I must say that I often feel a little guilty for polarising suffering as a rock bottom experience. The truth is most of the time we all suffer quite legitimately without ever going to the depths of brokenness — of being there all the time I mean. We don’t need to be in the grips of despair to not be doing okay. If a person were to ask you, “Are you okay?” it would be perfectly reasonable to say, “No, no I’m not okay,” and yet also not be in crisis mode.
Life is a little like that. It’s not unusual for people to have one or two horrendous days per month, for instance. From a mental health viewpoint, keeping things in perspective is important. The last thing we need to do is to get panicky about a season of life that has its normal peaks and troughs amid the normal/blah days we all have.
But these not-okay-days can still be woefully fatiguing, full of grief and anguish, triggering, overwhelming, and even despairing to the point of us questioning our existence.
For starters, there is the aberrant busyness of life to contend with, there are the problematic relationships, there are the shockwaves that sweep through all our lives, and then there are the issues of others, particularly those who are dependent on us. On any not-okay-day we may have several of these swarming like sharks at our emotional ankles. Then there are things like COVID, the general state of uncertainty, not to mention a range of geopolitical issues among other things that might stir us up, including a range of injustices that make our blood boil. The less media reports the better sometimes. Yet the fear of missing out (FOMO) prevents us from unplugging for extended periods.
I think we’ve heard it enough for it to roll off the tongue nicely: it’s okay to not be okay.
It really is. It’s okay to not be okay, and indeed it’s only when we can admit it, and we can share that load that we are able to offload the burden.
It’s okay if you struggle.
It’s okay if you don’t know up from down.
It’s okay if you don’t feel connected.
It’s okay if you feel like giving up.
But don’t. Share your burden if you can.
Find a way to keep going in spite of how you feel.
Be distracted if it’ll get you through.
Know that you are loved.
You can be not okay at any given point in time and still be okay overall. It isn’t even unusual to find that we just cannot cope one day, yet another day life’s a breeze.
Isn’t it better to know that not being okay doesn’t consign you to that state always? Wouldn’t it make it easier to declare that we weren’t okay if we all realised we are all in this position from time to time?
There is no shame in reaching out. Indeed, when we reach out when we need to, we privilege another person to the extent that they can care for us. There are so many people who love being needed for a moment like this; especially those who have been very well cared for in such moments themselves. To be called to care for someone is an honour. And all it takes is enough humility to be honest about our needs to reach out.
It’s okay to not be okay.
And having said all this, it’s okay to be clinically depressed, and suffer depressive disorders and anxiety disorders, too. It’s okay to be tired. It’s okay to be ‘done’. It’s okay to be over it all. It’s okay.
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