The song “Landslide” by Oh Wonder begins: “I know it hurts sometimes, but you’ll get over it. You’ll find another life to live. I know you’ll get over it.”
Though I loved Oh Wonder from the moment I first heard their songs during my junior year of high school, I never loved “Landslide.” Its lyrics felt too cliche, too easy. The idea of abandoning the hurt I felt—and, I assumed, the self I had built in response to that hurt—seemed too simple. I had been an introverted, sad child for as long as I could remember, and though the ways that my sadness manifested had changed countless times, the fact that it was manifesting never did. It became something I wove into my personality traits: sassy, resilient, clever, sad. Sometimes I offset how serious of a charge this was by calling it “sensitive” or saying that I simply “thought too much and too deeply,” but no matter what I called it, it was an integral part of me; it was me.
Oh Wonder’s advice seemed to imply that I should treat the hurt as an enemy, something to “get over,” and to me, this sounded like self-loathing: wow, look what a miserable and terrible person I am now! Thank goodness I’m headed towards a better life. I didn’t want to see myself as miserable and terrible, and so I clung to the hurt and sadness, ironically, because I loved myself. The logic was: if I like who I am, and this “sensitivity” is a fundamental part of me, then it must be good. And, if it’s a fundamental part, it might not even matter if it’s good or bad—it’s an unchangeable part of me here permanently, regardless of how beneficial it is.
Most days, I could convince myself that I needed the sadness. I bought into the myth that if I were to focus on recovery—if I were to see a therapist, or take meds, or restructure my life—I would also lose the parts of myself that made me smart, funny, me. I imagined post-recovery as a shell of a life: no depressive lows, but also no emotional highs, a complete and vast emptiness. I didn’t know who I would be without the sadness; I had never seen myself without it. Unlike what the “re” in recovery suggests, I wasn’t going back to anything. I would have to carve an entire life anew, with constant effort, and that life might not share the elements that I actually did like about my current life. Or, perhaps worse, I would have to “find another life to live,” completely abandoning any relics of the past.
I knew I didn’t want to be sad forever. As much as I tried desperately to convince myself that the sadness was a necessary compromise that allowed me to hold onto other, more positive traits, this argument never overshadowed the nights I spent awake in bed, unable to sleep, sobbing. In those moments, I would’ve given anything and everything to recover. I held onto the option of recovery as an escape hatch. But why I never sought it with more effort was that it didn’t seem like it had an escape hatch—what would happen if I did recover, then discovered that I liked my old, sad self better?
What I really hated about “Landslide” was the finality with which Oh Wonder sang. “Landslide” isn’t a song about how one can reach recovery with diligence and willingness. It’s concrete and all-knowing: you will get over it, whether or not you want to, whether or not you like it. More even than feeling better, I wanted to feel like I had a choice, especially as a preteen living in a world with limited choices. Clinging to my sadness was a way of asserting my own power: if I am choosing the worst possible option for myself, then everything that happens, as a result, is because of me. I cannot lose anything; the universe cannot mess with my life without my consent; I know exactly what is coming, and I am embracing it. Recovery didn’t share that same empowerment.
In the past few weeks, “Landslide” has been stuck on near-constant repeat in my mind. Instead of avoiding it like I used to, I’ve been embracing it. It plays in the background as I do homework in Olin, grab a tea in Peirce, walk down Middle Path, and read through old entries in my diary, wondering when exactly things changed. I find myself humming it as I apply makeup in the morning, singing it distractedly as I struggle to focus on class readings. When I’m caught in a landslide, it’s there. When the rain gives me sunshine, it’s there. Every time that I’m feeling lonely, and every time that I’m feeling low, I hear it, and I look around at this new life I have, and I feel immensely grateful.
I dance to “Landslide.” I’ll admit it. I dance to it not only in my room but walking to class. My Middle Path music sins comprise a lengthy list: snapping my fingers, turning up the volume so loudly sometimes I swear others can hear it, bouncing my heels, moving my arms in what only loosely resembles a dance move, opening my arms to the sky, even mouthing lyrics. I’ve caught people I don’t know staring at me and my bad dancing. People I don’t know have caught me talking to myself. I’ve gotten more than my fair share of quizzical looks and definite judgment. By almost all objective measures, I’m embarrassing beyond redemption.
And yet, I’m not embarrassed. The fact that I feel comfortable enough to dance on Kenyon’s sidewalks, to smile widely and genuinely mean it, is progress. Though I resisted the idea of recovery, I am recovering. I saw a therapist. I went to the Counseling Center. I stopped saying “I am sad” and started saying “I feel sad.” I chose opportunities that made me feel happy, loved, and seen: that gave me something to lose. I discovered that I didn’t have to fear disliking myself beyond recovery. I discovered that I actually did like dancing.
When I listen to “Landslide,” I revel in how wrong I was. I am better, beyond what my angsty sixteen-year-old self could have imagined. Sure, “Landslide” is still a bit too simplistic—I’d be lying if I said it doesn’t still hurt sometimes—but I did find another life to live. I found a life full of dancing in public, a life full of feeling grateful for the people I know, a life full of not viewing the “Landslide” lyrics as purely cliche. If they’re cliche at all, they’re cliche in the best way possible: because they’re meaningful, because they’re true.
Oh Wonder was right when they called hope “heavy.” At times, the weight of recovery was more than the weight of what I was recovering from. Learning to let go of sadness, and to embrace something entirely new, was terrifying. But not doing so, and continuing to stay locked in hurt, would’ve been so much more terrifying. Hope was, and is, necessary. Recovery was, and is, necessary. Now, looking backward at how far I’ve come, looking forward at how much life I still have yet to live, I’m filled with gratitude, and I’m filled with wonder.
Image Credits: Feature, Author’s 2014-2015 Personal Diary