July 3 2009 an album called ‘Lungs’ came out. I was 14 years old, lonely, depressed, and spent most of the time sitting by myself listening to Pandora for hours on end. I stumbled across the album and found so much comfort in every word that was executed so beautifully. Flash forward to 2011, Ceremonials came out. I was 16 and in a band (not a good one) and was playing music with people I really cared about. I still felt unworthy and just as unnoticed as I did when I was 14. I had gained weight and was incredibly uncomfortable in my own skin. Everything felt heavy and I continued to try to forget my comfort zone but I would constantly come home exhausted. A lot of things were going on behind the scenes that no one knew about, so I dealt with it the best way I knew how. Shake It Out became my anthem. When everything was crashing I turned to that song. In 2015, I was falling in love for the first time. I had committed everything I had to it and chased the illusion that this was finally where I was gonna be happy. I had earned it. I went through the years of sadness and anger, and now it was my turn. I’d be damned if I wasn’t gonna be happy now. Well the funny thing is happiness is not a random luck of the draw or a board game. It doesn’t take turns. I remember waking up to a messy house because I couldn’t pull myself out of bed to clean it. I remember doctors visits where I lied to my doctor about how I was feeling, and eventually allowed her to try and help. I remember working 2 jobs and trying to work away the pain, because if I was ‘busy’ I couldn’t focus on how broken I felt. I remember watching ‘Odyssey’ after How Big, How Blue, How Beautiful came out and completely losing it. “Love yourself, forgive yourself” played over and over in my head like a melody. “Love yourself, forgive yourself”. Why was it so hard? I went through the hard stuff, I faced the bad times, why was I still hating myself? I was older, a college graduate, had my own house, why was I still so sad? I remember the person I was with calling me lazy. Telling me that I was worthless and that I wasn’t trying hard enough. He left me and moved back with his family, but wanted to “make it work”. I moved out of that house and into an apartment with my dog and my best friend 2 years after that album was released. ‘Ship to Wreck’ resonates with me still. Even when I achieve everything I want to achieve, I have this self deprecating way of either destroying it or refusing to allow it to happen to me. Upon arriving in my new home, I also started a new job. I pleaded for my apartment to be a place of peace and that no one who isn’t supposed to be there to enter it. I was tired, and I needed all the negativity in my life out. I wanted to start over. This was my chance and I was not gonna get in the way of my own happiness anymore. That plea came true. The people that entered my apartment were people that were meant to be there. I ended that relationship and prayed to be single for the rest of my life. I wanted to heal on my terms and if I had learned anything it was that no person can heal you. Flash forward to June 29, 2018. I was still mourning the loss of my grandmother and my guiding light. I was also married, loving my job, moving into another house,(a yellow one to be exact), and was finally grasping at what happiness was. The growing pains had happened. My decision to cut toxicity out of my life had allowed me to bloom. ‘Hunger’ was released off the album “High as Hope” and once again My voice, my feelings, my thoughts, my emotions were put into words. I chased everything that I thought would make me happy for years. My inner peace was absent and I couldn’t find even an ounce of it back then. Last night I saw the band that stuck with me through everything, the highs, the lows, the uncomfortable, the extraordinary, all of it. That is why Florence and the Machine is my favorite band and last night everything came full circle.
titsay
prguitarman
gracieabrams
baratheonpilled
turnnoffyourmind
theartofmadeline
