it might be useful to focus on just, you know, every day. When you, when I look back at my life, it's very easy to think that years were terrible. That I had weeks that were all bad, days that were all bad, 100% bad. And then if I reframe and I really think about it, I really think about the years, the last 14 years since that diagnosis, how many days, if I had a calendar and a stamp, right? And I had this big red stamp that said failure, right? How many days could I really stamp? The whole entire day was a complete write-off, a complete waste of time where I was just debilitated and a complete nobody and it was the worst day ever. How many days could I write off? I don't think I could write off one. To be honest, in every day, even if I deal with depression for the whole day, there is a shining light, no matter how small. There is one little good thing that came from that. I don't care if I'm in bed all day and I discover a new Mozart song that hit me just here. I'm like, ooh, I felt good for a second. Then I can't write off the whole day with a failure stamp. If there's one good thing in the day, that means it's not a write-off. And anyone who's been through depression had panic attacks during the day. It felt completely low and hopeless. If we can just shift and just see, okay, hey, I ate a meal today. Hey, I had a cup of tea today. And that warm sensation in the body, that felt good for a second. Because with depression for me, I just had to wait some days for the clouds to break for a second. And then, okay, I feel good. Oh my God, I feel, okay, there's a bit of hope in the future. Okay, yeah, yeah, hold on to that. It's gone, okay. That's the day it's not a write-off. So, listen, the last many years have been, to be honest, like 99% fantastic. I've been very happy the last 14 years. It's been an incredible life. Going to school, working in all types of jobs, nonprofits, for-profits, in tech, in mental health, right, for the Canadian Mental Health Association, helping people with my YouTube channel and podcast. If we can, the biggest thing that helped me was being of service. Because with depression, people who deal with depression and anxiety, we're more likely to use the words I and me in our vocabulary. That's pretty standard. I feel this way. I can't believe I did that. I'm such a failure. What did I do wrong? They don't like me. They look at me that way. I wonder how they perceive me. When we be of service to others and we do things for other people, it takes the thoughts about ourselves, how we're all consumed, and it puts our energy towards something else, someone else. It's called a distraction, but it's a good one. If you want to lose your sense of self and ego, do things for other people. Volunteer somewhere, and if you can't have enough energy, if your mom's making something in the kitchen, hey, I'll wash a dish for you, mom. Or, hey, dad, I saw the car is a little dirty. I brought it to the car wash. I went for a drive and washed the car, or I vacuumed the mats. Like these little things. I'll tell you, a few weeks ago, I had a low, low, low day, and all I could do was wash the car. And that brought me comfort because it was a tangible action for us to do and something we'll talk about with compassion in a second. Car is dirty. What is the best possible thing in the world, in the universe that I can do? Wash the car. That brings comfort. We have a problem in everyday life. This is life. This is very standard, easy, simple living. And I love that. The car is dirty. What would be good for me? What would be good for my dad? What would be good for the car? Let's wash the car. That's all I did that day. Three hours. I detailed that thing. I waxed it. I vacuumed it. These are the things that are important for me when I'm dealing with depression. And that day, stamped with a win. These are the wins that we can take care of ourselves with when times are tough. I absolutely love this idea of celebrating little wins. It doesn't have to be huge. It could be something just as meaningful as getting out of bed because that in of itself can be quite difficult to do. Yes. And Monica, man, we got to talk for an hour, but we'll keep it short. I just want to say, you know, people listening to what is a win actually is we compare ourselves, social media and what we see in the world. We think that we need to achieve this grandiose purpose in life that we need to be this famous, successful, amazing person. And then we'll be happy. Then we'll be somebody. And we need to redefine the word win or amazing in our lives. The fact that everybody here joined this and watched it and came to learn something new. The fact that you're awake right now, maybe you're still in bed. The fact that you went to school, the fact that you ate a meal that you cooked that you cleaned that you went to bed that you made your bed that you studied that you brushed your hair that you put on clothes. These are the things in daily life that are amazing that you do. Why do you think we need to prove ourselves more than that? Why do you think you need to be better than that? That, oh, I'm not good enough because I didn't start a business. Oh, I'm not good enough because I don't have a girlfriend or boyfriend. I'm not good enough because I'm not the most popular person in school. I'm not good enough because the A minus didn't feel that I only got a C plus. You're amazing just by existing and by existence. We're moving forward by existing just by being here, by doing what you do by being who you are. It's an incredible