There are probably readers out there who see Star Trek like scripture. I have to admit that I put a lot of stock in the lessons that Star Trek has to teach. Let me expound. Those who prescribe to such things love scriptural study because of the idea that depending on your particular situation at any given time in your life, you can read something that you've read several times before and get something new out of it. This phenomenon extends to all sorts of literary works. Our perspective on life changes how we see the world whether it's holy scripture, our favorite author's classic novel, or Star Trek. This is going to be one of those articles where we look at something that we've had in front of us for decades, but from a slightly different point of view. Specifically, I want to present the theory that Mr. Spock's character evolution over the years can act as a parallel for the ideal cycle of working through depression. I promise it will all tie together in the end so just bear with me. Also, in order to really do my diligence, just let me acknowledge that the only version of Spock I'll be examining is the one portrayed by the fantastic Leonard Nimoy in TV and films that are unrelated to JJ Abrams' films.
As I've pointed out before, the topics of my articles are typically informed by what's going on in my life at the current time, or in this case, they're informed by re-reading articles that I previously wrote, as is the case here, which makes this some Inception level stuff, and a really long sentence. Yeah, I stumbled on this train of thought revisiting my article on Star Trek Nemesis, and specifically the character arc for Data. I was just puzzling through why Data's arc worked less well than Spock's. Just thought you should know. Now, I'm no stranger to depression. I've been dealing with it for over a decade. It has been quite the roller coaster, and I'm happy to say that I have fared better than a lot. That's not to say that it's been an easy road though. There have been some pretty low points. That's not why you're here though. You want to know how this harebrained theory works. Alright then, let's get to things.
First, you have to look at Spock's depression parallel in terms of his logic versus emotion dilemma. It's no secret that one of the more interesting aspects of the character was that constant struggle to remove emotion from the equation and operate of pure, hard logic. Let's face it, that's what made the character fun to watch! As I proceed through the years, I'll mostly point out highlights as delving really deeply into Spock's past would just be too much to write in a single article. But feel free to explore things on your own in order to form your own opinion of my theory! I'm also going to break things down by 'era', or maybe it should be 'sub-era' as there were a lot of different phases that the character went through at various times. Alright, you got that juxtaposition between logic and emotion in mind? Good. Now superimpose that train of thought onto the idea that dealing with depression is also sort of a struggle between logic and emotion, or at least it can be. See, there are a lot of different treatments available for people suffering from depression. You can do meditation, various types of activities, and of course, there are pharmaceuticals available. There are a ton of different factors that a physician is going to look at in determining the best course of treatment for an individual. It can be a painstaking and frustrating experience as trial and error is definitely a course of action on the physician's part, but once you really start to get things under control, the benefits are tremendous. In my personal experience, drugs were the way to go, coupled with counselling. I started on Prozac, but had some issues there so my physician opted to put me on Lexapro. It's a wonderful drug, but over time, I felt like it leveled me too much, and it really became impossible for me to feel anything. I was nearly completely emotionless. That's also a bit of where I'm coming from, and I like to imagine that there are quite a number of people out there who deal with similar issues. And that's why it's so easy for me to draw these parallels, but enough yammering about it, let's get to the meat of things!
-The TOS Years-
I like to think of Spock's TOS years as him in his pre-depressive prime. Think of this phase as the adolescent phase of a human's development. We're not really sure what constitutes normal for us on a day-to-day basis and so we're really just trying to figure out what all of our constituent parts actually become when summed together. This is TOS Spock. As a result of naivete and a small bit of ignorance, Spock is able to function pretty well as both an officer, and more generally as an individual. He understands the importance placed on logic by his primary culture, and he strives to emulate that, but he also feels the tug of emotion from his human side, and as a result, the two tend to clash from time-to-time. A perfect example of this comes from the episode "The Naked Time" wherein, under the influence of an intoxicating malady, we see Spock's emotional side in full splay. He's crying, or at least, he's laugh crying, and he's conflicted in a deeply emotional way, and you can tell that the entire experience is taxing him even physically. But, by the end of the episode, he's regained his composure, and he's able to mostly reconcile his logic with his emotions. This is a pretty important point. Again, from personal experience, dealing with depression is a lot about reconciliation between wanton rampant emotion, and rationale. It's literally a struggle between what you may know logically, and what your over-taxed emotional side is telling you. Most of the show, we see Spock dealing with this reconciliation fairly well. He breaks form sometimes, especially when it could be of benefit to his friends and crew, but that veneer of composure remains pretty solid.
But now, think of Spock's struggle between logic and emotion as a sort of coping mechanism. This is another one that I picked up from personal experience. When I was on Lexapro and unable to feel much emotion, I fell back on logic as a way to sort of justify the lack of feeling I was experiencing. That made things better because I wasn't just some emotionless robot, I was a rational human being who put more stock in the facts than in the feelings. That's Spock at this point. He doesn't really know how emotion is suppose to fit into his life, and so he seeks to subvert it, and he rationalizes that away with the culture of the Vulcans, and their quest for the suppression of emotion. In this way, his lack of emotion is normal, at least for him. We see Kirk and McCoy pointing out the fallacy behind this line of reasoning all the time, but Spock has entrenched himself in this idea, and let me tell you, once you've entrenched yourself in a particular way of thinking, it is hard to change your mind. But at any rate, it's during his TOS adolescent years that Spock at least appears to be a pretty well balanced being. As we're going to see though, he's in for a pretty abrupt wake up call...
