I was in a similar spot a long time ago. Even though in such a situation it's incredibly hard to see it from outside your black bubble of depression, from your family's and friends' POV, it really does help to try.
This line from Uncle John's Band by Grateful Dead is really simple and maybe kinda cheesy but it's given me motivation and kept me in check a few times:
Well the first days are the hardest days, don't you worry anymore. 'Cause when life looks like easy street there is danger at your door
Paul Simon has so many hard-hitting lyrics across his entire catalog. I'm sure I could find something from just about any album, but for me, what comes instantly to mind is this line from "The Cool, Cool River": "And sometimes, even music/ Cannot substitute for tears".
“Daddy grips the wheel and stares alone into the distance
He knows that something somewhere has to break
He sees the family home now looming in his headlights
The pain upstairs that makes his eyeballs ache”
Makes me think of someone who's so empathetic that their heart is just always overflowing with thoughts of other people's misery. It hasn't gotten better.
I feel this whole song so fucking hard. But this line specifically because I form codependent relationships with people like crazy, and I always feel like a fuckin' burden/like my friends or husband don't truly like me. Like I'm stressing people out or putting too much pressure on them, so I'm not worth the effort of maintaining a relationship with.
Seen the stars last night
We're only vehicles for life
So should your mind begin to shine
Say, "Hey, alright", say, "I got mine"
TV on the Radio - Lazerray
I like to imagine this song being a fever dream of the band, them writing it down and recording it on the same evening. It’s a psychedelic banger with this cute message right at the end.
Oh god so many I could ruin this post. Music is my most important processing art, and many of the musicians I listen to are very important to me. So I'll limit myself:
"We took a weekend, drove to Provo.
The snow was white and fluffy.
A weekend in Utah won't fix what's wrong with us
The grey sky was vast and real cryptic above me."
The Mountain Goats ~ The Mess Inside.
Because the work to get better and overcome truama isn't easy or short. I've done a lot of wonderful things with my wife, and we've both come incredibly far from our truamas. But most of the nice things we've done had very little impact on that recovery. To paraphrase a Ray Ramano bit from SNL, you're still gonna be you in Italy.
"I don't fall in love, I plummet." ~Ashley Virginia ~I Don't Fall in Love
"You can't stay everywhere you leave a piece of your heart." ~Little Mazarn ~Vermont
These two go together. I fall in love--with people, places, things, experiences--with abandon. I can be slow to let things in, especially people, because once I do it is quickly a no holds barred environment. It's what the Uhaul key on my necklace means. Because of that, I can't stay everywhere or keep everyone I love. I have to know when and what to let go, when and where to hold on.
Finally I guess I'm gonna wholly belie all notions of brevity with a whole god damn Diane Cluck song:
"Somethin' loosened around my heart
From where it was bound, it fluttered around
This funny motion first mistaken as attack
I realize and step back
With real eyes, I step back
And let it happen
Knitted so snug inside my chest
Iron lungs, ribs as rungs
Those who care to try and climb me
Sometimes say it's hard to find me
Still, in reflex, I would shout
When I began spilling out
Weeping clearly as a blister
"Hey, I'm here, " you almost missed her
And I have so much for you (Na-na-na-na-na-na)
Do you know how I get shy to show you?
I fill up, tender, with a glow (Na-na-na-na-na-na)
Fluff and puff as I try to show you
Display my falling feathers
As they leave me in this weather
The days, they go so quickly
Can't even stop them
Don't even want to"
Diane Cluck ~Heartloose
I usually have to listen to this song twice. It's so short, but so dense. Every bit of it shakes me. I don't have time to enumerate the ways this song applies, appeals, affects, and relates to me. Diane Cluck is so important to me.
Gimme that canvas, let me paint some shit/
Pass me some poison, let me take a hit/
I'm just embarrassed and comfortably numb/
But failure is painful and lying is fun
Dress code, cocktails, looking so fancy/
We feel like we're a little bit classy/
Cheers to the fact that we're not dead/
Swimming with the sharks, but we're still not dead yet
Psycho I go right to buy those/
Optimistic magic fix it pills/
I'm so right though, that's my life, bro/
Underwater, coughing with my gills
Don't let this moment go to waste/
You don't know when the feeling could happen again/
Don't let this moment go to waste/
You don't know when the feeling could happen again
Touch me, taste me, tell me I'm not fading/
Tell me that I look just like a man/
'Cause lately, baby, I've been going crazy/
Trying not to be an embarrassment
Hadn't heard it before no, but it's not my favourite of covers I've heard. The original song itself is very nostalgic for me with childhood memory attached so I love it as is. Only as an adult did I find any real meaning in the lyrics though. Can easily be palmed off as a shallow pop song I guess, but it has depth to me.
"The world made me feel like I lost myself, my own homies tellin me that I need help, if you got a solution for me you probly HOLLA AT YA BOY IF YA KNOW SOMEBODY" Hopsin
I'm on a hovercraft to Paris with my former best friend. We have to get to the cinematheque. We're not alone, but no one speaks english so we're free to look into each other's minds and see what we're thinking like we always used to. I miss talking to you.