I don’t know about anyone else, but I’m about done with 2022. In my head there is more about 2022 to say good riddance to (how polite Neil, say what you really mean) than there is to say bon voyage to – no 2022, I never want to fucking see you again. Yes, of course a lot of it is personal and a lot is to do with the way my bastard of a brain computes things, but nonetheless, 2022 can fucking do one. Let 2023 bring forth all it has, unleash the beast, loose the arrows, I am fucking ready for you (or at least I will be after another couple of CBT sessions…)
Of course not all of 2022 has been a car crash of a year, there have obviously been many highs, but my mental health has probably been on the descent more than it has on the ascent, resulting in me focussing on the negatives above all else. Some deep and absorbing conversations in the last week or so have led me to this post.
I Know I have made many self-defeating ill-formed choices this year, most of these have involved letting my anxiety roam free and ultimately make the decisions that have exacerbated my feelings of depression and being ill at ease rather than taking what, in my eyes, was the seemingly hard choice, but in reality was the fucking obvious option. Obvious for all to see but me.
I have somehow managed this year to go so far backwards that I have moved from a world (many years ago) when I believed I was alone in thinking the thoughts I do, though one in which I believed everyone else was fucked up too and had the same negative thoughts on a daily basis, back to a place where I recognise there are people who have never had the same thoughts and find it almost impossible to relate to the idea of someone catastrophisng every action or situation, thinking the world would be a better place without them, or being that person who struggles to understand why anyone else would like them or want to spend time with them when they loathe everything about themselves and regret just about everything they do.
As is my want, this blog is in danger of becoming a rambling mess such are the random electric pulses and branches shooting off from my initial thought process creating not so much of a mind map as a mind fuck. However, I’m at the point of thinking, if I don’t write it down, it’ll stay in that tiny-enclosed space between my ears, and no-one wants to deal with the aftermath of that. It’ll only end in a hideous snottery mess of tears, rage or both…
There may be many valid reasons to explain why I’ve ended up in negative head space so often in 2022, but I recognise through a combination of CBT and self-reflection that I’ve missed out on loads of positive experiences this year due to my own choices and behaviours. Sometimes it’s hard to see the things that are right in front of your face. I mean, my job has required me to write and deliver training this year that is packed with positive affirmations, mindfulness, tips for building resilience and living in the moment. It is even called The Best Version of Me. Oh the irony. I seem to have the capability of being blind to my own advice and have become the epitomy of the old adage “do as I say not as I do”.
I really don’t help myself. The term “doom scrolling” was recently highlighted to me. A phrase which I’d never come across before, but now makes perfect sense, and describes my social media habits perfectly. Doomscrolling (or doomsurfing) is “the tendency to continue to surf or scroll through bad news even though that news is saddening, disheartening or depressing”. I have probably lost days of my life in 2022 immersing myself in this activity despite this being pointed out to me on several occasions. It is like a drug or an addiction. I will start out by saying I’ll not do it again, but before I know it, I’m down another wormhole, lost in a world of doom and gloom and picking pointless fights with trolls and people I would never waste time or energy on if I met them in real life. I despair at people who may call me and my ilk “woke snowflakes”. This sends me on a downward spiral ending up dwelling on replies I’ve made or received and wishing they would have had a different outcome. All this because I just couldn’t do the simple thing instead – deleting and switching off. This isn’t helped when I find glimmers of positivity (like coming across the clip of Rakie Ayola on the term “woke”) that hook me in again, before I go on to read more negative comments that have me rolling round the hamster wheel again.
I need to take control of my own behaviours, take my own advice when I talk to others about focusing on what is withing your circle of control and not spending an inordinate amount of time focussing energy on all that I cannot influence or control. I’m sure if I read back older blogs, I’ll read similar things. I continually fall back into old habits which not only impacts me, but also has a negative impact on those around me. I’m sure it must feel to others also like that “here we go again” situation. Tiring. Getting into the right habits takes a lot of effort, but it is most definitely a worthwhile effort. We all sometimes need to remember to look out for the things that have previously caused us to fall into the ruts along the road of life and take the correct detours to avoid these. Sometimes these detours take us off the path for a while but allow us to make new discoveries and build new experiences along the way.
Watching the news does nothing to help either, as I watch daily reports of the incompetence of the Tory government and a series of intolerant empathy free individuals bemoaning that we have become a “cancel culture” society seemingly oblivious to the fact that this so called culture they are talking about doesn’t actually exist. They seem to lack the perception that it is the individuals themselves who are despairing about it that have opinions that are largely outdated, irrelevant or unacceptable in today’s society but they can’t grasp this fact or move their way of thinking along into the 21st century.
Perhaps I am too naive and too simplistic, I’ve heard the famous Charlie Chaplin speech several times recently, sampled in songs on my iPod and it feels like it is still all too relevant today, just as it was when the film it comes from, “The Great Dictator”, was released at the height of Nazism. Rather than focus on our differences, can we not spend more time focussing on our commonalities?
“I should like to help everyone if possible; Jew, Gentile, black man, white, we all want to help one another. Human beings are like that. We want to live by each other’s happiness, not by each other’s misery. We don’t want to hate and despise one another. In this world there’s room for everyone and the good Earth is rich and can provide for everyone. The way of life can be free and beautiful, but we have lost the way. Greed has poisoned men’s souls, has barricaded the world with hate, has goose-stepped us into misery and bloodshed.” Charlie Chaplin, The Great Dictator (1940)
On a personal level, I regularly shoot myself in the foot. I’ve lost count of the number of gigs I haven’t attended this year. Some I’ve genuinely forgotten about or got dates wrong, but others I have missed by giving a series of reasonable reasons when the real fact of the matter is that my anxious brain has told me it would be a bad idea to go. Talk about self-destruction at is finest, I mean I KNOW going to gigs has a positive effect on my mental health, whether that be through the music itself or the overall experience. So NOT going to a gig is in fact an act of self-sabotage, an opportunity to practice regret and dig myself into a pit of negativity. How bad can my ability to make a dick of myself really be? Can I really open my mouth and say the wrong thing to everyone I meet? Is that even possible?
I’m sure many people who have come across me recently wouldn’t believe that deep down I am a happy person, and I want to be happy, it’s just sometimes (often!) I come across and sound like a miserable git. I wouldn’t want to spend time in my company when I’m like that.
So, as we stride quickly towards the end of the year, I am confident that through an ongoing series of CBT sessions and the invaluable support of several individuals who will remain nameless, I know I will be able to end the year on an upward trajectory and enter 2023 on the front foot ready and willing to take on any challenge with a smile and a renewed positivity.
If you need help, don’t be afraid to ask. It isn’t a sign of weakness, and you shouldn’t be embarrassed, regardless of what your own little voices in your head say, or the reaction you get from those who lack empathy or understanding of how that little grey/pink wrinkly blob inside your skull sometimes works against you despite your best efforts.
Be yourself. Do everything in your control to be the best version of you. Recognise when you aren’t being the best version of you and the things that are stopping you from being so. Let go of these things, cut out the negativity from your life and do the things that make you happy.