In one of my classes we are learning about stress and its effects on our lives and my professor showed us this music video.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sA8PaIw5gcE

While we were watching this I was thinking about what to write for my article this week and I had just signed into the odyssey and was going to start writing and then I as I was thinking of a topic I heard the words to this song and they reminded me of a time when I felt like I was drowning and didn't know how to swim. There are times that it can feel like it's you against the world, even though that's not true it doesn't change the fact that that's what it can feel like. It's at times like these that it's helpful to know how to keep your head above water even when it feels like the world wants you to drown.

The lyrics "I found a tidal wave/begging to tear the door down/memories like bullets/they fired at me from a gun/cracking me open now/I swim to brighter days/despite the absence of sun/choking on salt water/I'm not giving in/ you gotta swim." really hit home for me because I realized that memories sometimes are something that we don't have all that much control over. Sometimes memories can come back to you and they are not always memories that bring happy thoughts. There are memories that come back that can often bring up bad thoughts and if we allow them to they can take you back to that bad place that you were in when the memories were actually happening to us, and once again it can feel like life is coming at you in tidal waves and you're not prepared and you're choking on the salt water that's coming at you. But you have to realize that you can't give up. When the tidal waves are slamming at you, if you stand there and don't do anything to fight back against them, yeah you're going to start to drown. You've had to fight back, you have to do everything in your power to try to stay floating, you have to learn how to swim. Sometimes you can't do those things alone, you sometimes you have to ask for help. When you get help things do not instantly become easier, it is still a fight to keep floating, but the fight becomes that much easier when you realize that there are people on your side and you are not in this alone.

You shouldn't let the bad emotions win, You should fight back and fight to keep your head above the water. You are never alone in your battle if you reach out you will find a whole world of people who are there to support you and want to support you and be there for you.