So you know how people sometimes tell you to move on? Or not to dwell on the past? Or best yet to “just get over it”? That’s so fucking dumb.

First off, there’s trauma which means you can’t just let stuff go because it’s had a significant impact on your brain. And usually if you explained to someone that you were badly fucked up by something traumatic, those people wouldn’t be rudely telling you to forget about it, they’d be apologetically dripping with false sympathy. Or real sympathy. But it would be annoying either way.

Second off, even if something isn’t quite “trauma”, it can still be really hurtful. It can be a pivotal experience in your life that affected how you developed or became the person you are today. For better and for worse, there are incidents that shape us and is it really so wrong to stay focused on those moments?

Who is to decide which experiences we choose to focus on and which ones we forget about? When people tell us to “get over it” should we forget positive experiences too? Just get over all the moments that made us happy, sad, angry, and more? What about creating our personal identity? We have to base our self-concept off of some memories, somehow, and they might as well be the important ones even if they are sometimes negative.

Now someone is going to feel the need to point out that it’s not ALL negative memories you should move on from. No, it’s just the ones that they find annoying for you to be hyper-focused on. Because where do you draw the line? Doesn’t everyone get to decide which memories are important to them even if they are painful or bothersome for other people to be reminded of? Not to mention maybe the reason you can’t move on about something is because it still has a meaning for you that you haven’t deciphered yet.

So go ahead and stay mired in the muck of your depressed thoughts. Be obsessive, be stuck. Because you get to decide which experiences and memories are worth dwelling on, and you get to decide when you truly feel something is holding you back. When you’re ready to move on, you’ll be all the better for having given yourself the space to think through what was having an impact on you in the first place. And maybe you’ll never move forward to the imaginary better that society has tried to sell you on. It’s going to be your personal journey, so you determine your destination, your path, and your pace.

So you know how another year is coming to an end, and everyone’s is preparing their plans for how to improve in the new year? And you’re caught between being glad that something new is happening to distract you from the perpetual boredom and pain of your condition, and being scared that you’ll actually have to make changes to your life?

It’s hard to decide to try new things or take on challenges when it feels like everything in the past is already perfect. -ly fucked. Perfectly fucked. And at times when you find that you should be looking forward sometimes it’s so tempting to just look back and dwell on your life history. Sometimes it is reassuring because as bad as it was, the past is over now, and barring time machines, you can’t actually change the past.

If you’re going to focus on what’s already happened, why not make an ethic of it? It’s a great time to think about what you’ve accomplished, and evaluate how much of it you truly feel you deserved. It’s a great time to think about the people in your life and how they’ve helped or hurt you. And it’s a great time of year to reflect on all of those dreams of what could be better, even if that does make you feel ungrateful.

You might think because calendars do control a vast part of our life, that it follows that we should worship the beginning of the year by marking it will all our plans to do better. Submit to the structure of external society and fall in line with the time-based programming of the overlords!

Okay or maybe you would rather say fuck it and just do whatever you want. And holidays, new years, and seasonal greetings bedamned, doing nothing is also a fantastic option. When all the world is celebrating, or thinking of ways to change society, it can be so wonderful to rebel your way into sullen apathy and lethargy.

So take a look at the past year and remember that there’s another one coming up. And then do more stuff? Or then do less stuff? It’s up to you as you’re dragged forward in time by the unrelenting laws of the universe.

So you know how Disney et al. tells you to follow your heart and be true to you? That shit is a bad idea. Fake it forever.

Depression can sometimes cause your internal world to be filled with negativity and critical thoughts. Not to mention taboos and deconstructions of societal norms. It’s a lot. Still, what’s wrong with sharing your heart? What’s wrong with communicating about how unique you are? Or how boring you are for that matter?

Nothing. It’s other people that are the problem. They might judge you. They might see you as dangerous. They might form stereotypical impressions of you. And then in the case of the mental health system, they might institutionalize you, and/or make you take medicine. Because depression is typically at least in part defined by thoughts that are not considered on the metaphorical tableau of the “well adjusted.”

Would you deserve these reactions? Would it be the natural consequence of being a deviation from the norms of the less depressed? Is this really what would happen from you just following that advice and being honest about who you really are?

Well there’s also the possibility that you could find someone, or a group of people, who can provide support. And if you are prepared for the emotional weight of sharing your inner self with the world, there could be the reward of others understanding you better, and even embracing your perspective. You could even find that some of your thoughts are original as fuck, or really helpful.

So you know, maybe you just have to be cautious and set your own boundaries? If you find that being true to you privately is okay, go for it. If you want to take it public, that’s cool as well. Yet while it’s hard to feel forced to care about society’s limitations, there is often some need to rely on people outside of yourself, and so being truthful can be a delicate balancing act to make sure that you can follow your heart and still get what you need to survive.

So you know how you’re stoic and don’t like to communicate? Not just like talking, but actually sharing your deep inner workings. And you keep all your feelings inside except for when, sometimes, you are struck with an urgent need to express yourself somehow, just never in a way that’s responsible or healthy, because that would be gay?

It’s funny how depression can make you feel like being repressed makes you superior to other people. All you are doing is refusing to communicate, but you think you’re fucking awesome as fuck for not being a mouthy loser who shares too much. And there’s all that time where you talk talk talk, but always keep the important stuff trapped inside, misleading everyone around you.

Then if you do decide to communicate, it might be an effusive mudslide of first in last out trauma from years past, which sucks. Or an eruption of angry last in first out bullshit ragers against all the people who most recently fucked you over with their assholery. And really these options, and the many many more, are all awful, so really communicating is just the worst, and all the people trying to get you to do it can get fucked.

The bad news is: yes exactly, never communicate. The good news is: you have free will and can express yourself the way you want to, and to who you want to, as long as you’re prepared for the consequences of whichever form of honesty (or dishonesty) that you choose.

Because it’s funny how you’re actually the one deciding what is so important that you should NOT share it. Get the gist? Like society does make everyone conform to bullshit expectations, but you’re still the ultimate arbiter of what is too taboo or trivial to communicate to others. Whether you go to therapy, talk to a confidant, or just rage when you want to, all options for communication are yours to think over, even if you just decide to stick with not communicating.

So you can feel superior when you repress your feelings. Because everyone knows that brooding just is cool. Still, if you do decide to express yourself, you’ll own the outcome of whichever type of sharing you choose, so that’s pretty boss too. Even if you fuck it up. Ha ha!

So you know when people are reminding you to look at all the good things you have in your life? And you feel bad because you know you should be more grateful? Fuck that.

It should be okay to revel in the pain of knowing it could always be better. So it could be worse. So who fucking cares? It could be fucking better!

And in the process of being ungrateful, you learn a lot of self-focus for survival. It takes a lot to handle depression, so it should be okay to think about your own life and be upset that it isn’t perfect.

Thinking about all the things that could be worse is also really depressing so why would people suggest you do that to feel better? And thinking of the things that could be even better is overwhelming, but at least it gives you something to dream about when you are miserable.

And when someone wants to be just happy with where they are and exactly what they have. Fuck them. It’s okay to be miserable always wanting more than what you have, because that’s what’s happening to people all the time, they’re just being dishonest and trying to pretend everything is okay.

So think about how much life sucks and how it could be better, or worse, or whatever the fuck, if you want to think about it. And if you don’t. Then don’t. Either way, gratitude for what you have only gets you so far. There’s more to life than appreciating what you have, and that’s okay.

*Ghost Written*