Releasing the Notes

As I graduated high school, I had a set of friends that were a couple years older than I was. A few of them were in a band, and they were playing a show a couple of hours away from me. One of them, Robert, invited me to come up and go to their show, and then I could crash in their townhouse for the night. It sounded like a lot of fun, so I went.

The show was an odd line-up, with the band before them being a guy with a violin singing mostly children’s TV theme songs (Elmo’s World is the one I remember the most), and the band after them basing their whole sound around one band-member who played the didgeridoo (cool instrument, odd choice for a rock band). The band I went to see put on a really fun show, my favorite part was the pop-punk version of I Want It That Way by The Backstreet Boys.

They had great showmanship, where the other bands had mostly stood still and focused on sounding good, my friend’s band was all over the place, Skyler swinging the bass around, and creating an amazing atmosphere.

After the show I followed them back to their place, and it was a dream for 18-year-old me. The three band members were renting this townhouse, a full band set-up in the basement, around 10-12 guitars in the house, seemingly a couple in every room. We hung out and played music, then played Mortal Kombat on an old gaming system, and I don’t know that we ever really went to sleep. I remember telling my mom about the trip when I got home, and her first response was, “Their poor neighbors.”

At one point, I was talking to Skyler, the bass player for the band, and we were talking about how fun it is to play the bass. He loved playing because, only needing to play one string at a time, he had more freedom to do fun tricks during shows, like the bass throw he had done that night.

At that age, that was the best answer I could have heard. He played bass in a punk band, and the way he played and put on a show was perfect for that genre. The energy at the shows was a driving force for that kind of music, more a complicated bass line ever would have.

A few years later, my friend Andrew and I were talking about music, and we were talking more about the musicianship of different instruments. He did a lot of good for expanding my taste in music, and one of the gems he shared with me was a band called Vulfpeck. We had been talking about bass guitar, and he wanted me to listen to an amazing bassist named Joe Dart. When I watched the first YouTube video of them, I was expecting the high-energy player with bass throws and all the aspects of what I thought a good bass player was, but this bassist just bobs his head a lot.

What Andrew was showing me was how his bass playing was intricate and how it really drove the songs in the band. That is a major part of funk music, a talented bassist driving the music, and Vulfpeck does an amazing job of this. The first time I really caught what Andrew was showing me was in this video:

When I listened to it, the first thing I noticed is that the words weren’t the focus of the song. They were words, but they were really just the package to deliver a vocal melody to the song. The song really boils down to the bass, and then each part above that is layered on top. And the bass is sensational, but not in the way I was used to. The timing, the chord building, the contrast from staccato notes to a full sound later after the chorus – just beautiful.

When I played Vulfpeck for my students, it was generally hated. Partially because it wasn’t country music, and teaching in farming communities meant that most of the kids wanted Morgan Wallen or silence. Remember, they were just kids, they didn’t know any better.

But they also didn’t have the understanding of how remarkable the bass in the songs truly was.

A lot like us.

Not often do people focus on the bass the first time they listen to a song. It is there, you can hear it, but the singer is usually in the foreground. Their skill is often missed or overlooked. Their skill isn’t recognized by many, mostly just other bassists, the ones who know how much time and effort they put into those songs.

We all have things that we do, and that we work hard at, that are in the background and underappreciated by people who don’t know how much effort it takes.

This remix is a great example for me. There was a song about anxiety that got remixed by Ryan Mack and Christian Gate both wrote remixes which were mashed together into this song (language warning: Christian’s part has a couple of F-words):

The song was celebrated because Ryan Mack’s part explains anxiety fairly well and Christian Gate’s part is supportive. I like Ryan Mack’s part, though the original song by Royal and the Serpent does it best. And I was originally on board with Christian Gate’s part, because it was nice to see someone recognizing that other people struggle and wanting to help.

After a couple of listens, the opening line started to really ruffle my feathers, “So just don’t get overwhelmed.”

As someone who has anxiety, there is a lot of work that goes into not getting overwhelmed. I don’t know what it is like for people who don’t struggle with anxiety, but by the amount of times I have been told to just not be overwhelmed, or to just calm down, it seems like it is something that isn’t terribly difficult; just a couple deep breaths and it’s not an issue anymore. I am pretty sure I am incorrect, though. It can’t be that easy, right?

A large part of anxiety is imagining the worse, and then getting stuck on it. I remember an anxiety attack I had just watching my kids go biking down a hill. They are good at biking, and responsible, but my mind went to them crashing and breaking a bone, or not being able to stop in time and ending up being hit by a car, or the chain breaking and them losing control and not knowing how to handle it, so they would panic and turn the wheel and flip and get road rash, then fall in the road, then get hit by a car. And I was too far back to change anything.

None of that happened. They had fun, stopped at the crossroad, and we made it home in perfect condition. I had lived through so many imaginary traumatic events that I had to go lay down and be done for the day.

And that happens a lot more than I would like to admit.

Add ADHD on top of that (my mental state is a train-wreck, I know), and the problem compounds. With ADHD, I am never doing what I am supposed to be doing. It doesn’t matter what I am doing, there is something else I should be doing. And If I stop what I am doing and go do the thing I should be doing, I then remember something else I should be doing instead, and now I am still not doing what I should be doing.

Right now, I am sitting in the food court of a local store writing my blog, but I should be working on my book. And if I was working on my book, I would think about how I quit teaching to spend more time with my family, so I should be home with the kids. At home I would see all the repairs I need to make as we prepare to sell, and I should really be doing that. But in order to do that, I will have to spend money, and I really should be doing something that will bring in money. I could get a seasonal job, make a little bit for now. If I get a seasonal job, though, I won’t have the time to write, and if I don’t write then I might as well go back to teaching. I should write something that will bring in some money, maybe, so I should really be working on my blog.

