Sure, but that's not what I was trying to say. "The only times I left the room was to eat and use the bathroom" isn't "I was feeling kinda down because I suddenly was $60k in debt and I didn't know how to go about paying that off", and I don't believe that most people can climb out of a hole that deep by basically "just sorting your bills by importance".

I believe that, yes, you can greatly improve your situation by reducing external stressors. But you'll have to get to a point that allows you to do that first, and when you're basically either sleeping or staring at the wall all day, you are not in that state.

To me, "chicken or egg" is rather clear: the depression must give way enough so you can get things done that will improve it further. Suggesting otherwise sounds dangerously close to "hey, if you just wanted to, you could just get rid of depression" which puts suffering from depression close to "it's a choice" territory.