A note to our listeners, this episode contains discussion of suicidal ideation.

Something that is important to know about mental health, about mental illness, about the

whole swirling swamp that our minds sometimes are, is that as long as we're alive, it's all

happening in the present tense. It's a now thing.

I mean, sure, you can talk about what has happened in the past. In fact, you should. It's important

to know what has happened to you, the environment you were raised in, the influence of the people

around you, the traumas and triumphs and big events that formed who you were. But here's the

thing. I think sometimes a person's mental health story is misunderstood as something that

has happened to them before, and now they're fine, now they're unaffected. But it isn't really

like that. It's like William Faulkner said, the past is not dead,

it's not even past. If you had trauma, that's still with you, having shaped you, and still

shaping you. The body keeps the score, as they say. If you've dealt with, say, a major

depressive disorder, then you're still probably managing that condition in the present moment.

Even if you feel great, it's still something to contend with.

Mental health is present tense.

You're not over it.

You're perhaps going through it.

Let's watch our prepositions.

Prepositions are important.

Similarly, talking about the future is great. What your mind will be like, what your approach to yourself will be, what you

want it to be, what you're going to need to address. That is fantastic. But the future isn't

lived yet. You're speculating, predicting, sometimes guessing from right here in the present based on who you are now.

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