Latest / feel your feelings with Ethan Jewell / why sadness is comfortable

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why sadness is comfortable · feel your feelings with Ethan Jewell

• 0:01
  I realized I didn't know who I was outside of my sadness.
• 0:05
  I was so comfortable in it, and it was so easy to maintain that
• 0:10
  it became my entire identity. It became a part of me and that
• 0:15
  made it nearly impossible to improve my mental health at all.
• 0:21
  Hey, there and welcome back to feel your feelings with me,
• 0:25
  Ethan, Jewel. Now I haven't uploaded a podcast
• 0:28
  episode in almost, Two months, and I could throw half-hearted
• 0:34
  excuses around as to why that is like, I went back to school and
• 0:39
  I've been working on bettering myself and all these different
• 0:42
  things but really I don't have a good excuse.
• 0:45
  Um, all I can say is I'm back and I'm really, really going to
• 0:50
  try to consistently upload weekly.
• 0:52
  So thank you so much for tuning in and let's feel some feelings.
• 1:01
  So like I mentioned in the beginning, one thing I've been
• 1:04
  putting a lot of energy into lately is bettering myself and
• 1:09
  trying to really, really break out of the hole that I've been
• 1:13
  in for so long. Because I'm going to be honest.
• 1:16
  I'm really tired of waking up at 2 p.m. and feeling awful all day
• 1:22
  and being depressed and unmotivated.
• 1:24
  So, I've been really trying to leave the sadness that I've been
• 1:28
  comfortable in. For so long and let me tell you
• 1:32
  it is difficult. One thing that nobody tells you
• 1:36
  about mental health, recovery is how difficult it is to leave the
• 1:42
  identity of sadness that you have created for yourself.
• 1:46
  I'm going to be honest, I have been super hesitant to try to
• 1:49
  get happier because I am so comfortable in my sadness.
• 1:54
  It's been all I've known for years.
• 1:56
  Now it's become a big part of my identity.
• 1:59
  It's Part of my career. It's become part of how I
• 2:02
  present myself to other people and it's so comfortable.
• 2:06
  And what I've realized is that it is so easy to become stuck in
• 2:11
  your sadness because of how comfortable it is.
• 2:14
  And that's what I want to talk about today.
• 2:17
  So how do we get to this point where sadness is a part of us?
• 2:20
  And it becomes so difficult to leave.
• 2:22
  Well I've been thinking about it and one thing, one message that
• 2:27
  I really push is to feel your feelings Right?
• 2:30
  I mean, that's the entire name of this podcast is feel your
• 2:33
  feelings. However, I think this can be
• 2:35
  really easily misinterpreted. And instead of feeling feelings,
• 2:40
  we identify as feelings. So, instead of thinking, I feel
• 2:46
  sad, I feel depressed. I feel angry instead.
• 2:51
  It becomes, I am sad. I am depressed.
• 2:56
  And suddenly, before we know it this Thought pattern completely
• 3:01
  consumes us. It becomes our identity and I
• 3:04
  know I for one became one with my sadness.
• 3:08
  I mean, for the longest time, I haven't known who I am without
• 3:13
  sadness. It's become such an integral
• 3:16
  part of who I am because I identified with my sadness for
• 3:20
  so long. So now as I'm trying to fully
• 3:23
  get this sadness out of my life, I don't exactly know who I am
• 3:29
  without it. It, another thing is, it's
• 3:31
  simply easier to maintain that sadness.
• 3:34
  It's easier to maintain a mentally ill, State of Mind, to
• 3:40
  put it very bluntly. Fighting mental illness is
• 3:43
  exactly what it sounds like a fight.
• 3:46
  It's not an easy thing. It is an uphill battle, it is
• 3:49
  so, so difficult and a lot of the times it feels much easier
• 3:55
  to just keep things, how they are in, this becomes Amplified
• 3:59
  if We are comfortable with our sadness because then the goal is
• 4:04
  to become uncomfortable. And of course, we don't want to
• 4:07
  be uncomfortable, getting rid of this sadness.
• 4:10
  Literally feels like you have to entirely reinvent yourself to
• 4:15
  try to recover from this mental illness.
• 4:17
  Feels like you have to become a new person.
• 4:20
  And oh my God that is overwhelming.
• 4:23
  That is a horribly hard task to set yourself up for To be so
• 4:30
  comfortable within sadness to be so comfortable within mental
• 4:34
  illness and to force yourself out of that and become
• 4:38
  uncomfortable, and literally reinvent who you are and find
• 4:44
  yourself again outside of sadness, that sounds virtually
• 4:48
  impossible. And that's why so many people
• 4:51
  struggle with or give up entirely on trying to get
• 4:56
  better. It is so hard.
• 4:59
  It is so so hard. If you have experienced mental
• 5:05
  illness depression, sadness, anything of the sort.
