It is a personal story, but about 20 years ago, I was battling with an illness. It was a nasty disease called “depression”. Day after day, all I could think about was dying. How can I die “easy”? How can I die “beautifully”? How many times did I think about jumping onto the train tracks on my way home from work? Depressed people do not realize that they are depressed at first. They think they are responsible for everything, and they are tormented by depression and agitation. They feel as if they have dementia because they cannot think clearly. The reliance on alcohol is another symptom of this disease. The amount of alcohol I consumed increased day by day. Then one day, he learned that he was suffering from depression. I believe my doctor saved my life at that time. He recommended that I keep a diary. I created a software program called “Excel Diary” out of necessity at that time. Click here
I was hospitalized and started treatment with medication. I was also healed a lot by the cat I had at that time. However, the cruel reality of the cat’s death spurred my depression. Even thinking about it now, it was an epic battle against illness.
Now, a long time later, I no longer suffer from the disease, but sometimes I have flashbacks to those days and am plagued by nightmares.
I would like to talk about how I was able to start thinking positively.
I suddenly came to think that the greatest “miracle” of all is that I was born as I was. Furthermore, I thought that this “miracle” was like an aggregate of many other “miracles. First of all, I was born into the “species” of human beings. You might unfortunately have been born a mouse, a dog, a cat, a cockroach, or a microorganism. And yet, you and I were fortunate enough to be born as intelligent “human beings”. Isn’t this more miraculous than any probability? I thought there must be others thinking the same thing, so I looked it up on the Internet, and there it was. The probability of being born into “you” is one in 50 to 80 trillion, it sais. Furthermore, in my case, I was born in a country called “Japan”. I think this is one of the “lucky” things, and more importantly, I was born in modern Japan (think of Japan 100 years ago, how oppressed the people was). This is important because even today, there are many countries on earth where people are never “happy” (e.g., without freedom). The fact that I was able to be born on “earth” in the first place must be a matter of astronomical probability when you think about it. When I think about this, I realize that I can never neglect the time of my life. Now, many times during the day, when I encounter delicious food or sake, or hear beautiful music, I tell myself that it is a miracle that I am able to enjoy it in the way that I do. This is what I want to say.