-The Motion Picture-
Alright, now say what you will about Star Trek: The Motion Picture, we're not here to critique, yet, but in terms of Spock's emotional growth, and especially as pertains to our depression parallel, this movie is really important. For reasons unknown, at least canonically, Spock decides to leave the Enterprise and go home to perform the Kholinar ritual, or the Vulcan ritual where emotion is banished. It's easy to infer that this probably just seemed like a logical next step for him. He's matured, and he's faced his emotional side head on. He probably hasn't found a lot of merit in this side of his personality, and so he seeks to completely subvert it. But out in the cold reaches of deep space, he suddenly feels a connection to a being that embodies all that he seeks to become. He's mentally touched by a being of pure logic. Ironically, this sudden discovery elicits an emotional response in him, and he ultimately fails his ritual. He returns to the familiarity of the Enterprise and his friends there so that he can confront this being that represents the realization of all of his aspirations, and the film is not shy in pointing that out. His primary goal is to contact this being, and learn from it.
This represents some interesting growth that also happens to work in our analogy. See, there comes a point, hopefully, where those working through depression begin to feel a bit more complete. Odd, and obsessive though it may sound, I had a similar experience to that of Spock. But before we get there, I just want to point out that 'breakthrough' experiences can happen for a person dealing with depression. These moments leave us feeling more complete and content than we have for a long time, and we're able to take pretty honest stock of ourselves and make fairly informed decisions as to how we want to proceed in order to make life even better. But getting to that point involves facing a lot of demons first. In my case, as in Spock's it took facing the embodiment of a being devoid of feeling. For Spock, that was V'Ger. For me, that was myself as I had become on Lexapro. Spock got to mindmeld with the V'Ger creature and in so doing, he was able to realize how, in an ironic twist, the creature was severely handicapped by its lack of emotion. Sure, V'Ger was perfectly logical with vast stores of knowledge at its fingertips, but not being able to access emotion left it unable to tap into the imagination that emotion offers, and that in turn, left it unable to truly realize its place in the universe. Spock looked into V'Ger's eyes so to speak and saw a creature asking questions that its current way of living couldn't answer. It needed its emotional side in order to continue to grow in an effective and meaningful way. This is the type of revelation that I too stumbled upon when I realized that despite my inability to really feel much of anything, it scared me that I couldn't really feel much of anything. Sure, logic is a good start, but I really wanted to define my place in this universe, and I found that logic alone was not going to get me to that point.
That's the point when I decided that I was going to ween myself off of my meds, and take my lumps, but I was really going to try and work through my depression and I was really going to learn to master my emotions, not by suppressing them, but by learning to use them constructively. This is really similar to how Spock reacted after his experience with V'Ger...
-The Wrath of Khan-
Who here doesn't like The Wrath of Khan? It's a bonafide classic! Again, that's not really why we're here, but I just wanted to get that out in the open. Wrath of Khan is a really interesting film in context of our theory. By the time we rejoin Spock, he's learned to use his emotions in constructive ways. He hasn't completely tossed his Vulcan heritage to the side, but the major by product of his emotional reconciliation is an empathetic ability to meet his friends and crew mates on an emotional level. We see him getting down right sentimental as he presents Kirk with a personalized gift in the form of an antique book. We see him act with a manner of pride as Saavik commands the Enterprise out of spacedock. He exaggerates the truth! These are states of emotion that Spock previously would have found to be totally abhorrent. However, by this point, he's learned better who he is, and therefore, he better understands how that emotional side of him fits in in the grand scheme of things. In much the same way, those dealing with depression eventually will need to get to a place where they understand the role that this affliction plays in their life. It's at that point, that they can hopefully learn to channel the affliction to more constructive pursuits, or at the very least, they can learn to suppress it to a point where it interferes less with their day-to-day activities.
Wrath of Khan packs a huge emotional gut check in the form of Spock's death. What I love about Spock's death over Data's is Spock's death fit with both sides of his psyche. The logical side of him could fall back on the axiom of the needs of the many outweighing the needs of the individual. In that way, he could rationally decide that it was better that he die than all of his friends. But the emotional sentiment of friendship that he felt could also be satisfied as he made the ultimate sacrifice out of love for his friends. It works both ways, and it represents the ultimate in conciliatory moments for Spock. In parallel, there hopefully comes a time in the life of an individual working through depression where they find enough inner strength to serve others as well as work on themselves. What I have found is that the more I put myself out there to help others, the better I feel, and the more balanced my life feels. Spock was able to come to that epiphany at the moment of his greatest sacrifice, and I think that that moment is one of Spock's most relatable in the entire franchise, at least for me...
