This is a post moved from my old blog: https://uzulblog.wixsite.com/uzul
As society has opened up more to the concept of mental health and the amount of disorder sufferers, it is clear to see we are slowly but surely improving on how we treat people with poor mental health. However, even though we have made this huge advance, there is still a lot of work to be done considering stigmas and false beliefs focused on mental health. And what better a day to discuss this than today, Mental Health Day, right?
If you’ve got a psychological condition or even if you just sometimes feel a certain way for no apparent reason, you’ll probably have noticed that there’s often a huge difference between young and old generations’ opinions on mental health. This includes myself and quite a few of my friends. However, this is not necessarily a negative thing on their part: they just haven’t been as exposed to it as we have.
It’s all around us in modern pop culture. TV shows like 13 Reasons Why, which controversial as it was, had suicide as its main storyline. We’ve got soaps on the telly talking about eating disorders, depression and anxiety. And young people are finally beginning to get more educated on it than ever before. This is perhaps partially why we’re generally so much more comfortable talking about difficult topics of our feelings and emotion, instead of sticking to the stigmas we've heard of.
Of course there are the classics: people with anxiety just need to chill out; if you’re depressed then just cheer up, but if you’re living with this condition yourself it’s clearly much much harder than that. Only the people that suffer with the same thing as you do are able to understand what you go through, but there are always ways to make your life more positive, such as speaking to a therapist or a consoling friend. If you need more help than this, there are hotlines, doctor’s clinics and mental health services to reach out to.
So, to commemorate mental health day in a positive way, I’ve chosen two songs relating to this topic perfectly. I mean, what were you expecting from a music - based blog?
The first one’s a classic: Space Cowboy by Jamiroquai. The very first time I heard this song, I knew it would never grow old for me, and that’s because of the jazzy but slow, smooth backbeat that makes you feel like you’re somewhere laid back, like a coffee shop. It’s the sort of song that would go well in the background of your life. Because it’s so relaxing, it would probably be perfect for those moments where you feel like life has seemed to come upon you all at once, and you need a moment to pull yourself together.
Lastly, if you’re a fan of Rex Orange County, you’ll know he isn’t afraid of speaking about his mental health and his feelings in general. It’s refreshing to see vulnerability like this, especially in the photoshopped, sugarcoated world of today. And the song Uno is perfect for that! I first heard this song in 2016, when I was going through a particularly introverted and insecure stage of life, and Uno was the perfect combination of emotions: he speaks about how he feels straight up, then combats it with the cheery chorus where he says he’s ‘doing his best’.
Happy Mental Health Day! Here’s to spreading even more awareness and becoming even more open.
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