The Journey Part II - The Battle of the Mind.

Hi again, or welcome? Thanks for clicking and welcome to Part II, the Journey of the Mind. If you haven’t read Part I, check it out, otherwise read on friend.

The Situation

Depression. You say the problem is in my head? A chemical imbalance, broken machinery that needs to be fixed. But that’s not the case. There are three causes to depression and anxiety: biological, social, and psychological (World Health Organisation). They are due to signals and responses from the outer world, they are produced socially, and thus require social solutions.

We aren’t machines with broken parts. We are human beings whose needs have not been met. Our brains physically change due to the circumstances around us, the society we live in. We have to start by thinking about it differently, it’s not what is inside your head, but where your head is at. You’re not broken, neither is your mind, you’re not what’s wrong with this world, even if it feels like it. The world is what is wrong with us.

We are living in a crisis, every forty seconds someone on this Earth takes their own life, someone extinguishes their own light. While conversations around mental health are on the rise, what I think we need to hear are stories. So I would like to welcome you to my mind, my own journey, and maybe, just maybe it can help you on yours. See you on the other side.

Part II

Loneliness

2020. The pandemic.

A virus has plagued the world, killing indiscriminately. A young, healthy person like me would be fine, but my duty as a human kept me inside, like many of you if I could potentially stop the loss of human life by sitting on the couch watching Netflix, sign me up. But what started out as a blessing, soon became a curse.

Human beings need connection, we need social interaction. Living, existing in your home you become lonely. Alone with my thoughts all the time. Loneliness can cause your cortisol levels to soar, equal to the same stress as experiencing a physical attack. Loneliness brings feelings of despair and profound sadness, and eventually depression, it remains one of the largest causes within society.

But how can you be lonely at home? With loved ones and friends? But home is just four walls, real home is community. And that community vanished overnight. We thrive off human connection, we evolved with it, we are who we are because of it. We were completely shut off from it, from what gives muse to our lives. For a whole year. Even more for some of us.

But how could I be alone when I was working? Meeting people every day. Loneliness isn’t the absence of other people, it’s the sense that you’re not sharing anything that matters with anyone else. I wasn’t able to speak about my own values and causes with anyone, I wasn’t able to share my light with others.

Loneliness is complex. It happens when our expectations for connection and the realities of them don’t align. It is based on our own values, being and feeling, and not just the amount of people we see and interact with. Loneliness can be a passing experience, or it can run for years. It can be the absence of intimate figures in our lives or even a broader social network of friends or community. And it can take a toll. It takes a toll.

At the centre of our loneliness is our desire to connect. The need for it. It’s in our nature to be part of a community, to be there for one another. To forge meaningful relationships and lasting bonds. We thrive together. Those connections help us through our tough times. And many of us have lost that. This world has lost that. I lost that. But that wasn’t all.

Values and Purpose

I have always been one to need to have purpose in anything and everything I do. To see how it relates to the bigger picture, to have value. And never underestimate the power of value and the need for purpose. After University I was working in numerous charitable and human rights organisations, even though the work was demanding the work touched my soul, because I was made for it.

That purpose came with its share of pain. Becoming too engrossed in my work led me to work tirelessly ‘for the cause’, exhausting myself to achieve what I thought was justice for others. I never knew how to decompress from difficult, sometimes traumatic situations and would take it home with me, overthinking and playing out scenarios in my head over and over again, maybe if I didn’t say that, or make that decision, maybe that person would be alive today.

And going from being a human rights caseworker to working a remedial customer service job creates a void. I died a little every time I came into work, because my work touched no part of who I was. I would meet hundreds of people, but they were all like strangers in the dark. The days were monotonous, and my purpose suffered, stagnated and it was soul-destroying. And this situation was forced upon me, I had to work, I had to pay my tuition fees because I had to pass Law School.

Loss

But there’s no greater trigger than loss. The fifth of December, 2018. My Grandad left this world. He would always speak highly of me, telling everyone he met that I would be a Barrister one day.

He never got to see that.

And we have all lost people in the pandemic. Everyday we would get a phone call of another family member lost to Covid, the Bangladeshi community was hit hard, I know so many families without fathers. But you can suffer that feeling of loss from even people you don’t know, but who you connect to, who directly affect your life.

20 July 2017. Chester Bennington.

7 September 2018. Mac Miller.

8 December 2019. Juice Wrld.

These names may mean nothing to you, but for me they were my heroes. And I lost all of them. People I looked up to, people who really understood me, despite me never meeting them. I have never been the one to be able to express myself emotionally, I hadn’t shed a tear in years, maybe even a decade, but in their music, I could lose myself in. I never knew how to handle loss or failure, but I would get through it with their music. Every loss I just carried with me, more weight on my shoulders thinking it would give me strength to carry on, when in reality it was holding me down.

