warning: huge trigger warning / tw for suicide and self harm
please stay safe friends, don’t proceed if you don’t feel like you should.
Everyone has a “kill yourself playlist”, right?
Right guys?
Well, I do!
So do a couple of my friends. Maybe it’s a gen z thing? A “kill yourself playlist” is what we named these playlists we would make that were just chock full of songs that were horrifically sad, disgustingly somber, and A silly name for something that we would listen to only at our darkest moments.
I think we called it this jokey title because it was so literal and to the point it was funny- that humor took off some of the edge off the harshness of what these playlists served as.
When I was suicidal, I would listen to my one of these playlists and cry, harder than anyone should ever cry, and either would hit myself or cut myself. I cut for years, from 2015-2021. It would vary in how often; at worst it was every day, and later it was once every couple of months. Every single time though, I would be listening to my playlist.
Obviously I have a weird relationship with the songs I featured in it, and I haven’t listened to them since 2021.
Until today.
I decided to listen to the number one song on my playlist, the one that would make me cry hardest, which is Switchfoot’s “Where I Belong”. I was laying on the couch with the fire crackling next to me, and my dad in the chair across from me. We were listening to music and doing a dab or two. It was really nice, and I’m not sure what influenced me to put it on, especially given my past with it.
While I was listening to it, mentally I was okay. Until about half way through, I suddenly noticed I was having a visceral reaction to the song… my limbs were on pins and needles, my breathing was shallow and fast, and I was shaking, almost vibrating. A minute later tears started streaming down my face when the frontman sang “this skin and bones is a rental,” but I quickly snapped out of it. Then the song was over before I knew it.
Why did I do that, put myself through the pain of remembering all the lowest of lows I’ve ever experienced mixed together, while I was happy? I needed to reframe my memories of that song to something positive.
I think the first step to that needed to be a spur of the moment, quick decision or it would never happen. If I had planned to listen to it I would have decided not to leading up to the scheduled time. I would have totally chickened out! Since this was such a sudden thought, it was able to just happen without delay.
The actual experience of listening to the song was weird! Very very weird. My body was shaking for a few minutes after the song was even over. I felt like there was something heavy on my chest. But now, a couple hours later, I feel like I accomplished something. I feel like I did the impossible- I am starting to reframe the song in my mind and by proxy reframe the traumatic memory of hurting myself for years.
Donna Bridge, the lead researcher from Northwestern University says, “Memories are not static. If you remember something in the context of a new environment and time, or even if you are in a different mood, your memories might integrate the new information.” Now, the song has a memory of me being comfortable by the cozy fire with my dad and smoking weed, not just self harm and devastation.
I will continue to reframe this song, and incorporate good things into my past horrible memories, not just put my past horrible memories onto these huge sad pedestals. I make up these songs to be so incredibly powerful when in reality they are just beautiful works of art.
Here’s my call to action: in the context of a happy memory, remember a bad one. This can be just talking about that bad memory with a trusted loved one in a safe space, making art about your past, or listening to certain songs, like me. Keep exposing yourself to it in a variety of positive ways, and eventually that memory will be completely reframed (according to research). I’m excited to get to that point with “Where I Belong”, because “this skin and bones is a rental” would make a cool tattoo.
mossyfawnron 
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