BDI-II: Beck Depression Inventory

Depression is extremely common. Even more so for entrepreneurs.

This study from UC Berkley (links to .pdf) reported that entrepreneurs were 30% more likely to have a long-term or life-long struggle with depression. This is why it can be helpful for some of my more entrepreneurial clients to take a self-report that can measure the general characteristics, symptoms, and attitudes of depression.

This article, by Benjamin Lee, outlines some of the reasons why owning a business can play such a large role in depression. 

So if you're like I was many years ago, then I'd like to say what my *own* therapist told me after I rattled off some typical-for-me feelings, "It doesn't have to be this hard. I'd like to help it make things feel not *so* hard for you." Sometimes, we don't know how hard things feel in the moment until we're given permission to feel differently and offered help.

Hopefully, an inventory like this can be a tiny little boost of help, if only to frame up and measure our normalized feelings.

There are a ton of depression inventories out there. This one is called the Beck Depression Inventory (BDI-II). In fact, the button below will take you to a page that has a couple more too.

Take the BDI-II (Free Online)

And if you don't have a therapist or want a different one, I'd be over the moon to recommend someone on my list of favorite therapists. Maybe you could take your BDI-II results to your first appointment?