Hope

And when you’re lonely, and when you’re values and purpose are misaligned, and you suffer loss, you begin to lose hope that things will get better. That things can get better. It starts with the small things, from watching my sports teams disappoint me yet again, to not looking forward to novel things like new albums or films. Food slowly loses its taste and the water from the shower doesn’t feel the same on my skin.

You then begin to lose hope in the bigger things.

I promised myself to not make these blogs political, so I’ll keep it short. The world fucking sucks. And is on fire. Literal fire. Everyday I would watch the news, so much hate, so much injustice, so much pain. You begin to lose faith in humanity, in eachother. But I kept watching. And I started to think maybe it doesn’t get better, maybe we’re not getting that break, maybe I’m not getting that break.

And that is when I began to lose hope in the greatest thing of all, myself.

Life begins to lose its joy and that begins to affect you, begins to change you. I began to shut down socially, situations where I once thrived, I was just surviving. When speaking to others rejuvenated me, I found the same interactions draining my energy, exhausting me. I started to avoid people, what little connection and community we had during the pandemic. I was for the first time in my life afraid. Not wanting to disappoint them, not wanting to lose them, not wanting to share what little purpose and value I had left. If I never interacted with anyone, then nothing would hurt me right?

When in reality I was afraid of the very thing I needed most.

The Battle of the Mind

I began to reject the natural world and chose to live in the artificial prison I created. Actively sabotaging any escape, because this prison I had manifested gave me security, safety, something I could finally control to protect me when things go wrong, and they always go wrong. A prisoner to my own ego. I would become hypervigilant to any perceived threat, because unconsciously I knew nobody was looking out for me. I was on my own, trying to survive.

And in survival mode your brain chemistry changes. I wasn’t living to live; I was living to survive. From how I studied to how I saw the world and my interactions within it, I would obsess on how things would eventually go wrong, how I would fuck this up, because that’s what I thought I was. Because if I was prepared for it, the stoic in me wouldn’t be upset right? I started planning my days to limit any bad things from happening, because if nothing bad happens then maybe I could be better again.

But if you don’t take any risks in life, if you plan to eliminate all the bad, you will also take out the good. Life itself will lose its value. Life without risk merits no reward, but there’s always a risk to happiness.

I purposely removed every element of my life that brought joy, that brought me light. The only thing that made me feel anything remotely were the intoxicants of this world. Trying to find anything to fill the void and emptiness growing inside me. Because an empty space has to be filled.

The only time I thought I was happy is when I was on the brink of damaging myself, because that was the only time that everything didn’t matter, that there was some peace, in that moment, that things were OK, and I just wanted things to be OK. That’s all I ever wanted. That’s all any of us ever want.

My own self-righteousness allowed no room for me to make mistakes, because the risks were too great if I failed. And every small failure builds up, the burden on my shoulders growing with every passing minute. This self-destructing behaviour didn’t take into account that I was human, that I make mistakes. Every slip up I became harder on myself, losing myself more, a vicious, hateful cycle.

Truth was I was hurting. Life was hurting me. Things began to build, and I was tired of it, but I had to keep going. And when I hurt, I turned to the only things I knew that made the pain go away, to cure the hurt the only way I knew how. I rationalised it with myself, hey, it’s for a good cause, it’s to get me through Law School, I deserve this, I need this, when things get better I will stop. Whether it was anxiety, stress, loss, pain, sadness whatever negative emotion I had they would put it aside, make me good again.

And I thought they were helping, because I was good sometimes. And when I was good I could keep going, because I needed to keep going, because I knew the risks if I failed, failure was never an option, there was just too much at stake. With death around me, I couldn’t lose the only bit of hope I had left in my life fall, the hope in me fall.

The Final Ember

And on that dreaded day, where my ultimate and final failure happened, I thought it was the end. My anxiety had never been worse than on that day, the day my entire life would change for the better, the little hope I had left in this world. This day was seven years in the making, my entire life, over twenty thousand pounds in tuition, sixty thousand pounds of debt (and still rising…) the hours of hard work, the early morning starts and the sleepless nights, the four jobs, and the exhausting work.

My results were supposed to be released at 10am, but I received them at 7.32pm due to admin errors. Typical. I hadn’t eaten in a week. But it would all be worth it when I passed, when I could look forward to something again.

Except it never came. Because I failed. Miserably.

And at a time I was barely surviving, where my hope was all but extinguished, in that moment I wanted it to be all over. In all honesty I couldn’t go on being who I was, and what I had turned into, because I didn’t even recognise him, the stranger staring back at me in the mirror, because I hated him, and what he represented, I hated me.

The deeper truth is I wasn’t happy, I hadn’t been happy for a long time, truly I couldn’t remember a time where I was happy. It began to feel like this tragic story was coming to its end, and there was relief in that, some freedom in that. Because I was tired from fighting, from failing, exhausted.