feat. We need to show ourselves that and start to believe that within ourselves. Like, hey, I'm me. I'm doing this life thing. Sure, it doesn't feel great sometimes. Sure, I get really down and things are really tough because I'm a sensitive person. But man, let me beat my chest a little bit. Let me walk to my own drum and say, I'm doing it. I'm doing this life thing. I don't need to prove myself to anybody. That for me is amazing. That for me is a win. So we don't need to achieve this grandiose thing that we're taught that we need to do to be somebody. If you're kind, if you wash that car, if you went to school, if you smile that somebody, that's a day. That's a day in heaven for somebody else and for yourself. Just mark that win. Those are the things that I think about during the day when I have a bad day. And I'm like, hey, hold on. You're awesome. Chill, chill, chill. Be gentle with yourself. Be gentle. What I hear is a lot of the idea of self-compassion. I think this is something we can focus a few minutes to talk about. It's definitely a topic that we can talk about for hours. So if anyone here is interested, please give the idea of compassionate inquiry or self-compassion, a quick Google search and do some research because the field is absolutely phenomenal. But yes, I'd love to hear your perspective on self-compassion and what it really means to you. Well, okay. So we hear empathy a lot. We hear of sympathy a lot. But compassion is a little different. Compassion, if you see someone struggling, okay? Compassion is the felt urge to relieve that suffering from that person. So compassion, I feel like it rhymes with action, okay? So the action is in the word compassion. When you have compassion for yourself and other people, you're actually taking action. And think of that word passion, Monica and everyone. Think about, if you're passionate about something, if you're passionate about basketball, all right? And I ask you, oh, you're passionate about basketball? You're like, yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm like, oh, do you play? You're like, no, no, no. I'm like, okay, do you watch basketball? No, no, no, no. Do you own a basketball? No, no, no, no. Do you have any posters of basketball players? No, no, no. Then where is the passion? Right? So if someone's passionate about something, you're watching basketball. You're playing it. You collect, you know, basketball cards, something like that. So when we offer ourselves compassion, passion means action. And it's being passionate and offering yourself a sense of action towards yourself. So if I'm offering myself self-compassion, what does that mean? That means that if Monica and I, if right behind me, near my little light there and by my map, which is of the Roman Empire in Constantine's, the Roman world, yeah, 337, whenever Constantine was running the world. Love that map. And I'm passionate about the Roman history. That's why I got the map. See, it works. It's action. So self-compassion is if someone was behind me right now, and you can practice this yourself if anyone wants to close their eyes. Are we okay to do that, Monica, real quick? Okay. I'll close my eyes too. I want to do this practice today too, because this morning wasn't the best. So everyone, if you can just come into where you are, where your feet are, where your sit bones are, close your eyes and come into your body. And if you can imagine just creating a bit of space and distance and hovering over yourself, looking at yourself from behind your chair, wherever you are, just watching yourself from behind. What do you want to say to that person that's sitting, watching this stream? What do you want to tell them? And what do they want to tell you? And as a best friend would come a little closer and maybe give that person a hug or whatever they need in this moment. What do they need from you? Whenever you're ready, you don't have to. But if you'd like, you can open your eyes again. Usually this is over like a 10, 15 minute meditation. But what I usually get from people is the person behind us. That's like acting like a best friend, caregiver, the higher self. And we see my, I see myself sitting in this chair. And what do I want to say to myself? I want to say, hey Scott, good job on the stream so far. And I know you were tired this morning and that's okay. You know, and maybe for some of us today's been a hard day. And then that person that saw us from behind says, I know it's been hard. I know, I know you're going through a hard time. It's going to be okay. I love you anyways, right? No matter how you feel, I love you anyways. This is when we create that distance from emotion. So this self compassion is removing ourselves a little from the internal dialogue of why me, I'm such a terrible person. Why am I feeling this way? I'm such a loser. Create distance. That's all that exercises. You create some distance between you and the emotion and you see that person there. Who's dealing with that? That's the distance from emotion. Other things to offer a self self compassion is you can hold all of these emotions that we feel in a ball and just look at them. And you hold this ball and how emotions are so complex and they have different layers and they get all tangled. They give a ball of yarn here and you look at it and you can twist it. You can see it from different angles, right? And just look objectively like you're a scientist like Monica, the scientist, the neuroscientist. Look at these things, huh? Okay, I'm thinking that. Is that really