Tonight, I was talking to a friend of mine who has been having some struggles with depression lately. Now, most of you who know me are probably saying “uh oh!” hahaha. I suffered with depression every minute of my teenage life. I was diagnosed as Bipolar Disorder/Manic Depression and Generalized Anxiety Disorder (which turned into Panic Disorder just a little less than a year ago) at a very young age. This was something that, in time, I learned to celebrate. I know, that sounds weird, right? Well…it is a part of who I am and everything that has made me who I am is worth celebrating. Not just the good stuff, but the bad stuff too because those things taught me some extremely important lessons.
I know how hard depression can be. Chemical or situational..its very rough. I have grown much bigger than my Bipolar Disorder. This in no way means that I do not feel depressed anymore, or that I do not ever feel manic anymore. It just means that I have learned to identify my symptoms and work through them. Not everyone is this lucky.
Now, with all of that said..I do not EVER party with the pity partyers. I do not sugar coat things for them, I do not give in to their pity partying. I dont party with ‘em. I am not going to oblige them. Theres no reason to. That isnt help. They dont need someone to say “ohhh oh my gosh, I am like, sooo sorry, you poor baby.” That shit doesnt help. It makes them worse, it makes them wanna cry some more. They need a fat hit of reality, even if it sounds completely rude. It doesnt mean I dont care, it doesnt mean they cant cry on my shoulder. It just means im NOT GONNA LIE. Reality doesnt lie.
So, onto the point of my story. I was conversing with a friend of mine who has had some problems with depression recently. I think that he is also dealing with quite a bit of self pity. I was just suggesting things that could possibly make him feel better and it hit me..MASSAGE! Its called massage THERAPY for a reason. I told him “You need to go get a massage! It will make you feel soooooo much better. The power of human touch is A-MAZING!”
His response was:
heh thers only one person ill let touch me and that a significate other lmao (sic)
My response to this was “Wow. Thats really fucking stupid. No offense.” Lmfao. Dont you love it when someone says something completely offensive and then says “no offense” at the end? I am guilty as charged on that one, over, and over, and over again. Yeah, anyway…I said “Dont ever underestimate the power of human touch. Its extremely powerful. Immensely powerful. There is NO need to sexualize human contact. Human contact is essential to our mental and physical health.”
So he said”
lol i guess you can see it that way but growing up without affection, if a female puts her hand on me my heart will flutter and if a guy does he must want to get hit (sic)
My response was “Guess what? Thats part of being human.” He told me that touch is a very personal thing to him. Well, touch is a personal thing to everyone, as it should be, because it is very powerful, however, just because something is personal or even sacred…that doesnt mean that it should be reserved and hidden. Not to mention that one would think that if someone is depressed and has stated verbally that they hate the way they feel and they want to feel differently…they would be willing to try just about anything. I supplied him with a few links about the power of human touch.
He says:
well ill just keep having logic failures and wait to be touched untill i find someon (sic)
well i grew up without a father, my mom maybe hugged me twice, and my bother and sister were much younger than me, and we moved all the time. what does this have to do with anything. maybe having touch from anyone other than who i want it from feels rather alien like a guinnee pig running up your pants(sic)
Now, here is where I will discontinue the conversation between my friend and I and get into my rant. There is no reason why being touched by someone should feel alien. Now, I realize that there could be trauma in many peoples lives that changes the way they feel about being touched and this is not what im talking about. That is a whole different situation that you wont find me discussing here.
In our “advanced” Western society, it feels alien to us to be touched by another human being that is not someone we are fucking. This simply is not the way things should be. We have forgotten about one another. We have forgotten how important it is to just hug each other once in a while. In a society that is so technologically advanced, we have abandoned ourselves spiritually. We have been left to fend for ourselves alone in this world, without the aid of our brothers and sisters because we have sexualized the human body and human touch so much that it has become taboo to embrace someone when they desperately need it. If two men hug, they are “gay” (as if being gay is some horribly negative thing). If two women hug, all the sudden they are lesbians who were only put upon this Earth as sexual objects of perverted 40+ year old mens desire. Its absolutely devastating that we have been so thoroughly brainwashed into abandoning each other. There are societies that have existed upon this earth for centuries that have entire medicinal arts based solely upon touch and the energy that is passed between two humans when they touch. There are martial arts based completely on the energy that flows throughout everything in our universe, including our own bodies.
The benefits of human touch are not only hailed in “alternative” Eastern medicinal practices, but in our own Western medicine as well.
I hate that our society has put such sexualized stigmas and taboos on touching each other. The positive energy passed between two human beings when they exchange touch is so powerful, it is love and I think that it is painfully obvious that our world needs as much love as possible right now. Hug someone today. Hug someone that you normally would not hug, I can PROMISE you that it will not only make your day, but it will make theirs too!
If you guys would like to learn more about how essential touch is, check out the following links:
Pleasure/Power
WebMB Power of human touch.
Reiki using human touch
^_^
I am Leslie. 