Wow, mean bout of depression. I got a full night sleep, woke up normally and just didn't want to do anything. Didn't get up and sit. Just lay there and listened to music. But it wasn't like the years I did that (2011-2013) and was perfectly content.

Finally I started feeling physically sick and immediately turned on the A/C, noticing overheating, and started to re-calibrate. Didn't get out to the gym, haven't been since last week. Before then I hadn't been since the previous Wednesday. Not able to get to the gym is a sign of depression.

One defense has been dharma and reading a timely passage from the teachings of S.N. Goenka:

(opening quote attributed to the Buddha, Sutta Nipata, II. 4, Maha-Mangala Sutta):
"When faced with all the ups and downs of life,
still the mind remains unshaken,
not lamenting, not generating defilements, always feeling secure;
this is the greatest happiness.

No matter what arises, whether within the microcosm of one's own mind and body or in the world outside, one is able to face it – not with tension, with barely suppressed craving and aversion – but with complete ease, with a smile that comes from the depths of the mind."

It's a benefit of long-term mindfulness training that I'm attesting to. Without the training they might just be words, but with training there's the realization that it's right, it's true, because I've experienced it. Just reading the words "smile that comes from the depths of the mind" resonates, even in the grip of depression.

I know that smile. The depression is here, but it doesn't cancel out that smile or knowing that I know that smile. The remaining unshaken, the not lamenting, the not generating defilements are all cultivated through mindfulness training. Depression doesn't erase those.

Depression may still hold sway, but at worst there's balance.