i can and i will

i'm not afraid of planes or heights or traveling.
i'm not afraid of spiders or bugs.
i'm not afraid of people, 
of breaking up or falling in love, 
i'm not afraid of commiting to something 
or leaving someone behind,
i'm not afraid of pain or hard times,
i'm not afraid of  rejection or failure, 
i'm not afraid of change 
and death doesn't scare me.

i'm afraid of terrorising agony, 
i'm afraid of endless suffering 
and pain without a reason. 
i'm afraid of giving in and being given up, 
i'm afraid of getting lost 
and never being able to find home again,
i'm afraid of waiting too long 
and being too impatient to get where i belong. 
i'm afraid of losing myself, 
of getting controlled by something uncontrollable, 
i'm afraid of insanity and illusions, 
i'm afraid of being bored 
and never interested in anything, 
i'm afraid of never being able to love someone 
and i'm afraid of never being loveable enough 
to make people stay and put up with my flaws. 
i'm afraid of being not smooth enough, 
with too many sharp edges, 
i'm afraid of being too plain to care about 
and too outworn to be reread or ever rewritten. 
i'm afraid of darkness without light and drowing. 
i'm afraid of not seeing the light at the end of the tunnel, of losing faith in myself, trust in other people 
and hope in general.
i'm afraid of always falling, but never crashing, 
i'm afraid of crashing without dying, 
i'm afraid of dying without having lived

how can there be so much panic in one person? how can i be scared of nothing but myself apparently?
what does my mind see, that my eyes can't? there must be something big and dangerous right in front of me, i can feel it, but it's not there, how can my body react to nothing,
i just don't understand...

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why is it, that the earth floats through space and travels around the sun but my heart is chained to the dusty lampshade beside my bed? wherefore rises the sun each and every day again no matter what happened and my mind is lost in complete darkness? and how does it come, that i can save no one, not even myself?

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i'm so tired i can't dream, i'm so hungry i can't eat, i'm so full of love, i can only hate.
it seems like i can't live, but i'm too afraid to die either.
this one wants me to lay down and never get up again, the other one wants me to run away as fast as my exhausted body parts can take me, just leave this place, these people, don't stay, never stop,
no wait, lay down, i'm gonna faint, i need to rest, i'm hungry, no i have to puke, i'm too full of nothing, give me more, give me less, leave me alone,come back, take everything away, i need more, i want everything, i want nothing, ever.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

i don't know what my fucking problem is. it feels different now. it always does. it always feels different than the time before but still familiar. like the funny feeling in your tummy is strange but you suddenly remember how sickness tastes. my body learns, and so does my mind, as soon as i accept a certain pain, i discover another way of hurting. i'm able to trick myself in a twisted, unhealthy way, when i'm struggeling to deal with that wound, as soon as i feel in control again, i find a new part to cut open.
i'm not really feeling sick right now, but my stomach hurts like the thought of him did yesterday, even though i took the pills, and i'm hot and sweaty and maybe i can just faint and everything will be black and calm.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

i'm so scared.i don't know what to do has become my first name
and helplessness my mothertounge.
i write it down to get it out of me, scrape it from the walls of my head, so i may feel alive again, like it's all just dead flowers and smeared make-up, art, melancholy, nothing more, nothing serious, totally in control.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

crying won't help, salt burns in open wounds.
some call it a desperate diary entry, some call it breathless bravery, some call it insightfull information,some call it pointless poetry, i call it a way of not losing my mind.

I feel pressured writing something about how to cope with pressure and how not to let the stress bring you down. Isn’t that ironic.

It seems to me, that all these things I want to say have already been written down hundreds of times.
But still, people feel the need to apologise for having negative experiences, for being not perfect or happy 24/7 or for not having ‘their shit together’.
And I know, this is no new information nor a surprise, when I say: It’s normal not to be fine all the time and it shouldn’t be a taboo to talk about it, if you’re feeling unwell.
We already know this, we’ve heard it already somewhere, but deep down in your brain you don’t really believe it or your parents taught you something else or you’re too embaressed to show weakness.
So maybe it needs to be emphasized more: It’s okay to feel down, to have doubts, to be sad, frustrated or angry.
Whatever it is, if it has an actual cause or if it’s a sudden mood, no matter what anyone might say, it is a legitimate thing and should be taken as seriously as you want it to be.

You as a human being have every right to feel the way you’re feeling.
You don’t need anyone’s permission to make “mistakes” and you can forget about anyone, who makes you feel bad for being “flawed”. I’m using quotation marks, because the things you may call mistakes or flaws are actually character traits we all have, some are only better at hiding them from you.

For a ‘public person’, as a youtuber with over 5 million subscribers, as a successful woman and teen idole, Zoe Sugg feels a lot of pressure to satisfy the expectations of her viewers as well as her own.

It’s hard, when you have a  picture of yourself or the person you aspire to be in your head and you believe   that you need to be a certain way to please other people but sometimes you just can’t do it.
You feel like a failure, like you disappointed not only yourself but millions of other people who look up to     you.

  The important thing is, you don’t.

Zoe, people don’t look up to you because everything you do is perfect and you are happy all the time and have everything together. That would be first of all boring and second of all it’s impossible. We like you, because we can relate to you and even though we may try to be more like you it’s comforting to see, that you are just as human as we are.

I personally think she handles all that attention and pressure so well and I’m very proud of her, despite the fact I don’t really know her and it actually doesn’t matter what one single viewer thinks anyway.
But I know that I’m not the only one, who respects her for what she does and she’s not the only one who feels overwhelmed at times.
And that’s the point of this post.

