Hello all of you! With so many sign ups following my ponds post, it’s so lovely to have you all here. This is a post about music but also again about anxiety and burnout.
And while this is certainly not going to be a newsletter that focuses entirely on anxiety and mental health, not writing about it would feel inauthentic to how my life is right now, and I’m sure for many of you too.
I wanted to say thank you for the warm and kind response so many of you gave to my last post about the difficult time I’ve had this summer. Something that really interested me was that it was surprising (I know this was meant kindly) that a seemingly capable and functioning person might have mental health challenges.
Because, really, I am both capable and sometimes suffer from challenging mental health. I think it’s really important to remember this. I feel quite passionately that it still has to be normalised to the point of it being just like (although obviously treated differently from) physical health. I realise for many there is still a huge stigma although it’s certainly changing, given that so many of us suffered really badly during the pandemic. However, I haven’t really had the “luxury” of only just starting to talk about mental health. Having experienced it knowingly for the last 15 years (before that I was just thought of of as shy or “moody”), I’ve really learnt to shed the shame of being on antidepressants, going to therapy, talking about when it’s hard and admitting when it’s too much, and need more help. Although there’s loads I do to work through the symptoms (gut-friendly diet, swimming, talking, therapy and meditation), my family and cultural history, my personality or my genetic make up means I have inevitably anxious tendencies and that’s something I’ve been learning to live with.
However, and perhaps this is a post for another day, I don’t know whether burnout is inevitable for social purpose leaders or whether there were steps I could’ve taken to avoid it. Right now I’m of the opinion that in order for a start up style, ethical, boundary-pushing entity to have made the changes it did, it would always have taken a leader who poured everything into it. Anything less would not have cut it in this capitalist, competitive, cut-throat society. However, I am forever an optimist so I’m genuinely hoping to be proved wrong so please feel free to prove me wrong.
However, work and purpose and all that aside, let’s talk about how to cope when you are feeling completely drained, overwhelmed and frazzled. Once you’ve seen your GP if necessary, reached out to your loved ones and begun to look after yourself as you should, and are now… waiting to feel better. When your anxiety etc is bad, but you know that recovery is slow and steady, you’ll be grateful if former you made some healthy decisions in advance to guide you through this time. These are music based decisions because (as my husband actually wrote on his Bumble profile) “music is my happy place” (I know! - I swiped right all the same!) Music is my absolute first port of call for mood change or self soothing but as a highly sensitive person it also is rarely neutral to me, meaning I feel quite deeply whatever the artist is singing about, or the tone of their voice so I have to be careful with what I listen to in case of further harm. If this sounds like you, hi, you’re not alone. I’ve devised this very unscientific mode of choosing your music for when you’re not feeling good. I’ve used my most listened to music but obviously you should substitute each section for your taste. So,
Find your Florence and the Machine’s Dance Fever
Find an album/song/mixtape/playlist that speaks to you directly about how you’re feeling. For me, it was F&TM’s new album, Dance Fever, especially the song, Free. In it, Florence sings about anxiety, creativity, motherhood and the related expectations. My friend recommended it to me when I told her how I was feeling and it really hit the spot, allowing me to channel how I was feeling through someone else’s words. The thing about your F&TM album though, is that you have to listen to it sparingly because it’s almost too on the nose. When you’re trying to feel better, it’s definitely helpful to know someone else has felt that way, but you don’t want to live in that music because it can pull you back into it. Therefore, you have to:
Find your Paul Simon’s Graceland
I could listen to Paul Simon every day. I do listen to Paul Simon every day tbh. He’s an artist I grew up with because my dad loves him, so for me his music feels like home, and like comfort. Following and during burnout, as an already highly sensitive person, I became even more acutely sensitive, with my skin and brain feeling like I absorbed everything from everyone around me. I couldn’t listen, read or watch anything that involved too much emotion, conflict or drama. Graceland was the perfect companion because it was so familiar to me, the songs are incredible and the lyrics are intelligent but playful but don’t contain too much heartache. Find that album that you love, without too strongly identifying with, for daily comfort. Speaking of which, you’re going to have to:
Avoid your Taylor Swift’s All Too Well + folklore
Ah TS. A friend of mine likes to tease me about my love of Taylor as well as how much I love country music but what can I say. I’d rather wholeheartedly like what I like than be cool. I mean I’m 36 for god’s sake. I’m well past cool and much more into self-acceptance.
I was never much of a fan of her earlier work, so I was surprised to completely fall in love with her albums folklore and evermore, and subsequently her 10 minute version of her earlier song, All Too Well. They were the soundtracks to my lockdown, with the song betty appearing at the tippy top of my Spotify’s most played of 2021. However, those songs are just too emotive for me when life is challenging, especially the heart wrenching ATW (did I tell you I was sensitive?) so they stayed in the locker for a while. Work out your key trigger songs and avoid for now.
And finally, be proud when you can start back on your Jamie T, Beyoncé, Ray LaMontagne and Brandi Carlisle
What’s great about starting to feel better, albeit in tiny increments, is that I was able to measure how I was doing, by how able I was to listen to my current/pre-burnoutbreakdowncrisis favourites. Once I started to feel a bit more resilient, I could measure how I was feeling by how much I could listen to of “before” albums.
I was so relieved when I was able to just listen to my old playlists and new releases and just enjoy the music again without feeling like I feel absolutely everything they felt writing it. Of course that still happens, sensitivity doesn’t just go away, but it doesn’t hit quite as hard once you’ve begun to recover.
For the record (lol) I’m starting to feel “the new Jamie T album, a bit of Brandi Carlisle and most of a Ray LaMontagne (but only in the evenings)” well.
Do let me know in the comments your mirror/safety/trigger/well songs or albums too.
Gabby x
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I've been thinking about this post and thinking about how some albums feel like home... The Beatles, obviously. But music also works as a mood modulator in other ways. I always find strength in Solsbury Hill, the context of that song and why Peter Gabriel wrote it, 'being prepared to lose what you have for what you might get...' is inspiring, and I often go to that.
Oh Graceland transports me right back to being a kid because my Dad loved this album too! Every Jamie T album is connected to particular parts of my adult life and the new F+TM album has really hit home. I wish I had discovered Sleater Kinney when I was a teenager, instead of just recently in my late 30s but glad to have them now anyway. Thanks for sharing this x