I don’t know what to do. My brain and my body feel like they’re imploding on themselves. I have had a headache for days, heartache for years. I’m broken, but I know I’m not. I feel totally inadequate. And then I remember someone was going to trust me to watch her children (whom she loves) for an entire weekend. I feel unlovable and then I look at my phone to see messages from people who know I exist and invite me to things. I feel untalented and then I look at the things I’ve made, with my own brains. I know being depressed isn’t my fault, but I also know it causes me to lose things I love. It’s a companion I know I could learn to libe with, but it’s also a plague that’s destroying the life I want.

It’s a constant battle between heart and mind and the result is an aching soul.

I’m sitting here in what must be Depression, because how can a sadness worse than this exist? Maybe for someone stronger than me, it is possible to be sadder, but this feels like my limit. I feel like my veins are filled with lead. My arm feels too heavy to raise. And it’s too boney. Why are my elbows so boney? My heart is heavy and somehow empty at the same time. I am the heaviest shell of a person you can imagine. I had barely hold my head up and everything in my brain is foggy. But the creative thoughts don’t stop. I’m filled with ideas I cannot execute because my body won’t do what my brain tells it to.

And it’s not me either. Because me is a person who jokes around constantly. I used to think “vibrant” was a great word to describe me, but I feel desaturated. The world has a grey tint to it. I only wear sunglasses with brown lenses, because I hate looking at the world with a grey tint.

So I have to do something. People are suggesting things like therapy, books, and medication, meditation, yoga, diets. I’ve tried them. I’ve even preached about them. But nothing is actually working for me. I know I could (and will) try harder and retry some of those things that help people. But different things work for different people.

So what can I do? I love yoga and therapy and all that. But as I’m thinking, I hear it, in the suave voice of Jamael Westman (sorry, Lin), I wrote my way out.

I wrote my way out of hell
I wrote my way to revolution
I was louder than the crack in the bell
I wrote Eliza love letters until she fell
I wrote about The Constitution and defended it well
And in the face of ignorance and resistance
I wrote financial systems into existence
And when my prayers to God were met with indifference
I picked up a pen, I wrote my own deliverance

Hurricane on Spotify

And it’s selfish too. Because it makes me feel better. Maybe selfish is a bad word. It’s a win-win. I wish I didn’t keep forgetting. I am so blessed to have a talent/love that is totally free for me to do. I can write on paper scraps. I can write on my own skin. I can write on the internet with potential for people around the world to read it. It’s the easiest, most beautiful thing. I can do it by myself or with other people. I’m lucky to have something that’s so easy to love. And it gives me hell, but I sometimes think it loves me back.

Here’s the remix version:

Note: My therapist also suggested I write more, so she gets some credit too.