Today I'd like to challenge you all to listen to music. No, I know you're always listening. I want you to REALLY listen, to feel the beat and the hear the lyrics, and try to understand. I hope you try to do this anyway; I know I do. But today when I turned on the radio it was playing Little Talks by Of Monsters and Men. Now, I really like this song, and I listen to it a lot. It's one of the few songs I've ever bought on iTunes. I can sing along to the entire thing. But about two months ago, for the first time, I really listened to the lyrics, and was shocked about what I heard. I was especially shocked that it took me so long to notice. Once I said to myself, in an imagined conversation, that drugs would just be easier. Not easier to do, but easier to understand. Everyone understands what drugs means. They understand the physical consequences and the emotional pain, if not fully, then at least somewhat. But the truth is that nobody ever seems to understand mental illness, unless they've really had an opportunity to experience it first hand. They understand that heroin isn't something you can just stop, but they don't understand that depression isn't something you can just snap out of. Addiction is something we learned about in my AP Psychology class, but it's a science. To stop being depressed is a really freaking messy thought process. You might get medication. You might not. I'm not saying recovering from addiction isn't messy or stigmatized, because it certainly is. I'm saying it's something we learn about in required high school classes and are constantly warned against and taught prevention, but not so with mental illness. In fact, these very same classes might help cause it. Anyway, back to Little Talks. That song is seriously upsetting, because if you listen closely, I'm fairly certain it's about a guy helping out some crazy woman who he loves. Let's analyze some lyrics: First, we have the girl voice saying: "And some days I can't even dress myself," and the male responds "It's killing me to see you this way." This isn't exactly specific to mental illness; it could be really any sickness, or she could just be getting old. But let's keep listening. A little later on, the girl says: "There's an old voice in my head that's holding me back," and the boy, with a pretty forlorn sounding voice, responds "Well tell her that I miss our little talks." She's hearing voices. She's probably schizophrenic, losing touch with reality. This is the line that breaks me, frankly. The guy seriously misses her, he wants her back in her healthy form. The saddest part to me is that I think he's given up on getting her back, and now he just wants her alive. Undoubtedly, you could interpret this differently. But that's what I get. Okay, here's a guy only line: "We used to play outside when we were young / and full of life and full of love." BRB CRYING And, lastly: "You're gone, gone, gone away / I watched you disappear / All that's left is the ghost of you." Yeah. I mean, this applies to a lot of terminal illnesses, but it also really applies to depression and schizophrenia and any number of other mental illnesses. It's truer than true and won't get any truer. There are other lines in the song that sadden me, like "don't listen to a word I say / the screams all sound the same" and the whole first stanza. But, overall, I think those few make my point. Mental illness — and serious illness overall — is never a pretty thing. It's sad and messy and most importantly, seriously changes a person. When someone feels like they're dying (whether they actually are or not doesn't matter) they tend to change. That's the whole point of mental illness, actually, and why it needs to be treated. Here's a kind of lousy example that I think makes a lot of sense. When I look at personality traits for my horoscope, they're often a little wrong. They're too nice, I usually think. Or too motivated. But I realized a few months ago that they're actually all mostly true. My horoscope shows what I would be if I wasn't so upset all the time. Before my mind got screwy, they'd be on the nose. Let me explain it again. Mental illness changes a person. Loving someone who's changing is hard, because they're not the person you first fell in love with anymore, but darling, that's not always them. That's not who they really are, and I doubt it's who they really want to be. But that doesn't mean you should yell and blame and get mad at them. Instead, you should hold their hand, walk and talk with them, and slowly guide them through the process of recovery. And if they're not going to recover, then the process of living. xox
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I'm Audrey, a college student and existential rambler.
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