Recently, I have been drop dead infatuated by albums that have correlations with personal experiences regarding mental health such as Nothing’s “Tired of Tomorrow” and Modern Baseball’s “Holy Ghost,” and it’s amazing how they turned their scars and weaknesses into a force that shines bright; a force that a lot of people could relate to— so I had to say this:
Shoutout to everyone who managed to create works of art in any forms and enhance productivity out of internal scars and mental health problems. Repeat this; you are not defined by your scars. I’ve come across a lot of brave and strong warlords who managed to create songs, writings, visual arts, and a lot more based on their personal experiences relating to internal wars inside their head and mental health. Or the ones who found a coping mechanism to rise from their fall by enhancing productivity and achievements that they later could be proud of. Even some of these kick-ass warlords are my own friends. This world is a battleground but you all managed to create your own fields where you tackle your own battles and thrash. You all are soldiers without weapons, and that’s amazing.
It’s not easy creating works of art when you’re mentally damaged, let alone creating works that actually have hints of your personal experiences regarding your own wars. When you look back at your song lyrics, your writings, or your paintings, or whatsoever, there are chances you’d get triggered and shiver over the memories that thrive again into you because you had to exert so much courage and work so hard to eradicate fears inside you when creating them. But the thing is you survived all those; you made it — you completed your works, and you actually got inspired by your own stories and wars, you got inspired to turn your weaknesses into audacity through your works and thrashed the living fuck out of your fears.
And it’s even more amazing when a lot of people could relate to those works; when a lot of people appreciate your works and thank you for creating them. Your works could save lives and assure other people that they are not alone. And by the time your works get bigger and more renowned, you’d have a circle of fellow warriors who are going through similar battles who find revelation through your works and they’d go through battles with you.
They sing along and mosh and stage dive to the songs you created. They thank you for writing the articles you wrote and tell their friends about how your writings saved their lives. There’d be lots of people who find the good light in your works, and there’d be lots of ways of expressing their gratitude and admiration towards those works, and towards you, who created them. In the end it would be worth it.
I’m not saying that we only create works based on/inspired by our own past experiences in order to be validated and/or in order to fish for compliments and/or in order to have people to relate to it; those are not the major purposes of course. We worked on them because we wanted to rise above; we wanted to turn our scars and weaknesses into strength through our productivity; we still had small feeble hopes that someday we’d stand on top of the mountains; we thought that manifesting our feelings is some sort of a way to connect to people with similar battles. But it’s even nicer when your works eventually produce outcomes and feedbacks that would make you say “it’s worth it in the end” with a smile. Shout out to you all because thanks to you all, magnificent creations that help others through hard times are born.
Don’t stop creating works about mental health and/or works inspired by your own roads in the battleground. It’d mean a lot to someone.
