Mental Health Awareness: It Looks Like

The week is now over and a new week has begun but the 14th - 20th of May is as poignant as it ever was. In a world where zero hour contracts and never being able to buy a house are an alarming possibility, it is important to take care of our mental health, not just over the week past.

I myself have occasional bouts of anxiety, probably starting around age 11 which I remember as being either manic bursts of energy that seemed to confuse people around me, or wanting to hide away from the world, being unnecessarily vicious and hiding myself in clothes several times my size.

It's so important to take care of yourself nowadays because our compromised mental health exhibits itself in various different ways that we may or may not notice.

It looks like not showering for days because what’s the point, I’ve got nowhere to be. Personal care can take such a hit that when you finally brush your teeth, you feel as if you just climbed Mount Everest barefoot.

It looks like having a nice, deathly palour due to lack of Vitamin D because your idea of going outside is cracking the curtains for 0.2 seconds before retreating back into the dark.

It looks like self imposed isolation because why would anyone want to hang out with someone who can’t get their act together.

It looks like over stimulation when you do interact with a loved one, leaving you over-emotional and tense even because you're not used to the rush of endorphins you get from positive engagement.

It looks like not recognising yourself in the mirror because you’ve given up on yourself for so long that your body has gone into survival mode and no longer has energy to make your eyes sparkle or hair shine.

Knowing yourself and knowing when you need a time out is so important. You don't need to be world famous by the time you turn 25. You just need to be happy with yourself. 

Why We Forgive Our Selfish Friends/Exes

 

I look at his photos on Instagram sometimes. Sometimes it's on purpose, but most of the times it isn't We floated in the same circles when I was 17 and some of his friends became my friends and my friends his. It's safe to say we would always kind of be connected to each other.

I can see his face when I'm on insta and not feel that little burning bubble of hatred that used to weigh me down for days on end when someone even breathed his name. I guess you could call that character development.

It's funny how you can go from having someone be a staple in your life and being unable to cope with the possibility of them never being in your life when really it's nothing like that at all. People are more like avocados than water. You don't need avocados to survive.

But how does someone get to that point of feeling not even a niggle of emotion towards a person who played such a pinnacle role in their development as a human being? I had many emotions about him, not all positive. Thanks to this time period of my life, I have many negative traits. I'm quite to anger, I'm loud and I can be vindictive. I am also highly aware of my value as a person and will let very few people take advantage of me.

We are all, however, victims of time and as time goes on we feel everything less intensely than we did before. This in itself is a bit of a faux pas because it leaves us vulnerable to abuse yet again. No one wants to believe that someone is inherently a bad person but our forgiveness can sometimes leave us open to it again.

But it is a blessing. Forgiveness. And if anything, forgiveness is more for us than the one who desires it. When we forgive, we take time to look back at what was done to us and we forgive ourselves for 'allowing''it to happen. We forgive ourselves for letting that person in because it is part of the beauty of us, we are warm and kind and we choose to see the light in people who only see the darkness in themselves.

So would I be in the place to meet up with said person and be happy? No way in hell. Do I still want them to burn in the flames of hell? Not so much.

It's Okay Even If It Hurts

Recently, I was affected by the loss of an individual who had touched my heart more deeply than I knew. I did not know them, I had never seen this person face to face, never spoken a word to them, but I had heard their voice and their message. I even shed a tear as I thought about all they had yet to experience and now never would. It was a blessing that as I decided to publish post today, I discovered that some of their work had been published posthumously.

They were a voice for progression, yet a victim of regression. Their words lifted others from darkness and put smiles on their faces. They were a role model, an advocate for LGBT rights, for equality, for mental health. This individual was a beacon of light in a dark world and it saddens me to see that someone so inherently good could be suffering such pain. What make the human life beautiful is the briefness of it and what good we choose to do during our brief time on earth.

We as humans are so harsh on ourselves. We see ourselves as less beautiful than we are, we beat ourselves down over every small failure and we fail to see the beauty that is in our lives. We don't like to ask for help and we rationalise our feelings by telling ourselves we don't deserve to feel this way, or that others have it worse than we do.

It is important to never forget how much we mean to the people around us, and not just to our family and friends. Everything thing we do touches the people around us in unique ways. You mean something to the person you smile to on your morning commute every time you see them. You mean something to the person who you just complimented because you like their outfit. You mean something to the person who overheard you tell a joke to your friends and then proceeds to tell it to their own. We may not always be able to see the difference that our existence makes, but that doesn't mean that it isn't there. You may think that the world would be better off without you, but the world wouldn't be the world without you in it.

We all have a little desire to save the world. Some of us can only save one person, and it's ok if that one person is ourselves.

If anyone needs help reach out. It may seem like nothing will help but it makes the weight lighter, even if just for a day:  https://www.samaritans.org/