I’m finding it hard to be excited about my life

Let me help Make It Make Sense xx

This advice column originally ran on Stuff.co.nz (along with a very cute video) so you should go there to watch that!

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“Luce, I’ve been really struggling with my mental health lately. I’m finding it hard to get out of bed, to see my friends, to be excited about the day. I know you’ve talked about your journey with depression before, do you have any advice?”

Dear Phoenix,

I know this question was hard to ask, but you’ve come to the right place, so first of all, I’m proud of you.

I’ve been exactly where you are, so many times. It’s like: why can’t I get out of bed? Why don’t I want to see my friends? Why am I planning my escape route from the party before I’ve even arrived?

Let me introduce you to a word that might just change your life: Phoenixing.

Phoenixing (verb): The phase that comes after everything burns down, and life as you know it feels like it’ll never be good again. It’s when you enter the most powerful flight of your life. The bad times are the ashes, and you are the bird.

Our brains are fickle things, and there’s no one size fits all approach to ‘getting better’. For some of us it takes antidepressants, for others it’s therapy, for some it’s time.

But one thing that I believe to be true for everyone, is that out the other side of your dark times, comes the most incredible period of your life. Phoenixing.

My co-author Bel introduced me to this word when we first met and she was nursing a life-shattering heartbreak. I was so taken by it that I asked if she’d write about it in our daily newsletter, and when she did it created a reverb in our community that I’d never quite seen before.

This word is now so ingrained in our lives (and dare I say, my own healing) that we have a whole chapter dedicated to it in Make It Make Sense.

This word, and the very idea that after something terrible, can come something umimaginably bright is my biggest relief in this world. It won’t always come at you as some huge revelation. It will just lay with you, tucked under the covers until you’re ready to notice it.

In the meantime, let me leave you with this poem that Bel wrote for our book, which I have since printed out and put on my wall:

Happy phoenixing,

Luce xxxx