Heard Something That You May Understand

Well, that's one way to put it. Depression is an "acceptance stage", so to speak, so it's at least one step closer to recovery than anxiety is.

I imagine the logic follows the way that accepting devastating facts is the best cure for the state where you desperately avoid anything that can assimilate those facts.

It's basically "break out of your shell" from the way I understand it.

Interesting, I kinda took it like anxiety requires one too actually care about something, so if you're depressed and experiencing an absence of feeling, it frees you from anxieties.

Yep. Surrender frees one from all positive expectation. Fear happens when one mentally projects a state that is worse than the current situation, but when there is indeed no hope left, one can't mentally fall any lower than he already is. So there is literarlly no worse, or lower, position to be fearful about.

Not because worse situations are nonexistent - one's situation can always get technically/physically/practically worse than it already is (lose more money, get more sick, lose an arm, lose a relative, ...) - but a drop in mental perception has become close to impossible, no matter what befalls the depressed person. I say "close to impossible" because there are of course the old reptilian reactions that shuts up the active mindset as modelled by the neo-cortex (think of life-threatening scenarios).

Perhaps we should all become a bit more depressed. It sounds like a weird thing to say, but I think it would do society many favors. Not just from a collective point of view (less conflict, greed, envy, ...) but a group of more depressed individuals with a more slow, stable and stoic lifestyle would indirectly contribute to a more balanced whole.

@NipNip Well, from what I heard you'd certainly end up with lot more tortured artists. Which, by the way, I am much more in favor of than the alternative.

Much like anorexia keeps those unwanted pounds off.