This line of reasoning reminds me of a common misunderstanding of depression I've seen from people who've never been clinically depressed (1). It's an understa

This line of reasoning reminds me of a common misunderstanding of depression I've seen from people who've never been clinically depressed (1). It's an understandable mistake, albeit potentially dangerous (2). Depression isn't on the happiness-sadness scale. It's quite tangential to that. In fact, perhaps quizzically, you can be happy and depressed. It's fairly common for people who learn about the loss of a loved one to recall how happy them seemed the day before. Depression treatment, therefore, doesn't make one "less sad". And consequently it wouldn't make a healthy patient "more happy". (1) I don't mean this in a negative way towards the comment I'm replying to. Nor am I implying that the commenter believes this. I just noticed a pattern and I'm responding in the spirit of education. (2) It's okay to not understand depression; not everyone has to be an expert on everything. It only becomes dangerous when providing ill formed advice. Which is unfortunately common when it comes to depression.