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Exercise can be nearly as effective as therapy for depression

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Re: Exercise can be nearly as effective as therapy for depression

#261

Post by genghisjahn »

heavyset_go wrote: post #58
HauntingPin wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I also question the universality of it. No amount of exercise changed my depression or made life any less miserable. Anti-depressants finally helped me get past the trauma I was unable to properly process otherwise.

I'm a non-competitive athlete, and yes exercise can help depression, but no, it will not be sufficient for anything but your mild to average case of it. Exercise is a crucial part of dealing with it, but it is not a panacea.

True. I ran my but off in 2025 but it was mainly holding my anxiety over finding a job at bay.

Re: Exercise can be nearly as effective as therapy for depression

#262

Post by taeric »

hn_acc1 wrote: post #241
taeric wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As someone that is unable to keep any sort of routine, I have objections here. :D Without some sort of obligating circumstance, it is incredibly easy to forego what would have otherwise been today's routine.

This 100x. I go to work because I don't want to have a long uncomfortable conversation with my boss, and because I hate interviewing, and not having income is even worse. Even at work, I often find reasons (like HN) to do actually DO work. I've had routines at times in my life for months. And they disappear in a matter of days when I get stressed or my schedule changes or whatever.

It is funny, as this extends to stuff like watching TV. I have never, in my life, managed to watch more than a few episodes of a show. It isn't that I don't like shows. I just don't have the habit of getting ready to watch a show.

Re: Exercise can be nearly as effective as therapy for depression

#263

Post by machomaster »

a_t48 wrote: post #204
kayodelycaon wrote: post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I really don’t like being snarky here but this is an absolutely perfect example of what I was talking about in my last paragraph. I didn’t mention energy because energy has no relevance. I’ve literally broken down crying because I really wanted to work but my brain refused to move. I was having such a great day and was really motivated. I spend hours and absolutely exhausted every bit of energy I had trying every adv…

You aren't the only one. For me it was diagnosed as ADHD.

Way too many people treat ADHD as an excuse of not following proper task-management rules. They are so special that no rules could possible apply to them. To all hundreds of millions of them...

This is backwards. In practice, it should be the exact opposite. ADHD people should be MORE vigilant regarding the correct behavior, rules, habits. It is neurotypical people who have some leeway to be lazy with what and how they do stuff, but ADHD have way smaller margin of error!

Sometimes there are things (noise in the room, other distractions, mess in tasks, etc.) that neurotypical can safely ignore, but that will make an ADHD person not able to work at all.

The fact that life is harder to organize and manage for ADHD people only means that they should pay EXTRA attention to doing right things the correct way.

Sure, ADHD people have their own peculiarities (as does any other neurotypical person), but in my experience this is a drop in a bucket of issues that are actually solvable with typical means without reinventing the wheel.

Re: Exercise can be nearly as effective as therapy for depression

#264

Post by nradov »

blandflakes wrote: post #256
andy99 wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People would rather blame external factors and not take responsibility. It’s actually insulting to people who work hard that some people assume they have it easy somehow, like the “must be nice” comment upstream. Not everyone takes the view that you can’t control what happens to you, it’s pretty easy to see who does.

It's also pretty insulting to assume that everything is equally easy for all people.

No one is assuming that. Everyone has their burdens. But gradual improvement is always possible.

Re: Exercise can be nearly as effective as therapy for depression

#265

Post by vlod »

cheald wrote: post #2

This is a finding that keeps coming up, and I've certainly found it true in my life, but there's a significant chicken-and-egg problem in that depression frequently precludes the motivation to exercise, and if you don't already have a deeply-disciplined routine to overcome the lack of motivation, people won't do it. Exhortation to develop those good habits in the good times, I suppose.

“Action precedes motivation.” ― Robert McKain

This seems to work for me at least. If I start trying to reason with myself why I should get out of bed at 5am to go to the gym rather than excuse XYZ, I will talk myself out of it.

If I simply start "moving" and start doing "stuff" without engaging my brain, things happen and within a short space of time, I'm pumping iron and feeling great.

Re: Exercise can be nearly as effective as therapy for depression

#266

Post by nradov »

ericmcer wrote: post #128
yomismoaqui wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Motivation is fleeting but routine persists. When there is something that you want to do regularly (exercise, doing the final boring part of some sideproject, cleaning the house...) you remove willpower from the equation and set a day and a time. For example, everyday from 18 to 19 I work on my sideprojects, or saturdays from 16 to 18 is house cleaning time. There is no question if I want to do it, it is set at that…

It is really easy to have a routine when you are single and healthy in your 20s. It stops working so well later on. If you have friends, partner, kids, parents, pets, work, health issues etc. the routine is going to be challenged. If that only happens once every few months no big deal, but now that I am in my late 30s with a partner, kid, 3 pets and elderly parents. I literally have something derail my day almost eve…

Routines tend to get more and more derailed as the day goes on. Wake up early and get the important stuff done first.

As for narcissism, the optimal amount is not zero. If you want to continue being of value to your family over the long term then sometimes you have to take care of yourself first. Unless it's a life-or-death emergency, others can wait a bit for help.

Re: Exercise can be nearly as effective as therapy for depression

#267

Post by nradov »

parpfish wrote: post #148
ToucanLoucan wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's also worth noting that willpower in general is constantly being whittled down by how stressful and, for lack of better term, fucking annoying modern life is. I'm reminded of a quote from my favorite article from Ed Zitron: > In plain terms, everybody is being fucked with constantly in tiny little ways by most apps and services, and I believe that billions of people being fucked with at once in all of these ways…

I just got a new phone which meant I had to read-login and set up every app and account. It was an intense deluge of SMS codes, flipping back and forth to the Authenticator, dismissing welcome popup modals, security email notifications. I was frazzled by the multitasking and can only imagine how hard it would have been for some senior citizen that was badgered into updating their device.

Which phone? Upgrading recent Samsung phones is pretty smooth and low stress, everything just transfers over.

Re: Exercise can be nearly as effective as therapy for depression

#268

Post by tayo42 »

WalterBright wrote: post #144
CrossVR wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This has more to do with hunger requiring a tremendous amount of willpower to ignore rather than fat people having less willpower than people of average weight.

Curiously, if I'm busy I don't get hungry. I don't eat before going out dirt biking, and don't feel hungry at all until after the riding is done and the bikes loaded on the trailer and turning on to the road home.

Boredom snacking durring the work day kills me, maybe even slowly litteraly.

Re: Exercise can be nearly as effective as therapy for depression

#269

Post by [deleted] »

roguechimpanzee wrote: post #199
andy99 wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People would rather blame external factors and not take responsibility. It’s actually insulting to people who work hard that some people assume they have it easy somehow, like the “must be nice” comment upstream. Not everyone takes the view that you can’t control what happens to you, it’s pretty easy to see who does.

You can actually just choose to lock in. And you don't need a perfect streak. Waking up early, working out and eating a nutritious breakfast is a perfect morning for probably 90% of people but our society is so broken that being healthy is associated with being either a grifter or a fascist.

[deleted]

Re: Exercise can be nearly as effective as therapy for depression

#270

Post by NedF »

cheald wrote: post #2

This is a finding that keeps coming up, and I've certainly found it true in my life, but there's a significant chicken-and-egg problem in that depression frequently precludes the motivation to exercise, and if you don't already have a deeply-disciplined routine to overcome the lack of motivation, people won't do it. Exhortation to develop those good habits in the good times, I suppose.

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