Art by Neil Cathro
[dropcap color=”#” bgcolor=”#” sradius=”0″]T[/dropcap]he aphorism “mind over matter” has been suffering abuse, for your mind can’t be allowed always to be in control.
A person’s entire life cannot be controlled by mental health. This is tough advice to take, but it comes from someone who has been medicated for seven years for anxiety. Sites, like Tumblr, advocate for those who suffer from mental disorders to surrender themselves to a life of apathy with shaky forms of self help.
Mental health is an important issue and should be handled with care, so one can’t help but wonder; why are so many people trusting unsourced blog posts on the internet? One can only attribute this to some kind of trend that must stop.
The first offence of the internet’s preaching is the abuse of the mental health day. It is fine that once in a blue moon you stay home on a bad day. However, the reality of the occasional off day can’t be stretched to “miss class and your responsibilities whenever you don’t feel up to them.”
Avoiding responsibilities doesn’t make them go away. While one may think that they are giving themselves more time to prepare they are just setting themselves up to fail. If someone keeps skipping their tests, they still have to take it. It only means that they are going into the test with the material that they learned being less fresh on their mind.
The attitude of going home the second you feel bad will only hurt your future. Mental health is important, but in the professional setting it can not be allowed to halt work.
[quote font_size=”0″ bgcolor=”#” color=”#” bcolor=”#” arrow=”no”]The culture of being automatically excused from life by mental illness, is setting its followers up to fail. [/quote]While the idea of staying home is appealing, it just isn’t an option in the real world. It may feel good in the moment, but the disappointment from teachers from a bad quiz or from teammates for missing practice is simply not worth it.
The second offence is the reliance on expensive, short-term self care methods. Often things like bubble baths, hot drinks and even scented oils are promoted to soothe someone. These are expensive and unproductive. Things as simple as deep breathing or writing down what you’re worried about has worked.
The internet is a great tool for communication, so it can be assumed that there will be discourse in mental health, but this discourse has been less than productive. Internet self-help culture can not replace professional help, and those in need of care should accept that.