That we live in a world full of dichotomies, it’s not a surprise for anyone. Whist some of us live very luxurious lives, the majority struggles to get a roof under their hands, pay the bills, bring food to the table and so on. Oftentimes we fall into narratives like work harder to earn harder and never mind the rest. Quality of life takes the backseat, and we will pay the cost in terms of heath sooner or later.
It’s not easy to navigate so many stimuli, so much information, so many images of cruelty and violence that pop in our screens daily. What can we do to avoid falling in the same pitfalls of previous generations, how can we make the world a better place, a place where we can thrive and feel fully alive?
“Velvet rope” is not just the name of an excellent Janet Jackson album: it’s the distance that goes between the gatekeepers, the privileged, the powerful and the common mortal who takes life day by day and feels excluded from most of societal conversation. The one who just wants to keep his/her head down and do the job at hand and not take up too much space.
What if now is the time for these people are brought together and fight for their rights? Black people, women (who unfortunately still need to stand themselves nowadays because the oppressors are everywhere), LGBTQIA+ movements and so many others. We need leaders who have true love for the people they are representing and not for the money and status a public political position can mean.
Our stories need to be amplified and maybe we just need to be a little bit louder. When you are labeled as “the other” it’s tough to find a comfortable connection to yourself and your own experiences, you bow down to the established order, you feel inferior, scared, ashamed.
I can speak specifically on mental health: being hospitalized in a psychiatric ward twice and not always receiving a treatment isent of prejudices, it would be easy to hold on to resentments. Instead I managed to forgive whoever I felt was not correct with me, get better and move forward with my life. Receiving a bipolar diagnosis which is considered a lifelong illness made me question everything: who I am, my purpose on the world, my very fabrics as a human being.
I really don’t believe there is light separating people with psychiatric diagnoses from people who don’t have them. “Normal” is a fallacious definition. The core message of this digital magazine is that we are all human, we all feel the same things abeit with different degrees of emotion, empathy or understanding. Our similarities are more than what separates us.
So to whoever that may reading this right now: you are not weak for asking for help, you are not weak for crying and needing time to heal. In a world where quick fixes are so marketed as the miraculous solution you know better than fall for scummy golden formulas. You know there is inner work to do and if you want to get well, you need to go to the root causes of your unease. Don’t suffer in anticipation, don’t think you don’t have the time, because in the end every effort that is an investment on your well-being will be completely worth it.