• 5:10
  And if you have attempted to get better, whether or not, you are
• 5:13
  successful, I know that, you know what I'm talking about.
• 5:18
  And I know that, you know, how difficult it is, over the last
• 5:23
  few months, I found myself wondering what the point of
• 5:26
  getting better. Is I found myself wondering,
• 5:30
  well, I'm so comfortable in this sadness.
• 5:32
  It's such a big part of me. Why should I get better?
• 5:36
  Why should I get uncomfortable? Why should I have to reinvent
• 5:40
  myself? And I think I finally answered
• 5:43
  these questions. The first and most difficult
• 5:46
  part of this process for me, has been starting.
• 5:50
  I've had to switch my mindset away from thinking that I have
• 5:55
  to reinvent myself and thinking that I have to get rid of my
• 5:58
  sadness entirely. You see sadness mental illness,
• 6:01
  things like that. They will be there.
• 6:03
  A lot of times whether you like it or not, things will come up,
• 6:07
  triggers will be activated, and you will feel bad.
• 6:11
  You see mental health recovery is not about feeling Perfect.
• 6:14
  All of the time. I'm it is about reaching a
• 6:17
  neutral State, and knowing how to deal with negative emotions.
• 6:21
  When they come up previously, I would approach recovery thinking
• 6:26
  that I had to reinvent myself without sadness.
• 6:30
  And obviously, this is an impossible task.
• 6:33
  Instead, I've realized that, I just have to ReDiscover the part
• 6:37
  of me that seeks. Joy and happiness, and
• 6:40
  positivity, and bring that back to the surface.
• 6:43
  Sure there will be days. Days where I will get depressed,
• 6:47
  where I will get sad. We're all feel like I'm back to
• 6:50
  square one. However, I can find relief in
• 6:53
  the fact that that is not my neutral when we become
• 6:57
  comfortable with our sadness or our mental illness, then it
• 7:01
  becomes our neutral point, that becomes our normal.
• 7:05
  When in reality it should be a low that we have to recover from
• 7:10
  and I think that it is a beautiful thing that we are able
• 7:14
  to experience these Changes of emotion and feel that sadness,
• 7:18
  and feel that depression and feel that anxiety and be able to
• 7:22
  come back to a neutral place. It is uncomfortable, it is not
• 7:26
  easy, but it is part of the human experience to feel this
• 7:31
  wide range. Remember, whatever issue you are
• 7:34
  fighting should not be your normal instead, you should seek
• 7:39
  to feel those feelings without letting them.
• 7:43
  Consume you out of the comfortableness that is sadness
• 7:47
  and is mental illness, looks different for everybody.
• 7:51
  I can't tell you exactly how to reach that.
• 7:53
  You have to experiment and try new things and see what works
• 7:57
  for you. You have to see what helps you
• 7:59
  recover. I'd like to remind you.
• 8:02
  I'm not a psychologist. I'm not a mental health
• 8:05
  specialist. I'm just a guy who has
• 8:08
  experienced some big feelings and is experiencing them right
• 8:12
  now. And from my personal, I can tell
• 8:15
  you the best thing you can do for yourself is to try new
• 8:20
  things, try everything that you can to reach a happier and more
• 8:24
  stable mindset for me. It looks like picking up new
• 8:29
  hobbies like skating and working out and rock climbing.
• 8:33
  It looks like focusing on my poetry and writing.
• 8:36
  It looks like talking to friends and family.
• 8:38
  It looks like getting out into the Sun going to therapy.
• 8:42
  These are all things that we can do to Leave be comfortable and
• 8:47
  enticing nature of mental illness.
• 8:50
  Remember no matter how comfortable the sadness is, no
• 8:54
  matter how much it has become a part of your identity, you are
• 8:59
  able to find yourself without that you are able to ReDiscover
• 9:04
  a happy joyous and free version of yourself, and I believe that
• 9:10
  you can do it. I'm trying my best every single
• 9:13
  day and it is an To fight. And if you are at least trying
• 9:19
  that is more than enough, and I am so so proud of you that just
• 9:25
  about wraps up. Today's episode, thank you so
• 9:28
  much for tuning in. Thank you for your patience.
• 9:31
  As I haven't been posting and I'm really looking forward to
• 9:35
  consistently posting these episodes again on Saturdays at 5
• 9:41
  p.m. Eastern.
• 9:43
  So thank you so much. For tuning in, message me on my
• 9:47
  Instagram at Jewel, boy underscore and let me know what
• 9:50
  you think. And also go check out my music,
• 9:53
  Ethan Jewel on all platforms if you need to cry and feel
• 9:56
  something. So thank you so much for tuning
• 10:00
  in. And as always, thank you for
• 10:03
  feeling your feelings with me. I'll see you next time.