And no matter which one I pick, it is the wrong one.

At the end of the day, I know I should be going to sleep, but if I go to sleep then I just have to wake up and fight that whole battle again, so I stay up and watch something on my phone. The light from my phone is bright, though, and I don’t want to keep my wife awake, so I should go out into the other room. If I fall asleep in the other room, my wife will think I am mad at her. And I will be woken up way too early by whoever wakes up first, then I will be grumpy all day, so I should stay in bed. I can’t fall asleep, though, because I am imagining all the terrible things that are going to happen soon, and I can lay here for hours just spiraling, so I should watch something on my phone to keep my mind off of it. If I am going to be awake, I should be doing something productive, like writing. If I write now, I can spend more time with the kids tomorrow. That will just get me wound up again, though, so maybe just playing a game on my phone will wear me out. But sleep is important, so I hear, so maybe I should get some sleep. Or read. I could clean up the house. Or go on a walk, but that would creep out my neighbors.

It is exhausting, really. All the while, my anxiety is giving me the worst-case scenario in each of these options- no one is reading my blog, and no one will read my book, or worse, they will hate it. No one will want to publish me. If I don’t get the house fixed up, and it won’t sell for enough to pay for our new house, or not at all. If I don’t get a job right now I will not be able to support my family, and I will have to give up on my writing dream anyways. I could just spend time with the kids, but then I will run out of money and not be able to support them.

My anxiety tells me I can’t do anything right, my ADHD provides the proof, and they both invite my depression to the party and I get into a low mood.

I am a pretty low-energy person, and it’s not because I am lazy (probably). It is because I am using so much of my energy to fight this unseen battle on a daily basis. I don’t have a lot of energy left over afterwards.

So when people say to just not get overwhelmed, or to just breathe, it looks a lot different for me than it does for them.

I have found that there are essentially four different reactions people have when they get a good glimpse of my inner struggles:

1 – They step back. I don’t blame them, I can be a lot to handle. And, honestly, I have plenty of times I wish I could step back from myself as well. I have been pretty open about the only way I have figured out to do that. It isn’t an option.

2 – They downplay it. This one can actually look differently from different people. There are the ones like Christian Gates, the “just calm down” people. As I mentioned, I wish I could. It doesn’t work like that for me.

The other way that this one shows up is when some well-meaning people try to relate. I was once having an anxiety attack and a kind soul let me know they were also feeling anxious, and they understood. They related what I was feeling to what they were feeling when they were in traffic and late to something (work, a movie, I don’t remember), and they started feeling really anxious. This is a normal response to traffic. Being late due to traffic is a logical response. My anxiety instead shows me the semi three cars in front of us catching a gust of wind, causing the trailer to jerk into another lane. The driver then over corrects and jackknives his truck, causing the rogue trailer to tip over and cause a 16 car pile-up. That is not the logical response to traffic. That is an issue. That is what anxiety is like.

3 – They dive in head first. These people don’t understand anxiety, but they want to. They read books and articles, and they will send me all of the hacks. I get meditation videos, breathing exercises, and herbal remedies. I love these people. They are showing love, trying so hard to understand. I will try out the tricks they send me, and we can talk about it. They will be there if I ask, and they are trying so hard. It is a beautiful reaction, but it can get to be a little much.

At some point I quit being a person and I became a problem to be solved, or a puzzle that just needs a piece or two to be found so the rest of me can fall into place. Our interactions become a report on how well I am doing all of the assignments they give me. I will explain that I had a hard time getting out of bed, so I didn’t take that brisk walk today. Or I will say the breathing exercises are going great, because if I let them know that when I tried them out I felt a pain in my chest or noticed my heart rate was high, and then I was convinced it was a heart-attack they will add that to the search terms in order to find the latest google-approved trick.

I admire their efforts to help, but sometimes all of their efforts to fix my overwhelm can get… overwhelming.

If this sounds too familiar for you, and you want to learn about anxiety and depression, this is a good book. It is still in my TBR (to be read) pile, but it is highly recommended by health care professionals, so I would give it a shot:

4 – They understand. These people break my heart, I wish they didn’t understand, because I wish they didn’t have to go through it. These people are an invaluable resource, though. They are the people that I can share anything with, and they will just listen. They may throw out a coping mechanism that has worked for them, but they won’t push it because they understand that everyone experiences it differently. They will ask how I am doing, and they want a real answer, not the standard “doing great”, or “best day of my life”. They don’t let me get away with those answers, because that helps nobody.

In high school I had a friend like this. He would come over to my house, and sometimes we would watch TV in silence for a couple hours, then he would just go home. He was fine with that, there was no expectation that he had to be entertained or we needed to do something. He was just there for me.

I once went with him to California, and the drive was the most refreshing nine-hour drive I have ever taken. We spent a stretch of hours just sitting. Then there would be a space of time that we would sing our hearts out to the music, or laugh about anything that we said. The relationship we had held no room for judgement, and no need for forced conversation.

He and I have since grown apart, and are at different places in our lives. I haven’t talked to him in years. But I love that guy. He was exactly who I needed, and I hope I helped him out in some way as well.

Some people don’t hear the bass line in the song, or recognize the skill it took to sound that smooth. Some people don’t understand the effort it takes to hold anxiety at bay. But those that do see that work, and they see the talent shown in playing it that way.

If you love somebody with anxiety, thank you. Thank you for seeing past the struggles and into the actual person they are.

Often we think we should love people the way we want to be loved. I would suggest a small change to that, though. Instead, we should love people they way they want to be loved.

And we should be willing to ask for that kind of love for ourselves.

You deserve it.