Autonomy key to happiness, study finds

[Bibliovore]

3. The ability to affect what's going on in your life also helps combat depression.

My father was a research scientist in neurochemistry, and he studied antidepressants for a while. To test an antidepressant on a rat, you first have to make the rat depressed. Apparently the way to do so is to give it unpleasant situations it cannot do anything to change; a rat in a cage where a mild electrical current (scaled to be uncomfortable but not painful) was run through the floor at random intervals would be fine if it had a lever it could press to turn off the current, but if its lever did nothing and thus it couldn't change its situation, it would become depressed. (That's part of why this whole administration has been so depressing -- it has often felt like there's little or nothing we can do to affect or stop it.)

If you're depressed, try doing something you can immediately affect. Maybe that's starting or finishing a small project, or organizing or cleaning something (large or small), or calling a friend you haven't talked with in a while and inviting them to do something, or anything else that comes to mind. Keep doing things like that. It can help, both in little bits immediately and in larger bits over time.