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This is our YouTube video right before Christmas, and I've been talking about Christmas with your kids and raising mentally strong kids and finding the joy in Christmas. Well, if you're anything like me this year, it's hard, and it's been hard honestly since I lost my son Reggie in 2016. Christmas is always important to me and it's a reminder of the loss. If you're listening today and you have lost somebody. Yes, feel that grief. Feel that pain but find joy. Today I want to talk about, how do you do that when you're struggling with depression? How do you find joy when you really don't feel like it? And this is the choices we talk about, and we talk about it all the time in the Mentally STRONG Method. The Power of Choice. I'm not saying fake it and pretend like you're not depressed, but we can find things in our life to be grateful for and still acknowledge the pain. We can still acknowledge the depression. I want you for right now if you are feeling depressed coming into the holidays and you're worried about finding the joy. I want you to for a second just in your mind to tell yourself on a scale of 1 to 10, where is that depression? And 10 being the absolute worst, maybe even wanting to hurt yourself. If you are above 5 or 7, please seek help, maybe even an antidepressant, that it is OK. That's the other thing here, Mentally STRONG is that balanced thinking. It is the right time to treat yourself and allow yourself to take some antidepressants. Medication is not bad. We have to acknowledge if our depression is at a point where we need treatment. And I have struggled with depression on and off my whole life, the older I get, the more mature I get, the more I work on myself. I feel like I can choose joy. It’s still not easy and this is what I need to tell people. This is why I'm trying to get people to follow me on my journey because it's still a journey, you know, yes, I want you to learn the Mentally STRONG Method, but it is not a drive through you are not going to be healed or cured of your journey, this is part of who you are and there's treatment for depression. I want you to seek that, but it's still something that we have to work through every day. Sometimes it's really hard at the holidays. Sometimes it's really hard to find that joy when you just feel like the world is pretending. But sometimes in that way it feels like pretending we can find that gratitude. I want you to make a list of things that you are grateful for, at least 10 things that you are grateful for and maybe even at least half of those specifically about the holidays. If you were watching the last video or listening to the last video you, you know I started to choke up when I talked about my grandma's cookies but that could be a gratitude. Oh, my grandmother made Christmas a beautiful thing and she passed away when I was in my early 20s. Instead of feeling sad about that that we're coming into the holidays and grandma's not here, we're coming into the holidays and Reggie is not here, part of my gratitude list could be that I had a grandmother that thought Christmas was the best day ever and made sure the rest of us did. It's OK to choke up for that, but it's also OK to say that's part of my gratitude. That's part of my history. That's part of who I am. That's part of my story and I'm grateful for that. I am grateful that Reggie absolutely loved Christmas. So if you're struggling with depression going into Christmas, and especially if you have young kids you have to show up. You have to show up for them. Find the gratitude and have a Merry Christmas and happy holidays and whatever your Spiritual Relationship is look at your traditions, look at that, and have a wonderful holiday season because you are Mentally STRONG.