World Suicide Prevention Day (WSPD) is organized by the International Association for Suicide Prevention (IASP), designating that september 10th was a day for focusing attention on the problem world-wide.
The month of September is known for the abundance of campaigns that help disseminate how important it is to have a support network while fighting disorders like anxiety and depression. For the sake of knowing that it is so common, especially with young people living in a world full of information and stress, having an everyday battle inside their mind that no one knows about.
When a person decides to end their life, their thoughts, feelings and actions become very restrictive; they constantly think about suicide and are unable to visualize other ways of facing or getting out of the problem. These people think rigidly due to the distortion that emotional suffering imposes. Getting informed to learn and help others is the best way to fight the problem. But we are only able to do that, once we are too, on the path of recognizing how we can treat ourselves better: that’s the healing journey.
Healing is not a one-time event, but a journey of self-discovery, growth and transformation. Beginning a healing journey takes a lot of courage, but it can lead to a beautiful progress full of small steps towards feeling yourself again.
As it was said, having a supportive group definitely helps us heal our internal wounds, such as sharing our story and listening or reading to other´s stories that we can relate our feelings to and feel seen.
In an interview with the streamer and youtuber Melissa Vieira (@melizzex), who experienced some ups and downs with mental health, especially when finding the right path and things she genuinely enjoys doing, she then became extremely interested and invested in learning more about the topic for her own benefit and others. We talked about the life-long process of healing, and how it is important to know ourselves deeply enough to share our view and story. Melissa told me that as she began her healing journey, she acknowledged how our bodies and minds are connected, and developed more habits of self-care into her routine, such as long walks, eating better and consuming more books with this type of content, like her last reading: “The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual EnlightenmentÂ
Vieira described her teenage years as a struggle with finding a real group of people that made her feel seen and valued in her full authenticity. And now, at 29 years old, she began to understand herself more each day and set boundaries, becoming more selective with the people that she hangs out with, leading to a life in a safer environment for discussing and releasing her feelings with no judgment.
The selection of good friends is deeply aligned with the sense of continuously asking yourself who you are, with whom do you wanna spend your time and what actions resonate with the person you are becoming. This can lead one to find similar stories and relatable feelings, while also discovering new forms of progress in their journey.
When we know ourselves, and share our story with people that truly understand us, we expand our minds and create such compassion, that we never would enter an unwanted harmful situation.
Melissa Vieira
We also talked about the importance of therapy, and how it can help to become more sincere about our feelings. Frequently joining a safe place with the purpose of understanding our patterns and actions can make a huge difference in our healing, while also improving our sense of affection and responsibility in any type of relationship.Â
As the interview came to an end, Melissa said some valuable thingsabout how the healing journey itself is a long process of finding authenticity and conquering the capacity of turning things you truly love doing into habits and rituals present in everyday life. We talked about the importance of a balanced social life with the enjoyment of solitude, and how we can continue to promote healthy mind and body habits and awareness for the new generation:
My purpose is to find myself, and there’s still so much I know I can do for myself. If I continue my journey and truly take care of myself, I can see a bloom in my full authenticity. And we have to go deeper in this topic, share our stories, listen to others and be curious about it, especially in a time when it’s so easy to fall into the fast technologies and fake social connections attributed to the system.
Melissa Vieira
Sharing your story is a necessary part of your healing journey, and promoting healthy supportive conversations about feelings and thoughts can help the mental health improvement of many people that struggle with telling how they really feel.Â
Once we continuously take care of ourselves, we continuously notice the need of checking on our loved ones, or helping everyone, openly, as a team, while spreading the message: you are not alone, and if you need help, please ask for it here.Â
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The article above was edited by Fernanda Miki Tsukase.
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