Dr. K explores why more people today are struggling with depression that doesn’t respond to the usual fixes. He explains the difference between “classic” depression caused by things like chemical imbalances or cognitive distortions and existential depression, which arises when the future feels objectively bleak.
Drawing from philosophy, psychiatry, and Viktor Frankl’s logotherapy, Dr. K shows how existential depression can freeze your sense of possibility, leading to hopelessness, burnout, and lateral behaviors like doom-scrolling, gaming, or numbing out. He argues that standard treatments like SSRIs or CBT fall short here, and what’s needed is a deeper re-engagement with meaning, balance, and forward momentum.
Topics include:
- Why the serotonin imbalance model doesn’t explain most depression
- The rise of existential depression in a world of uncertainty, debt, AI, and climate anxiety
- Depressive realism: why some depressed people see reality more accurately than others
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- The “frozen future” and why it leads to lateral movement (scrolling, gaming, numbing)
- How imbalance between thinking, feeling, and doing worsens existential depression
- Three sources of fulfillment: self, service to others, and the transcendent/spiritual
- Practical tools: restoring life’s natural rhythm, paradoxical intention, and dereflection
This episode blends clinical insight with existential philosophy, offering both big-picture frameworks and concrete techniques for anyone feeling stuck in the meaninglessness of modern life.
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