For a lack of anything better to do, I am still pondering the cause of my "misery"

I'm posting, cause I don't know what else to do. I have these nights where I can't think of anything to do. I feel restless, unable to sit still and unsatisfied with the options. No one returns my phone calls, there is nothing on t.v. I've already been to a meeting, I don't have work to do. I can't concentrate to read a book. This is the sum total of my life these days. I've pondered the hell out of why I am unhappy when my life is seemingly so great...and despite my best efforts, I don't have the answer. I think it is time to move on from this question. I would like to just say I am an unhappy person, but at the same time, I'd like to believe there is a little more hope underlying my misery. I would like to believe that happiness is at least an option. It's something I could have, possibly.

I imagine this is what depression is like. I think I've been depressed before and it didn't feel like this, but I think this is depression. My lack of motivation grows worse, I feel like I have to drag myself to do anything, I don't even want to go to work. I feel like my effort is pointless. Everything is forced. Truthfully, the only thing I really want to do when I get home every day is drug myself to sleep. Do I do this? No, of course not. Could I? Yeah. Why don't I? Cause I am clearly putting too much thought into it. I happen to like sleeping pills or things that make me sleep, so, I have to be careful. I have Lunesta in the house. Why? For the same reason you all save things like Vicatin and other narcotic pain killers you no longer need - just in case. In case of what? In case of a headache of course. I'm being extra careful cause I had a dream that I drank last night. It was just like I imagine it would be if I ever drank again. What I wouldn't give for a little relief.

Frankly, I am pissed because I didn't feel this way until I went on and then off of Zoloft (and it was a very brief experiment). To sum up my whole experience with psychologists, psychiatrists, mental health professionals - let's just say I am underwhelmed. I get that anti-depressants arem't supposed to make you depressed. Duh. But that is what they do to me. Now can you help me or not? Apparently not. It's great that I don't feel anxious anymore (though I am not sure why). It's too bad that not feeling anxious means I don't care about anything, at all.

The best solution I have been able to come up with to my current state of affairs - is to work more. I know that seems like the wrong solution - but I know that the problem, or the underlying issue is always self-centered fear, and when I don't work as much, I have a lot more time to feed these fears and focus on the negative. In the month of August, I billed 35 hours less than I do in an average month - that's like a week less of work, and I am moving at about the same rate this month - no wonder I'm all caught up in the misery that goes on in my own head. I've been spending a lot of unsupervised time there. The thing is - my job is the only thing that motivates me really because it is the only thing in my life that I feel like I am good at. I am good at it - really good at it. I could throw myself into it - see how fast I can make partner - there is so much more I could do there. My job is a distraction - and it works like a drug.

So, around and around I've been going, so desperately wanting to be happy. And this is the only answer that I have been able to come up with - looking at it from all angles - I am unhappy because I choose to be. Every day, when I wake up, I choose to be miserable. It is a choice I have made all my life, to look at things from a specific point of view, with a specific perspective. I could just as easily choose the opposite. Your attitude, how you approach a situation or a problem, how you handle stress and conflict, whether worry consumes you, how you are in the world, how you treat people - you choose these things. It shouldn't surprise me what a struggle this is - to make a different choice - after living my whole life from a certain perspective. It does amaze me sometimes how easy it is to know the right thing to do, but to consistently make the wrong choice. I think about this especially as it relates to our personal relationships - where the truth really lies in the subtleties of our behavior. It just goes to show you just how hard it is to make a different choice than the one you've always made.

And by the way, I was thinking today about friendships and the various things I have learned in AA - favorite things that I have learned. One thing I always like to remember when it comes to my personal relationships, and the wrong choices that we make - is that we judge ourselves by our intentions, but other people judge us by our actions. Your best intentions, they may not be enough.