In the United States, work has become the centerpiece around which our lives revolve. Without strong family or social support policies, it is difficult pay for necessities like childcare or healthcare without spending an incredible amount of time working. Whether it is paid or not, we have allowed labor to consume our lives, rarely allowing ourselves to unplug and experience life free from the stresses of modern society. In an article for The Atlantic published in March 2021, Jerry Useem made a case to bring back the “nervous breakdown” from the early 20th century. And I quite agree.
I know what you’re thinking: “isn’t that a bad thing?” Well, yeah, probably. Most people do tend to avoid having nervous breakdowns. However, in the early 1900s claiming a nervous breakdown was a socially acceptable means to take yourself out of everyday life and work on reclaiming your mind from the torments of modernity. It placed responsibility for your distress on the outside world, not on personal actions of the individual, which insulated the nervous breakdown from the stigma it has today.
Useem’s article provides an account from a Dr. George Miller Beard in 1901 who believed the nervous breakdown was a disease of the civilized world. Humans, he claimed, “had a set amount of nervous force” which was used up as we participated in modern life. Exhausting this force led to an “epidemic of nervous disease” caused by the acceleration of society that resulted from the rise of technology and the news media.
If the increased use in technology in 1901 caused nervous disease to terrorize society, we are certainly at risk in the highly content-centered reality we experience now. We are burnt out, and it isn’t our fault. The society we live in has placed productivity and progress above all other metrics, and it is unsustainable. Bringing back the possibility of checking out of society for a bit to focus on our mental health would provide comfort to countless Americans.
If you had the possibility tomorrow to declare a nervous breakdown and step away from society, would you?
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I wrote that in Spring 2022, my last semester of grad school. Since then, I have applied to more than 50 jobs, moved to a new city, and started a new life. I am unemployed, living in my best friend’s spare bedroom. I didn’t know that in five months I would, in fact, step away from everything and recallibrate. At first I was embarrassed: I felt like a failure. Why does no one want to hire me? I am too old to be doing nothing, this will ruin my career. Spiral, spiral, spiral…
But then I altered my brain chemistry, and I thought of that paper.
I have been so frustrated for so long feeling forced into making life-altering decisions. Going to college to get away from an abusive ex, no thought for what comes afterward. It would figure itself out eventually, I thought. And it kinda did. Can’t find a job after undergrad? AmeriCorps. Can’t find a job after that AND add a lil global pandemic into the mix? Grad school. I have never felt control over the course of my life; drifting from one thing to another without intentionality. Following the motions. Doing what I was told.
But that has stopped working, and I need to learn to live my life intentionally. So, instead of going to law school (which, honest to god, is what I’d prefer) I am taking my nervous breakdown now. My darling friend has given me the opportunity to rediscover who I am without homework or deadlines or bills to pay. I have been living here for a little over a month now, and I feel like a new person. I have been reading books again, taking walks, journaling, doing all the things I could never force myself to do after a long day of work and school. I am reconnecting with things which bring me joy and creating a life for myself that isn’t based on other people’s expectations.
I am taking inventory of my life and doing a massive rebrand. Here are a few things I have changed since I have snapped out of it that may help you, too:
1. Stop talking shit about yourself. I always scoffed at people who said self-talk is important, but, like, it really is.
2. Ask yourself why you do the things you do. You may find there are things you do, that you don’t enjoy, that you can choose not to do.
3. Doing the bare minimum is always sufficient.
4. This is the most important: There are literally no rules for how to live your life. Yeah there are laws and things, but the way you live your life within your home is up to you. You can adjust things to work for you. Taking care of myself has always felt like such a chore because I didn’t understand I could fulfill my needs however I wanted to. I don’t need to wash my face in the sink every night before bed, I can just keep a bottle of toner by my bed and do it laying down. I don’t have to fold laundry, just sort that shit into some bins and call it a day. Functionality is better than perfection, its just evolving to what you’re given, babe.
I am absolutely not a life coach, but I have felt really alone for most of my life feeling like I am the only one who doesn’t have a plan. I know that isn’t true, most of the people I know are doing going through the motions like I have been. I know I have been given a rare opportunity to take time for me, and I will continue to let you know what I learn in case it can help you too.
Bring Back the Nervous Breakdown, Jerry Useem. Published in the March 2021 issue of The Atlantic: https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2021/03/bring-back-the-nervous-breakdown/617788/