You, who reads this right now, are struggeling.
I know this, because I am too. We all do.
We all are trying to cope with change, confusing feelings and with finding our place in this world -If it’s about your future job, the person you fancy and you want so bad to be at their side right now or you’re tired and stressed and just want to go to bed – we all are trying to get to this one place in the world, that we might fit in perfectly.
You can work on some of those things, but you have no influence on others.
Accept it and it’ll lower the pressure.
Breathe.
I want you to know, that everything actually will be alright at some point.
Allow yourself to be upset. It’s okay.

In conclusion: our sense of perfection is the only thing that’s really imperfect and in the need of revision.
We are no robots, we are flawed and that’s why we should not judge, but respect and help out .
I hope that you’ll feel better soon.

I feel like everyone talks about it but at the same time nobody really says anything about it – depression, bipolar, personality disorders, anxiety, it seems like almost everybody has to say something about it, so many people suffer from at least one of the above at some point in their life, especially in their young adult years - but mental illnesses and a social life, how does it work?
One of the major problems is the way I want to deal with it in front of other people.
Can I control it enough to not mention it at all?
Does it make me seem weak, if I tell my friends about it?
Or will it make everything easier, because my behavior will seem more normal, if the people around me would know what’s going on?
Those are very difficult questions, not only regarding your own wishes and boundaries, but you also have to consider the needs of the other human being, will he/she be able to cope with the knowledge and are you really that “close” to address something like that, do you trust that person or maybe it will trigger him/her and make everything uncomfortable?

Especially whilst growing up and then meeting new people at your university or starting relationships with a new boy-/girlfriend, those questions might be popping up in your head, you could introduce yourself as a new person, as someone you would like to be or as the person you are on your good days, or you could go all in and just throw every detail in their faces.
I can’t really recommend the last option.
And although the first option seems to be easy at first, you will be under a lot of pressure, acting like you want to be seen and experience even the fear of not to be loved for who you are, but for who you aspire to be one day.
Everything would be easier, if you could just walk around with a ‘please handle with care’-sign and never had to do any explaining. But that’s not how life works.
Tragically, people always seem to forget, that human beings are complex and if you tell them you suffer from an mental illness, they immediately create a picture of you in their head that might not be identical with the actual you.
Just because you say, that you are depressed, it doesn’t mean you sit at home all day, blankly staring at a wall.
Just because you tell someone, that you’ve been diagnosed with a panic disorder and you have difficulties with certain tasks, it doesn’t mean you can’t go out and have fun.
This concept and your individual problem can be so hard to grasp for people, that it’s understandable, that some patients never want to address it in front of their friends, because they can’t really relate to it and they’ll never know, what the other person has to go through. 

If you're reading this, you either suffer from a mental disorder yourself, have a close friend, who's dealing with one, or I sent you this link without any explanation.
In that case, let me introduce my demons: Panic and Depression. 
Both of them have been with me for almost all my life, i take medication and i've been in therapy for over 5 years.
No, sadly it's not all just in my head, but most of it is, that's why it's called a mental illness,
yes, my brain is "sick", no, i can't snap out of it, but yes i'm doing my best to live with it.
No, depression doesn't mean that i cry all day, yes, uncontrolling panic attacks suck, yes, i'm very open about my problems and i'll carry them around on my sleeve, you just haven't noticed yet and no, you won't have to deal with any of this, if you don't want to.
Hi, nice to meet you.

If you don't know what either of those illnesses are, check out the tags "depression" and "anxiety"/"Panic attacks".


As “the friend” you can only guess and try to listen carefully and maybe to some research on your own, and even that isn’t a guarantee, that you won’t make mistakes, treating the person accidentally wrong, because you underestimate or overestimate the illness or that you might break down yourself and can’t deal with it all.
It’s such a risk and makes every awkward social thing even harder.
So the answer is, I don’t have an answer. I know, I’d be disappointed, too.
Reading all this, without being offered a solution can be very frustrating.
But so is dealing with a mental illness, no matter if you suffer directly from it, or through a friend.
All i can say is, that you have to try what works best for you and remember, self-care always comes first, if your (boy/-girl-)friend doesn’t accept you or can’t be bothered to support you, kick them out of your life and take a chance with another person.

 Someday you’ll find someone who’s able and willing to love you for who you are, every part of you and until then, dare to touch your own butt once in a while.

I planned this day for two weeks and waited for it for 18 years. I've been dealing with anxiety my entire life, so two hours on a train and two hours in a big city always seemed impossible. Until now. Accompanied by my therapist and two of my closest friends, who would all stay in another compartment, I got on the train and totally touched the butt. I didn't even just touch the butt, I became the butt. The nervousness didn't feel like anxiety at all, it felt more like excitement. Excitement to finally going to be able to do the stuff I want to do, to being able to say yes to things that scare the living daylight out of me and on top of it all, excitement to finally declare war on my anxiety. I'm not saying it was easy- the week before was horrid, I wasn't able to eat, sleep and relax at all, but as soon as I found a vacant seat, it felt like the most normal thing to do. Listening to the Frozen-Soundtrack, smiling the entire time (the people must've thought I am completely crazy), I started thinking. I always thought of myself as Elsa, isolating myself, being a prisoner of my own fears, but lately I've started discovering my inner Anna. And I love it. The pure excitement of going outside, meeting new people and 'dancing through the night' has always been a part of me, I just never found the strength to do it despite the anxious feeling. Maybe there is an Elsa in all of us, but it's our own decision if we let her control us or if we're going to fight her. And I think that, after 18 years of being Elsa, I finally deserve to learn how to be Anna. I forgot how to live and now it's my turn to remind myself of all the beautiful things I would keep missing out on if I don't internalise why so many people are in love with life. It's not going to be easy, it never was, but I'm getting there. 
Dear Anxiety, I hope you're scared of me.
You really should be.