I believed I had already done so much in 25 years on this earth, and if I died it’s only because I lived my life my way, that I tried to do some good and pass Law School, and I couldn’t be sad about that. But it also drove me insane. Nights I lay awake thinking, why am I like this?

Why is my heart so restless?

Why am I dying to get to this place?

Why am I turning to the world of non-existence?

Why does every living being fear death, but I was running towards it?

And that is the cruelest thing about depression. It drains your desire to be alive. You see the world in black and white, devoid of all its love and beauty, just a sea of negativity, of darkness, where you can’t even fathom what happiness was, and you can’t remember a time when things were good because it just seems so far away.

We all want to feel alive, and the only time I felt like that was when I was on the brink of death, because it was the only time I really felt something… anything. The pain and grief in my life became a necessary reality, part of me didn’t want to recover. This grief was the only way I felt connected with others anymore, with anything anymore, the only thing that reminded me I too was human. But we grieve because we love, and sometimes that grief is necessary.

I used that pain to serve others, and that’s how I remunerated, using the worlds sorrow as motivation, inspiration, and energy. I was sorry that I couldn’t help you in your hour of need, but because of that I will do everything in my power to ensure it never happens again. But my grief shouldn’t be weaponised, even for a good cause. Because depression itself is a form of grief, for everything we need but don’t have.

I felt as though I didn’t even deserve a break or even to be happy, I hadn’t deserved it, because I was responsible for it. I thought my collective shortcomings were my failures. And then that pushes you down a dark fucking path. I never really spoke to anyone about it because I thought I could just rationalise it all in my head, but sometimes you have to admit that you might not know the answer.

The Awakening

But on that dark day, something beautiful also happened. That dreaded day where I was going to end it all, once and for all, I had to make my final amends. A shadow of my former self I slowly made my way into my Mum’s room and closed the door. My mother who was as anxious as I the whole day, she looked at me with eyes of such hope, and I had to share with her the worst news of my entire life.

My final message.

My Mum, the person who has done nothing but provide and pray for me night and day, through the storms and sunshine, the one who I thought expected the world from me, and I was damn adamant to give it to her. And when I told her I had failed, I had done something I hadn’t done in decades.

I cried.

I had never cried when I lost family, friends, or during any of my life’s ups and downs, I always put on a brave face, because that’s what was expected of me, but that day I couldn’t hold it in, I couldn’t just ‘man up,’ and I couldn’t stop crying. And I didn’t want to.

Why? Because my Mum was there for me, she was my shoulder to cry on, she held me like the child I used to be, like I still am, and I felt safe in her arms and her embrace, a safety I never knew existed, it felt like everything was going to be OK in that moment.

Because I let it all out, for the first time in a long time I couldn’t hold the pain and hurt anymore. And with those tears I began to expel the hate imprisoning me, banish the darkness within me. The demons, blinded by her light fled, and my mother, that blessed angel entered. She really did save her boy. I guess it’s true what they say about a mothers love.

And that love, that connection, that hope, is what I desperately needed. Even when I failed, she still loved me. And that’s all I needed to hear.

She never wanted me to be perfect, even though she prays for me night and day, even though she loves me more than anyone or anything in this world, and even she didn’t put that expectation on me, she never cared about that, only I did. She just wanted me to be who I am, to be happy, even if it’s not the person she wants or thinks me to be.

And that changed everything. That began my journey back to being me.

End of Part II

Well that was a lot to take in huh? I would again like to thank you for reading, and again hope that this blog has helped make sense of at least something going on in your life right now. Finally I’d just like to say your depression and anxiety does not define you. It is not permanent, and most importantly, it is not your fault.

This can happen to anyone, it’s not alien, its universal, it makes us who we are, it’s natural. Your brains way of telling you that you shouldn’t have to live this way and that you are missing out on so much of what it means to be human in this life. It is no measure of health to be adjusted to a sick society.

We have been given the wrong explanation, and we are seeking the wrong solutions. We aren’t tackling the causes but merely remedying the damage. You are suffering from a social and spiritual imbalance that is rampant across society. The culture and system we’ve been forced into has programmed us to what life should be, to what happiness is. A life based on the attainment of wealth, status and resources. But that is not the purpose of this life.

It might be what you want, but it is not what you need. What you need is reconnection. A community. Meaningful values. To be with nature, to be respected, to have security, to not feel ashamed, humiliated, and afraid. What you need is purpose, fulfillment, and to help rationalise it all in your brain, and to provide you with meaning for your pain. And when you find it, that deep, profound and liberating purpose, you will shine.

And I have tried my best to explain how I now choose to live my life, and what I did to ensure I am healthy, happy and shining. Please read on for Part III of the Journey – Awaken the Soul.