It is common to see people masking their trauma through distracting themselves. Oftentimes, they bury themselves in work instead of balancing their time.
Today’s celebrities are no exception.
We are all susceptible to falling into the trap of submerging ourselves in isolation and the consequences thereof.”
— Staff Writer Chloe Fitzsimmons
When Johnny Depp became the household name the world knows today, his lifestyle would be expected to drastically change. Constant traveling and a turbulent career often come with being an actor, but the truth is, that’s what Depp was used to.
Before starring in movies, Depp lived in an unstable household where he constantly moved. His father separated from the family when Depp was 15, leaving him alone with his physically and verbally abusive mother. In an attempt to escape, Depp joined a band and began investing all his time into music, going as far as to drop out of school and move to Los Angeles.
Once his band broke up, Depp searched for a job. Most people would call him lucky for falling into fame and money, but what Depp’s career became was an opportunity to distract himself from his pain.
Depp kept himself busy to mask his trauma, falling into the cycle of traveling and working constantly, abusing substances all the way, and masking his deep emotions with anything that could keep the pain away.
Depp worked constantly, and on any downtime, he used drugs in order to temporarily seduce the pain. This made him fall into the cycle which has proven so difficult to get out of. He constantly traveled on tours, going to film events, and leaving no time for important things like family and friends.
It is not just Depp. We are all susceptible to falling into the trap of submerging ourselves in isolation and the consequences thereof.
We isolate ourselves from everyone and everything that can help us. As proven by the COVID-19 pandemic, isolation is detrimental for mental health with four in ten adults reporting symptoms consistent with anxiety as well as depression during the quarantine.
The problem is burying ourselves in work causes severe stress because there is no time for our brains to relax and process the past.
It can be seen all throughout schools. Anxiety is taking over, and it’s causing millions of us to fall into a dark cycle of distracting ourselves from what matters and equating our worth to the work we do.
Many teens and young-adults feel society’s expectations, resorting to working as hard as possible in the place they spend the most time: school.”
— Staff Writer Chloe Fitzsimmons
Especially with the pressure of succeeding these days, many teens and young-adults feel society’s expectations, resorting to working as hard as possible in the place they spend the most time: school. In 2019, 22.1 percent of college students felt overwhelming anxiety.
In order to overcome the trauma, we must balance ourselves. We often fall into the trap of investing all our time into one specific hobby, but we should be making time for all the people and things that make us happy. By fully submerging ourselves in the work we do, we’re only digging ourselves into a hole that can become nearly impossible to get out of.
Whatever we’ve gone through in life, whatever trauma we’ve succumbed to, we’re worth more than all of it. There is no way to make the trauma disappear, but there is a way to overcome the pain it brings, and it isn’t by masking it or by pushing it down deeper and deeper.
In the end the work, the success, the money, and even celebrity status, mean nothing when we aren’t happy, and producing more won’t compensate for our mental health or the satisfaction we wish to possess.