If you've ever found yourself at a point in your life where you were considered troubled; seriously mentally afflicted by a pain sometimes too loud and equally numbing to even put into words, you may have been advised to find a release. 'Go out, meet people, be happy!'- no mean feat for someone who can't even pinpoint the source of their inner turmoil. You wake up one day, and you realise that you'd just rather not be awake. You're going about your day and you feel like you're dragging the weight of an abyss behind you; empty but simultaneously crushing. The concurrence of two completely different states exist in you daily, from sunrise to sundown, and you cannot pinpoint what led you to a state of such apathetic misery.
Depression for me, has been one of the most inexplicably draining things I've ever been though. Always tired, always on the verge of tears that when I tried to force out, never came. Like they were teasing at the emptiness I felt; taunting me with the prospect of emptying all the toxicity in my brain but deciding that they were only going to come at the most innopportune moment, when there was nothing to cry about.
Being in that state, completely bereft of enjoyment, excitement, even empathy, drives you into a dark place within yourself, and for some, it becomes impossible to emerge. And the hardest thing to come to terms with, is that it's all in your head. There's nothing anyone can really do to pull you out of the murky depths of your empty, suicidal toughts and realising this feels even more hopeless.
This is your own battle. You fight it against yourself, and you either win or die.
You ignore all advice, because really and truly, its a long while before anything helps. And now you're at an impasse. You've reached the limit of what you can handle and breaking point is not a pretty sight. Finally those tears come and you're on the floor heaving, begging to know what brought you here. Begging for a way out. Begging for release. 'Find a release'.
Of course I didn't take anyone seriously at the beginning when they told me to channel all my angst into something I loved. I didn't even have the energy to shower at one point, how would I be able to have a hobby? It was finally the boredom that made me turn to writing. I was bored of being tired. Bored of being sad and empty and useless. And I had always had an affinity for words.
Writing at first wasn't a release, it was an escape. I would disappear for hours creating characters, worlds and storylines that made me forget that my reality was far less exciting. In this way I found simultaneousness in being happy and sad.
The concurrence of states.
I was still depressed, but a little less depressed when I saw the numbers go up on my Wattpad teen romance (long deleted and never to be revisted), one hit of sweet dopamine at a time. People were enjoying what I wrote and I was enjoying writing it for them!
No, my problems weren't all suddenly solved, but I had found an opening. A source of meaning, and I refused to let it go. With time and a maturing mindset, I began to get better, and I honestly believe that writing so much helped. I found something to be good at, people to share it with who were proud of me and that made me feel really bloody good. Granted, I couldn't pinpoint exactly when or why my depression started, but now armed with my growing creative powers, I could literally feel myself clawing my way out of that muted bubble that surrounded me and painted everything in my life a dull gray hue.
Unfortunately, depression never seems to completely go away. You can feel great for a while, and start slowly slipping without realising until you've relapsed and feel even more hopeless and disappointed with yourself.
But overcoming it once proved I could do it again. and each time I managed because I had found my release. I started writing poetry after I acknowledged the concurrence of beauty and pain.
You can sometimes only feel certain magnitudes of appreciation and reverence for the beauty that is your mind, your thoughts and dynamic emotions if you've experienced the personal pain of war with your inner self.
There are certain emotional boundaries you break through when you've been at your lowest and resurfaced. Processing and experiencing emotion becomes an almost spiritual act. Everything is more volatile, tangible and holds so much more meaning for some reason, now that you can finally feel, as though the Universe is gifting you for all those empty days and nights.
You gain a heightened awareness of the intangible source of energy that courses through you, and aligns you in your place in time, as well as a craving to understand it more deeply.
And I fuelled that craving by writing down my wondering thoughts- musings.
Poetry for me, is not an expression of or a release from pain, but the lasting impressions pain has left on me in the form of appreciation for the beauty that life has to offer, that only seems fulfilling enough when you've worked really hard to find it.
I love what poetry does to me, and I love what poetry does to people, because it seems to harness the essence of pain, and turn it into beauty, and there's a deep magic in that.
If you're reading this, I hope you take a minute and enjoy my poems, and also seek beauty in your own situations
Love, Eva