An important choice we all must make

Every morning she opens her eyes from the bed. The light of day enters the room from the window, but she sees only the dark and icy gloom that thickens like molasses on the walls and drips down from the ceiling, stinging the inside of her heart with that awful burn of sadness.

She decides to swing her legs to the side of the bed and rise. Her will tells her mind that she must get up and start her day for fear that the darkness will swallow her soul into a black abyss and finally extinguish what barely remains of the light in her eyes.

Forty million adults in America have anxiety disorders and 15 million are clinically depressed, which is the largest cause of disability for people between the ages of 15 to 44. According to the "Economic Burden of Anxiety Disorders," anxiety and depression cost $42 billion a year in medical services, nearly a third of the total mental health bill that is calculated for this country.

Causes of anxiety disorder and clinical depression are many. At the top of the list are family genetics and life's circumstances. You've been given your mother's belief that on a beautiful summer day, a black cloud will cover the sun and rain will loom across the horizon. You surrender any hopes and dreams to the failures of your job, your marriage, or to the endless number of things that go wrong in every 24 hours of life that asks you to breathe into a new day.

Physical signs reveal probability that your symptoms are real. You don't have an appetite or you go on binges and eat junk food. You drink too much or take drugs to escape reality. Your personal hygiene is poor. You don't care to clean your house. You detest having to be social with others. You want to sleep all day instead of facing the challenges of the big bad world that await you on the other side of your home's front door.

Doctors prescribe antidepressant medication to lift your spirits. This can be good and bad. The good is the pills work. The bad is the pills work. Now you realize that you need mind-altering chemicals just to get through the day. You live with the side effects. You've convinced yourself you have to do this because there's no other way.

And yet there are other ways, ones that are healthier, too. You tell someone you love about your feelings and ask him or her to check on you regularly. You do simple things. You have lunch with a friend, attend a concert or a movie that brings you joy and laughter.

You spend time outdoors hiking, boating, biking or just walking down the street. You paint. You read. You pick up a hobby.

You never let yourself sit for more than an hour at a time. You get up and move. You eat better. Get more sunlight. Erase your negative thinking by realizing that you have too much good in your life that's worth more of your emotional attention than you've been giving.

You work out at the gym or take a class. You schedule a weekly dinner date to reawaken a relationship with someone whom you have forgotten to love but want to love again.

You simply blind yourself from that black cloud. Instead the sun invites you into a smile because you have been given the gift of a new day. You tell yourself you are beautiful, not in a physical manner, but in a spiritual sense. You possess the knowledge that you are an extraordinary human being. You are on a mission to find your purpose, and with that will come your peace of mind.

You understand that to love your life you have to live your life.

She opens her eyes to another day, but this time everything feels different. The sun enters through the window and brightens the room. She takes a long, deep breath and she smiles. She swings her legs to the edge of the bed and rises into a stretch, reaching her hands above her head to almost touch the ceiling. There's a skip in her step as she makes her way toward the window. She looks out upon another cold winter day but realizes that her seasons of emotion change with the seasons of nature. She gazes across the yard and her mind visualizes summer flowers in her garden and butterflies dancing across their blooms.

She taps her finger gently on the window glass, summoning an imaginary butterfly to come and sit upon her shoulder. She understands what she needed to do. She wants to be alive again.

Happiness does not fall upon us like stardust from the night sky. It's a matter of choice. Choose to be happy today.

Rich Strack can be reached at katehep11@gmail.com.