The little things

Bad Days

The video above is a video I watched about 15 minutes ago, followed by the video Hazel references called Bad Brain Days by Jack Howard. I suggest you watch them both because they have important messages and some of what I'm writing is influenced by or directly referencing what they said.

In my time writing this book/collection, I have written 120 original pieces, all expressing different thoughts and feelings at different times of my life when I had different things going on. Some were creative, some were fun and some were quite dark. This is piece 121.

When I first started writing it was fairly frequent, I had some breaks but for about 3 years there has been a steady flow of writing being produced, up until now, where my publication has become quite sparse.

I could use the excuse that I've been working on pieces in my drafts, I've been editing for other people or I've been busy. And the truth is I haven't been busy and while I have been doing a lot of writing in my drafts, it's not nearly enough that it takes up my every waking moment and I don't have the time to spare to write for my other, published pieces.

The truth is, I don't know what to write, I have been working on a single piece for over a month now and I don't think I've even hit 100 words. I have 6 pieces sat in my drafts, almost finished, but not quite complete for a lack of feeling.

Never mind bad brain days, I've been having a bad brain month. Since I have nothing I need to do I have been sorely lacking the motivation to do anything. Today in fact, I have only gotten out of bed to get food or use the bathroom, then returned straight away. I only do what is absolutely required of me and because that is not consistent, I have become complacent with doing nothing.

Dodie and Hazel talk about how written pieces and videos and ambiguous snapchats and tweets are really just a cry for help, because at 3 am we're desperate for someone to care. And how in reality we have all these friends surrounding us who are here to talk to, to care, to help. And how often we can forget that, or simply not believe it.

However, and believe me, I have ensured I do not fall into the category of being ignorant to friends, my friends just don't give a shit. And do you know what I do have some very caring friends, but either we just don't get the time to talk, or we are not close enough that I feel I can tell them what is wrong, because sometimes it is very personal, and you need someone close to talk to.

I can be so certain that my friends don't care, because they have told me exactly so. They have even become angry and insulted me before, because I wanted their support for my problems. Either because, I was being self-centered, my problems weren't important or I should learn to deal with it by myself.

And if my friends read this they'd all start coming out with some bullshit, 'oh I'm here for you', 'I didn't know that's how you felt', 'you're being dramatic'. I've heard it all. But guess what if they are one of the ones that would feel shitty if they read this, good, they deserve to feel that way.

Never let anyone tell you that your problems aren't important or worthy, or that you should learn to suck it up. You should never do these things alone. It doesn't work. In my experience, it either makes you depressed or angry.

This is why I have been struggling to write, because, I don't want to write negatively anymore, because I feel that it misrepresents me, and even as I'm writing this I'm realising this isn't what I had planned for this piece, but generally I am an okay person, I tend not to suffer. I wouldn't necessarily say I was happy, but I'm not depressed. 

I have realised that often I write from a place of anger, because I write either to convey a message or to express what I'm feeling where I elsewhere can't. And there are very few emotions that I can't just express out in other ways, through talking or actions, I can convey my excitement, contentness even sometimes my boredom or sadness. But what I cannot safely express are my anger and loneliness.

It is the build up of these emotions that I think creates the bad brain days. Of course I can't be certain, but from what I know. It leads to a lack of motivation and desire, creates a mental block, it leaves me in a slump that I don't know how to get out of.

Sometimes I just need a reminder of what it means to be alive, especially on those kind of days. It's those kind of days where I question what the point is, even though I know there is no point. But it's because I know there is no point and it's just about having fun along the way that those days especially suck, I feel so drained and exhausted and unalive.

I keep trying new things, in an attempt to avoid these days as much as possible or have a way of making them better, unfortunately I don't have access to all the things I know would help, for a variety of reasons.

But I'm going to keep trying, and I ask you to do the same. Even if I seem to have had an extremely long run of bad brain days, things can't stay bad forever, regression to the mean.

Even my worst days are only 24 hours and I have survived 100% of them so far.