-The Search for Spock/The Voyage Home/The Final Frontier-
I lump these three films together because old Spock as played by Nimoy gets very little screen time in The Search for Spock, and we're going to see a lot of similar things going on in both The Voyage Home as well as in The Final Frontier. However, I don't want to minimize the outing in The Search for Spock because in terms of our analogy, some pretty big stuff happens. By the end of Search for Spock, Spock has been returned to his former glory physically. His body is restored, but his mind has a great deal of healing to undergo. Life is not without hope, though, and we get that hope via the brief interaction between Spock and Kirk where Spock sort of relives his experiences from the previous films, and remembers to a small extent the relationship that he used to have with Kirk. The saddest part of this whole situation is that the task of filling in the gaps in Spock's post-resurrected mind falls to those pesky Vulcans. They have chosen to suppress their emotion, and as a result, they fail to see the value in embracing them. This leaves Spock in a sort of factory restore mode. All the parts are there, but they're not working the way that they used to, and this is quite evident, especially throughout Voyage Home.
During that film, we see Spock grappling with the person he currently is, and the person he used to be. This is where Spock's evolution as a character becomes especially poignant. You see, even as a person begins to overcome their depression, and get to a more balanced place in life, memories of that former life before depression, assuming that such a time exists, tend to haunt the mind. We long to be that person that we were before the emotional train went off the proverbial rails. I know for me, I found that I liked a lot of what I was before I became sidled with depression. I was a pretty vibrant person with lots of different interests, and the energy to actually pursue those interests. I was decisive, and sometimes even a little brash, and I was pretty self-assured. Not to say that I was in a super great place, but in my mind, I felt like I was at least in a better place than I was as I was working through depression for myself. We see Spock struggling with that conflict in Voyage Home, and also in The Final Frontier. He's been in a place where he understands the kind of balance that can be achieved between logic and emotion, or in the case of our analogy, depression and rationale. He probably understands the benefits from a clinical point of view, but though the heart is willing, the mind has not yet reached a point where it's capable of operating in the same ways that it once did.
We see this in Voyage Home as Spock tries to understand the significance of, and employ in his own language those 'colorful metaphors'. We also see this struggle manifest itself in the form of Spock forgetting how to lie. We see him going through life kind of robotically with flashes of emotional insight along the way. Then in Final Frontier, we see him grappling to find the meaning of a camp song with nonsensical lyrics. He struggles to really grasp the meaning and the value of friendship. But, he experiences the possibility of losing a friend as they thwart the efforts of an alien 'god', and he sees the convictions that can sprout from emotion through his half-brother, Sybok, and you could say that these experiences are analogous to the little experiences, had over time, that can help those struggling with depression to work through that depression. You experience little victories, and you learn to take great satisfaction in these little victories, and that helps to bolster self-confidence, and that in turn helps the rationale balance better with the emotional. That's why by the end of Final Frontier, Spock has more thoroughly come to terms with the way in which he exists, and the way in which his emotions fit with his livelihood.
-The Undiscovered County-
Undiscovered Country sees the culmination of Spock's rebirth into a being that learned to master his emotions, and as far as our analogy is concerned, it lays the groundwork for what it means to cope with depression. Spock has reached a point by this movie where he's more comfortable with himself, especially where his illogical emotions are concerned, and he's more comfortable in sharing those emotions with those around him. We see a Spock who is really self-assured, and who's extremely empathetic to those around him. He's learned the value of logic in guiding discipline, but he's also come to terms with the fact that logic is insufficient in the pursuit of self-determination. At this point, Spock has learned the value of his emotions in taking leaps beyond logic as well as the value in imagination in expanding his intellectual horizons. All of this culminates in Spock's off color comment at the end of the film, as well as his undeniable tendency towards a 'zen' perspective as a result of the reconciliation of intellect and emotion. For purposes of our analogy, this is the point that everyone dealing with depression hopes to reach. It's a point where mastery of depression allows a person to lead a mostly fruitful life, a life where they can pursue their interests and where they can actually be passionate about things, and a life where they can appreciate the day-to-day, just as Spock had done by this point.
What's the point of this particular exercise? There are a ton of people out there who deal with depression everyday. Their struggle is typically private, and unseen. These people don't get the luxury of a lot of understanding from their peers who don't understand what the struggle is actually like. You may also have noticed that I haven't alluded to ever actually overcoming depression. That's quite intentional. There never really comes a point when anyone struggling with depression is ever actually cured of it. It's a struggle that tends to continue everyday for life. It's a struggle that takes courage and resolve to deal with on a daily basis. The lives of those who struggle can be made infinitely more bearable with a little understanding from the people around them. So I guess the moral of the story is, everything that I've ever needed to know about life, I learned from Star Trek, and try to be kind to the people around you because they're bravely struggling in ways that you probably can't see, and that you probably wouldn't quite be able to grasp. Oh, and stick around for next week! We're gonna step in some serious stuff! Should be fun!
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