On Tomorrow’s Conversations
When I was growing up, feelings weren’t something you talked about at the dinner table, or with your friends, and certainly not in the classroom. I had many daydreams in class, and many of them had an angry voice cutting them short- the voice interrupting the introspection that’s necessary for life, the ideas shafted in exchange for the curriculum that had no place for them.
What I really learnt, during those many classes and interrupted daydreams, were that feelings weren’t something that you brought up. Not in public, at least, but only in hushed conversations in doctors’ offices, and there, they were serious, solemn conversations.
We never did get round to talking about feelings in class, but I did see my first therapist when I was 12, following an “outburst” from an incident in school. I did think at the time that the outburst was my fault, but many years after, I know that it was a very natural reaction to my world- the frustrations of being misunderstood, by teachers, and also, the emptiness of not having the conversations I wanted to have.
It took a long time for me to put a name to those empty feelings, and in many ways, I’m still waiting for that conversation.
Certainly now, in this changing world, much has been written about the need to talk about mental health. The other question is this: what do we talk about once that conversation starts?
Part of that conversation is talking about how to navigate a shifting world in the time of a pandemic. We have to cope with the grief of our pre-pandemic world, and part of that coping is the solidarity that Social Media can offer, a feeling that someone, other than me, was having trouble.
I have wondered often if the children of the generation after me will have parents that talk openly about their mental health – if mindfulness programs will be commonplace in school alongside art crafts and PE.
This is the future I dream about, in my time of solitude with the freedom of no teacher yelling at me. And here’s to the hope that it continues.
