I'd add that self-examination has morbid and healthy forms.... Morbid self-examination is one form of what traditional psychology called melancholy. I'm innately melancholic and this has always been weakeneing.
Hither came Conan the Cimmerian, black-haired, sullen-eyed, sword in hand, a thief, a reaver, a slayer, with gigantic melancholies and gigantic mirth, to tread the jeweled thrones of the Earth under his sandalled feet.
Conan too was weakened by his melancholies. As a literary figure, they provide us with the adagio moments that counterbalance the allegro and fortissimo aspects of the tales. As a living being, however, they are not desirable moments to live out.
It may also be that they aren't helpful. Joanne Jacobs, writing about educating the young, mentions that children are easily bogged down by being asked to reflect on negative feelings. This may account for some of the degredation of early education (along, of course, with the bad educational theories that have come to predominate). But she ends here, talking about adults:
By the way, at least for adults, dancing, jogging, yoga, lifting weights and aerobics are "as effective as cognitive behaviour therapy – one of the gold-standard treatments for depression," writes researcher Michael Noetel on Conversation.
That, I think, is correct. Years ago, writing at BlackFive, I advised veterans with PTSD to take up horseback riding for its positive effects, one of which is making you stop thinking about the war and focus on the horse and the world around you. Getting out of your head and being in the moment is extremely healthy -- riding motorcycles also has this effect.
Another of the helpful effects of horseback riding is learning to encounter and make peace with an entirely different kind of mind, which has the capacity to improve your ability to deal with people who are different from yourself as well. The self-mastery that is necessary to work with a horse often involves stopping thinking, stopping feeling, and focusing on the necessity of doing. Later, when you have time to think and feel again, you've done the things that needed doing in the moment.
For those of us who are overly inclined to self-observation and criticism, these may be the most helpful things to learn. For those who are utterly not inclined to it, they may yet benefit from being taught to ask searching questions. If you are a man of gigantic melancholies, however, it may be helpful to lift more weights and ride more horses.
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The Studies Show has quite effectively called into question the idea that exercise and activity are depression preventers or treatment. However, even they say that there is some effect, it is simply overblown in its claims. Your specific example of horseback riding had not been studied, so far as I know, but your reasoning makes eminent sense. It has the advantage of full distraction of your abilities, at least intermittently, rather than marinating in your negative thoughts; it includes the intriguing eye movements left and right that seem to have an effect, though the mechanism and explanation are still unclear. (Discovered accidentally by vets who found Tetris surprisingly relaxing.) The others you mentioned would on the surface seem to have similar advantages. But there are powerful confounders. It may be that be who are less depressed go out and dance more - an indicator not a treatment.
So also your observation that those who are not inclined to self-observation may benefit from it. Years ago, before blogging was a confounder, I would say at the hospital that all the people who journal should give it up, while all those who don't should take it up.
Conan's favorite way of deaing with his melancholy was to go out and slaughter his enemies. Worked for him, I guess.
I wonder if children might be susceptible to the bad effects of self-observation because they lack the experience of bad feelings and uncomfortable situations often being transitory (not that similar things don't happen to adults). It seems that some of the ideation about an event defaults to assuming that current conditions won't change. That's not unreasonable when you have both limited life experience and limited agency, and I think it points to adults needing to consciously teach that "this too will pass".
To further confound the stories with anecdotes, several friends I know through the Strongman community credit weightlifting with helping them fight depression. They point to brain chemicals that are released during the exercise that serves as a kind of natural medicine.
It may be just that they're healthier now, their bones are getting stronger and their muscles, and so they're more capable and energetic. That could likewise have psychological effects apart from whatever dopamine or whatever is associated with the lifting.
Conan's favorite way of deaing with his melancholy was to go out and slaughter his enemies.
Yes, that's what I meant by the fortissimo moments of the tales.
Howard also had gigantic melancholies.
Years ago, writing at BlackFive, I advised veterans with PTSD to take up horseback riding for its positive effects, one of which is making you stop thinking about the war and focus on the horse and the world around you.
A cousin of mine recently told me that as a child, horseback riding helped her deal with the problems of an alcoholic father.
Seeing how other childhood peers responded to a childhood with an alcoholic parent, I'd say that my cousin's solution was the best one.
Horse therapy.. I read The Horse Boy, which tells how a horse helped an autistic child. My cousin told me that one time a school teacher took her Special Ed students to my cousin's place. My cousin saw how an autistic child responded to her horses. My cousin was less than pleased when she told the school district that the autistic child was welcome to visit at any time, but the child never came back.
It's a tangent, but thinking about Howard reminds me of two other melancholic writers. When I was a teen, I read Howard's Conan, Michael Moorcock's Elric series, and William Gibson's Neuromancer, Count Zero, and Mona Lisa Overdrive trilogy. Gibson was dystopic in those three, and Howard and Moorcock's fantasy was bleak.
After finishing the Elric saga, I started another Moorcock series, but it just wasn't the same dark, brooding fiction and I only finished the first book. I read later that the Elric series had been quite successful; Moorcock quit drinking, got married, and lived happily ever after. But I never enjoyed any of his fiction after that.
Same thing with Gibson. His dystopic cyberpunk was fantastic, but then he got successful and happy and, again, I don't think I've enjoyed any of his fiction since Mona Lisa Overdrive. Well, no, I did enjoy his and Bruce Sterling's The Difference Engine, but not as much, not enough to keep me reading his work. I did read Idoru, since it was set in Japan, but, meh.
That said, I'm glad Moorcock and Gibson became successful and happy, and wish Howard had made it to that point in life. I'd much rather they be happy than write novels that entertain me.
Back on topic, I've found journaling cathartic and helpful for dark moods. But maybe I'm fooling myself and should quit that and go horseback riding instead.
AVI recently posted about singing being good for depressives, and after reading that it made a lot of sense to me.
When I am most overset, I find that garden weeding or floor scrubbing does me a lot of good. Dog training is good, too. Purposeful movement with a concrete positive result not only breaks the pattern of frozen misery or fury but passes the time while leaving behind a physical improvement in both myself and my surroundings, as well as the pleasant sense of having completed a duty.
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