Jekyll or Hyde?
I am not a role model. I am living meme, relatable but only in a tragically funny way. I talk a big game, put on a face full of make-up and carry multi-coloured binders everywhere but don’t let me fool you. It is simply an illusion, a façade, a magic trick if you will. This is the Becca that the world gets to see, the one with the colourful hats and eccentric shoes. When she opens the front door to her flat, sprawls out onto the sofa, her true nature is set free. In other words, the Hyde to my Dr Jekyll.
I get why Dr Jekyll would hide his inherently evil alter-ego: he wasn’t a very nice guy after all. That being said, the worst thing that my alter ego does is dance embarrassingly in the union and unapologetically eat a full tear-and-share packet of cinnamon buns. So, considering that my alter-ego- the slob, the impulsive buyer and awkward dancer in me- is neither violent, cruel or murderous- why do I feel the need to hide her from the rest of the world? We all have a Mr Hyde, right? If you will indulge me, I have a theory. Mr Hyde is our purest form, he is equally impulsive as he is vulnerable. We hate to be honest, have anyone know what we are truly thinking or feeling. We think we are going to be judged or ridiculed- the way Hyde is for his appearance. This is where Dr Jekyll comes in- our public face. The smile we put on for the rest of the world so that they don’t know anything is wrong.
Now if we could keep up the pretences everything would be fine: fake it ‘till you make it after all but it’s just not that easy. Sooner or later, our Hyde comes out- no matter how hard we try to suppress him. The thing is, the more furiously we fight him, the more furiously he fights back. In other words, the more we get ourselves into trouble. At least this is my experience. The harder I tried to have my life together and give over the idea that I knew what I was doing, the harder I fell. I put so much pressure on myself to have it all figured out. Any student can relate to this ludicrous attempt to balance everything and still maintain a single shred of sanity. We measure ourselves on such a high bar that only an Olympian could reach, and it’s safe to say that the majority of us are just not Olympic material. There is this intense pressure to be on top of our studies, do exercise, eat well, balance a job and work experience, have a social life but of course you still need 8 hours of sleep per night. Here’s the hard truth: we simply cannot do it all. I would love to be able to tell you that with enough organisation- the balancing gets easier to handle but you know as well as I do that the list
- has an endless amount of tasks and
- you can never tick off items because they have a nasty habit of springing back up.
If you are still reading and have not descended into a complete existential crisis then congratulations- you are made of stronger stuff than me! Although, we cannot defeat the List , it doesn’t mean that all hope is lost. Unlike Dr Jekyll, the vast majority of our alter egos are perfectly harmless and should be embraced. There is no point denying that we have a good and a bad side, Mr Hyde is a part of all of us after all and if we are honest with ourselves and let him come to the surface once in a while by binging out on a few netflix shows or by eating a tonne of cake- then we can avoid a full on bender or life-shattering mental breakdown.
I mentioned a few weeks ago about my mental health and how I was now on medication. Don’t get me wrong, they help me get out of bed in the morning but you might recall that they are simply chapter 1 of a much longer book on restoring and maintaining your sanity. Unless you are some extremely sick person who skips to the end of the book and ruins the story, you have to go chapter by chapter, step-by-step to get that point where you feel remotely normal. It’s a slow process and you can’t achieve it all at once. Firstly, you have to recognise that you have a problem and act on it: go the doctor, get medication, go to therapy. This is the first step in understanding your illness and knowing how to live with it. Once you get this, chapter two is about identifying the techniques that work for you and implementing them in to your life. This is where we tend to give up, or at least I do. I love a good sweeping declaration, an over-optimistic resolution, an ambitious goal to better myself but the majority do not make it past the three- day hurdle. I used to sit myself down on a Sunday night, week planner out with a set food and exercise schedule and if I missed anything…simply the whole week was shot to hell. This all or nothing approach just doesn’t work and it took me a long time to admit that my strategy needed to change.
I have started to instead make little, manageable steps which are notoriously not my style but seem to work for me. For instance, in the new year, I downloaded an app called: Year in Pixels. You colour code your day depending on how you are feeling. To the sceptics in the room, I hear you- surely we all know when we are happy and we are sad. By now, we should be able to tell the difference but what I’d say to you is that this app is useful in several ways. It helps me focus on exactly how I am feeling and realise that one moment does not dictate the colour for the whole day. In a pathetically pitiful way ( I’m really competitive, even with myself) , I don’t want to make the day red and it gives me this strange kind of motivation to find the positivity in a day so I don’t have to. It also allows me to keep track if my meds are working. If you are anything like me, you might laugh off how you are feeling to other people. You may use the “I’m great- I’m fine- it could be worse!”. All very standard and appropriate answers in polite conversation when nobody really wants you to get too personal. I get it, it’s a social necessity but it gets to the point where the details become unclear and hazy, my memory becomes diluted and distorted and I lose track how I have been feeling. I try and write as much as I can as well. I definitely don’t do it everyday, I think that amount of self- deprecating would be too much to handle! However, if something has been playing on my mind, I find it really useful to sort out my feelings on paper. Rambling until it makes sense so to speak. Obviously the running is helping, if I do have a bad day- I more often than not have this completely bizarre urge to run. Call it running from my problems if you wish but at least it is a semi- productive use of my time! It’s quite a foreign feeling but it helps me clear my head and the fresh air helps too. If running isn’t your thing, I do recommend exercise, in any form. It might be the last thing on Earth you can imagine yourself doing but I promise the hardest thing is starting and from then on it does get easier.
The thing is not every technique that some health guru tells you is going to work for you. I’d love to like meditation and it is something I am trying to work on but for now I’m honestly terrible. I cannot for the life of me turn my brain off long enough for it do any good- I’m constantly thinking of the stuff I should be doing; my shopping list, homework, fem soc stuff etc etc. It never ends and regretfully I just find sitting on a yoga mat, legs crossed awkwardly, just concentrating on my breathing, a waste of the little time I have. I’d love to be convinced otherwise because I can totally see the value in it but I just find that other techniques work better for me. I love cooking, for instance. It’s a passion that I have only discovered in the last year but I find it is a great way to switch off my brain. I love looking for new particularly healthy recipes which I am sure I will share with you at some point.
I also love doing yoga with my wonderful flatmates. I mean, we are terrible and my granny knee that clicks every time I move hates it . However, I just can’t stop laughing. They say laughter is the best medicine and while I wish I could avoid the cliché, you can’t deny how important it is. We tend to hide away when our Mr Hyde comes out when really we should be looking for the people who love both parts of us- not just the Jekyll but the Hyde as well.
