How do you define mental health?

“I think mental health is taking care of your mind.”

How do you define self-love?

“I think self-love is really just finding an appreciation for you who are and making sure you love who you are and are taking care of yourself. So, I think in a lot of ways it goes hand and hand with mental health. In order to have good mental health you have to be able to self-love and have love for who you are as a person.”

Is mental health an aspect of your life that you choose to focus on?

“I think as I have gotten older yeah. I have struggled throughout college kind of just adjusting to the college life and kind of looking back at how I was in high school I think I would have benefitted greatly from focusing on mental health. I wasn’t really confident, and I wasn’t really secure in who I was, and I really struggled. I don’t think I really gave credit to that, but now as I have met different people in my life and kind of just as I have learned from other people on the importance of taking care of yourself and really being in touch with how you feel upstairs as opposed to just your body. Like it matters how your head is and where your head is at and accepting that it’s okay to not be okay and learning and growing through your mental health and with mental health. Because there’s a lot of stuff especially with this year and everything we’ve all been going through like your mental health really takes a hit having to deal with so many different things. So yeah, I definitely have begun to focus on it. I saw a therapist for a while and that was really helpful and something I needed at the time just to kind of talk out loud to someone else.”

 Have you ever had struggles with your mental health? Do you feel comfortable sharing any of those struggles?

“Yeah! I really think in high school I kind of was ignorant to it, but I really think that if I would have talked with someone at the time I definitely would have been diagnosed with some sort of depression or behavioral disorder. I just wasn’t comfortable in my own skin. I think I had some anger stuff I needed to work through and yeah, I think I definitely had some struggles. And I think this past year I had some struggles during COVID, and the fall was really a tough time… So yeah, in terms of what I guess you would say is big mental struggles I don’t think I would fall under that category, but I definitely have had struggles with my mental health where I have not been good and I think a lot of it came from, going back to, self-love. In high school I just didn’t like who I was and even today I struggle with how I am, and ruminating thoughts are something that I have struggled with… I’m super self-conscious and that’s something I have struggled with for a long time…And I don’t really know how to work on that.”

What makes you most happy?

“I think people usually make me really happy. Interacting with people and having fun with people. Whether that’s going to dinners or hanging out or going to a party or just like human interactions make me happy…with my friends. I get uncomfortable with people I don’t know, but with friends and family…I love that stuff.”

What’s a moment in your life that you look back at with happiness?

“…Honestly, some parts in quarantine were really, really fun. My birthday was a really good day with my family…We had kind of been on each other’s nerves and my birthday was just so much fun. We all got along so well…it was just really fun and that’s just something I look back on with a lot of happiness…”

With sadness?

“I don’t know. There are a lot of moments that I look back with sadness. I think maybe it’s not just a specific moment, but anytime I’ve gotten in a fight with a family member, or I’ve said things that I didn’t mean to family members…Any of those conversations or fights I look back on with sadness because in the moment it seems so big and you say something you don’t mean, it’s hard to take that back or apologize for something like that…”

If you could tell your younger self one thing, what would it be?

“…In middle school and high school when I just really didn’t feel like I fit in and I was trying to be somebody I wasn’t, I would say just to be myself and that that’s enough and that’s okay and people will love you for who you are and if they don’t, then you’re surrounding yourself with wrong sorts of people…”

What is something you would change about yourself?

“Oh man. I don’t know it’s hard because I think there would be a few things I would like to change about myself, but I think that I get annoyed when I shouldn’t get annoyed…And I think some of that comes from judgment. So, I wish I wasn’t quick to judge, and I wish I didn’t allow that judgement to make me get annoyed with people or want to control people. I don’t particularly like that about myself…”

What’s your favorite thing about yourself?

“I think my favorite thing about myself is my heart because I think I do have a good one and I think I have one that cares about other people that I know and people that I don’t know. And I just want the world to be a good place, and I have a hard time when it’s not. And it makes me probably too emotional, but I think I generally have a good heart.”