On my daily dog walk the last three days I saw this dumpster in a back alley way near my home in Washington, D.C. It looked like 'trashtalk'. Are we trashing ourselves, I wondered?
“Staying alive is the most punk sh*t I’ve EVER done.”
Wow for this person! Or, whoa there..? A celebratory or cautionary tale?
We can argue and split hairs about the intent of the writer. We can also sit in judgement as to why did this person write THIS? And why’d they choose THOSE words? What was the tipping point to push this person to the brink of such consideration for their own life?
The irony is not lost on me that the person who wrote about staying alive wrote this on a dumpster. Perhaps one of the biggest containers we have to haul away all the unwanted items we no longer use. Perhaps the person wanted to throw away their life? “Out with the trash.” ?
But instead, did something else, made a different choice.
Which ever way we slice it, it shouldn’t matter.
Any interpretation of this statement should be a championing of life and getting through adversity. Somehow this writer used resilience and was bold and daring enough to authentically share a truth.
It also reminded me:
✅ As of today's publication, it’s still September and still suicide prevention and awareness month;
✅ As we conclude the month, we need to keep championing mental health and suicide prevention; and
✅ We cannot and should not keep “trashing and throwing away” empty comments about life, well-being, or mental health.
Today, on the dog walk, that dumpster is gone. It vanished.
Like the dumpster that disappeared, so many of the “wellbeing focus of the month” campaigns, come and go. We need to bring Wellbeing and Mental Health to daily life. A ‘here today, gone tomorrow’ approach is not going to improve or save lives.
Maybe it's just the little things in life that help us remember how great it is to be alive. Maybe this helped remind you?
And come to think of it, ‘staying alive is the most punk sh*t I’ve ever done’, too.
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