true? Is me beating myself up right now? Is that I see that thought there that I'm no good and I'm never going to be loved by anyone? Is that true? No, I don't think so. Let me look at that from another angle. Oh yeah, my mom and dad love me. Oh yeah, people at school, they smile at me today. Yeah, so that's not true. Okay, okay. And offer yourself that kindness that we know we have in ourselves. What a best friend would say to you. What Monica would say to you in her soft podcast voice. What would she say to you, right? So these are the perspectives that we can bring to offer ourselves some compassion and love. Because I know we're over time, but just 10 more seconds. With depression, I had to really realize I blamed myself for 10 years. I always thought it was my fault that I wasn't thinking the right way for all those years. And you know, oh, it's because I didn't exercise enough or it's because this happened in childhood and this and this and this. Is that my fault? Oh yeah, my life was going just great. And then I thought, hey, you know, it's spice things up a bit, a little depression. Yeah, that would make my life great. Do you think I did that? You think we wake up every morning everybody and think, hey, I don't want to have a good day today. How about a little anxiety and depression, spice things up? Of course not. It's not our fault that we go through these things. The blame, you know what I mean? It's like, wow, let's really be like, it's not my fault. It's not your fault. It's not. We're just, sometimes we lose genetic lotteries. But I tell you what, that I promise you there's another side and I've seen the other side and our sensitivity to the world and our emotions. It is a gift. If like I've used it, you know, for the betterment of myself and it took a while, but anyone who's struggling right now, hang in there. There's another side. I promise. Off yourself some love and compassion. Thank you so much for sharing this powerful exercise. I could just feel the difference. I feel so much more like happy, just the warmth in what? Two minutes in which goes to show the power of even micro steps that you take every single day to feel the way you want to feel. And so, yes, thank you so much for sharing your story, for telling the whole community about the power of reframing situations. I think we mentioned celebrating little wins, seeing things in a different perspective. You know, you can just take information and sit with it. You don't have to go do something about it immediately. Just sitting with it and then practicing our short little exercise. I know that you also have a wonderful platform where you go through mindfulness exercises. I would love to hear more about that and do tell the community about ways that they could also get involved with you. Yeah, of course. I feel like before, like I've been on YouTube since 2014, and I was always the guy offering like tips and all of this. And now I feel like I'm just the guy with my YouTube channel and podcast that I'm just like telling people that everything's going to be okay. I think that's my role now. And I find comfort in that now, saying that. So I have a YouTube channel. It's called Scott St. Marie and a podcast called the Being Human podcast where, you know, next to diagnosis and mental health, this is all part of being human and being humans hard. It is. We didn't ask to be born. We didn't ask to be here given our situation. And so we're doing things the best we can and the best we know how. So the Being Human podcast is really fun. And then there's a something you can sign up for. If you ever want to meditate with me on zoom, we do these small groups and their support chats. It's peer support. We get on zoom. People chat with me. We it's like a small group. We meditate. We reflect. And then we connect. And the, the amazing physiological benefits of belonging and sharing how we feel. It takes that heavy coat off. You know, we feel a little lighter when it's like, oh, you feel like that's what that is. Me too. Me. I know what that's like. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You went through that. Me too. And it's just fun to connect and to, you know, have space together in an area of compassion and non-judgment. You know, where can we go in life where we don't think people are judging us? There's zoom group. That's the place. So that's something I offer as well with, with my work. Thank you so much for sharing. I put it in the chat for any of you are following just scroll up and you can see the link of where you can join Scott. And hopefully a whole community of people who just understand you who also hopefully will be able to practice compassion. Yes. And like, I don't know what age people are, but my, a lot of my work is going to high schools and elementary schools and giving talks. So if you ever want me to come to your school and give a talk, that's my thing. That's my thing. We can meet in person. How about that? But that's, that's just another piece. So we've heard just a small part of your incredible story. Definitely urge all this like to go community members to please follow Scott and just, he's doing amazing things. Just follow and yeah, you'll find a community of people who support you who want you to be happy. And thank you so much for joining us today. So let us know what you would like to see next in terms of story content in the comment section below. And thank you Scott again for joining. Thanks to all of us like to go community members and wish you a great day. Bye. Bye everyone.