It started during lockdown. My downtime gave me plenty of time to ruminate on my lifestyle, relationships and behaviour and thought patterns up until the pandemic. Which was good, because I had a lot of things to think about in these regards, things that might otherwise have been swept under the rug of day to day life excuses and interpersonal drama that had been accumulating for -well- my whole adult life. Once these distractions were depleted the rug was lifted to reveal a pile of mental crap that I’d hoarded around and masked as ‘just being myself’ or ‘it could be worse’, or ‘but look at me, I turned out just fine’.
The unshocking truth is: that was a bunch of BS.
Mangoes and Mental Health: a Memoir
Faced with this realization I decided that now was as best a time as ever to begin picking at the pile. But to cope, I didn’t log onto a Zoom call with my (very real) (okay, non-existent) therapist, I rang my besties on WhatsApp video chat for the only therapy a 20-something year old in the middle of a pandemic could afford.
"I felt like the onslaught of memes weren’t making my mental health better, or encouraging me to work on myself."
And so began an in-depth, achingly vulnerable, blisteringly honest and sometimes sadistically sarcastic and humorous back and forth analysis on our life journeys thus far. The chats were supplemented with a constant exchange of motivational, comforting, nihilistic, #relatable and life-changing but temporary (and ultimately non life-changing) Instagram mental health memes.
You know the type: self help quotes, Twitter screenshotted advice, iPhone note wisdom, beautifully curated anxiety checklists, depression porn, numbered slides on your love interest’s narcissistic traits, pretty cursive reminders to release the tension in your jaw and shoulders, Arial-font captioned images telling you to let that MANGO…
But did these viral self-help slides that we shared, found comfort in, laughed despite ourselves at and used as evidence for each other to leave that toxic relationship pattern behind really help - or were they more harmful than anything else?
Self-Help Side Effects
Personally after a while I began to feel they were less inspiring, comforting, funny or helpful as they were depressing, unfactual, dark and enabling.
"Are you nice or just scared of abandonment? It’s all rather… Anxiety-inducing."
I felt like the onslaught of memes weren’t making my mental health better, or encouraging me to constructively work on myself. Like thanks, now I'm acutely aware of how my anxiety and trauma manifest physically and in my current relationships - WHAT TF NOW?
They were confirming what I already knew in an endless cycle of the same thing said in a different way, and quite frankly driving me mad with overthinking and self-diagnosing myself and the people around me.
The flip side of the coin (and there always is one, when a lack of balance is present) is that the self-help culture of social media has bred it’s own unhealthy side effects such as:
Self diagnosis: Okay so now you know you have anxiety thanks to that infographic. WTF now @everyonehasanxietyincludingyou ??
Diagnosing others: Spending 3 hours a day on @yourexisanarcassist doesn’t make you a therapist nor does it make your ex a textbook narcissist.
Depression: ‘Haha’ quickly turns to ‘help’ when your IRL struggles become the subject of seemingly humorous and relatable content, when they are in fact a daily battle that isn’t funny at all.
Anxiety: Is your friendship circle toxic or is your mate just going through something? Was your childhood more traumatic than you originally thought? Does your lethargy actually signal anxiety? Are you nice or just scared of abandonment? It’s all rather… Anxiety-inducing.
Thanks for the Mem(ori)es
But I’m not bashing self-help social media culture, I think it’s great occasionally, and lord knows I’m grateful for the laughs and insights it provided on those dark nights in the midst of lockdown winter.
The thing is, in themselves, self help memes can supplement your recovery and coping mechanisms for mental health issues, they can provide much needed humour in dark situations and they can spark conversations about things you hadn’t acknowledged. They can remind you to prioritize your self-care, to be kind, to be accepting and indeed, why you definitely made the right decision to let that MANGO (plus more). But they are not enough by themselves, or a replacement for actual self work.
For that, you’ll have to log off first.
Feature image: Zoya Pon