Last night I had my whole girl's cross country team over for a team sleepover. We spent the whole evening just enjoying being together in every way. We really enjoy our time together as we are a very close team. We stayed up late and then woke up this morning and ate breakfast. Slowly everyone was leaving the house, and it just felt really good. Somehow, being with friends is so rejuvenating. It takes all the unhappy problems and whisks them away for a while. When with friends, one can just let loose and enjoy being surrounded by people who love them. That's how it is with my team. We spent that evening together and my whole world became brighter. All of a sudden I was not alone; I was loved and cared for. I was apart of something bigger than myself that also made me important. We were a group all raised on pedestals. "And in that moment, we were infinite." For that time together, we empowered each other in ways nothing but a close group of friends could. I sat on my own after everyone left and just felt wonderful about the world. I was loved. I was cared for. I was important in ways I'd never thought I was. I spent the day cocooning in these glad thoughts and happy feelings, allowing myself to soak them up for the future.
Now let's turn the topic. When we are feeling really bad, we so often turn away from those we love. We desire to hide in our beds under the warm blankets - warm and apparently safe from the hurt of the world. All alone, we wallow in depressive thoughts and drop ourselves further into the dumps. This alone-ness doesn't help.
If, when we were hurting inside, we turned to our friends: got together with them and allowed them to fill us up, we wouldn't keep the sadness inside. We've all seen the effect that a good time with friends can have on us. Being with them can turn a bad day on it's head. So why do we yearn to be alone in our darkest times? Why do we run from our greatest asset?
So many people seem repulsed by those who "self-harm." But what they don't realize is that self-harm comes in many forms. Everyone who tries to hide away and doesn't seek help from friends in their down times is hurting themselves. Every time you make the choice to hide in bed instead of trying to make yourself happier is hurting yourself. To be honest, everyone hurts themselves to an extent. Generally it is unintentional - but unintentional doesn't make it okay. People need to look at the choices they make and analyze whether or not these choices are positive or negative for them.
Stop hiding away from your problems. Use your assets; your friends can turn your world for the better.
Stop hurting yourself.
I think that the reason why we yearn to be alone when we are sad is because our minds need time to reassess the situations we are in. It is okay, for a brief time, even for a full day, to cocoon. After a day of thought and reflection, though, get a good night's sleep, and then approach the new day with gusto, perhaps spending it with the friends you mention above. I like the reflective tone of your blog entries.
ReplyDeleteI agree with the comment that people need time to think, and solitude sometimes helps, so when we are sad we often want to get away from others. Maybe we withdraw in various way, figuratively going out into the "desert" or "wilderness" to be by ourselves. Additionally, I'm thinking it could also be affected by each person's personality, in that some people may tend to be more comfortable alone than others, who are more comfortable with people around them. I think psychologists talk about introverts being drained by crowds and extroverts gaining energy from crowds. Personally I was always more of a loner than a joiner, partly to my detriment I'm sure, but probably also due to my personality. An inner world of ideas was (and often still is) more comforting to me than an outer world of people. But friends can definitely help, so I don't think your thoughts & suggestions are wrong. You wrote one thing that especially makes me ponder, where you say that people can hurt themselves in many different ways, not all physical. That is really profound I think. Even now I tend to withdraw from everybody and everything when I'm sad or emotionally confused. A little while is perhaps fine but too long is probably not. People really do need to think about such things, and evaluate their own habits of coping. By the way, I really like how you "turn the topic" in the middle: that seems both effective and nicely stylish.
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