Take one break for himself and put the first his mental health. With this intention, last summer, Shawn Mendes had canceled some dates of his Wonder: The World Tour.
“After talking to my team and working with an incredible group of health professionals, it has become clearer that I need to take the time I’ve never taken personally, to find myself and come back for more.” strong”.
The singer recently, in an interview with WSJ Magazine he told of how he tackled this personal journey of his to find himself, after the not easy choice to give up part of the tour.
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“The process was very difficult – confessed the singer-songwriter – A lot of therapya lot of trying to figure out how I felt and what made me feel that way». However, a path of healing that Mendes also defined as «the most enlightening» of his life, especially since it allowed him to understand the importance of knowing how to listen to yourself and of don’t be afraid to set boundaries. «Understand that drawing boundaries doesn’t make you a rude person really changed my life.” explained the singer. «It’s not easy. It’s a difficult thing. You don’t feel comfortable. It makes other people feel uncomfortable for a moment, but in the end it is a very powerful and useful gesture to make for all relationships.
Shawn Mendes then thanked the people who showed great understanding for his choice: a sign that something is changing, even in society. «LMental health is really becoming a priority.”, the singer pointed out.
The importance of taking a break
We do not know what kind of malaise met Mendes when he decided to cancel his world tour dates to focus on himself. What is certain is that his experience invites us to reflect about something that too often, even in our daily experience, we tend to underestimate: that is to say how important it is, in terms of mental well-being, to know how to stop. Knowing how to take a break to find yourself and to come back, as Mendes himself writes in his post, stronger than before.
Daniel Golemanthe famous American psychologist, writer and journalist, in his book Focusnot surprisingly underlines how the ability to take a break is vital to regaining control of one’s attention. Only by stopping we have in fact the possibility to disengage the autopilot with which we “travel”, that is, we stop acting on impulse to return to being truly masters of our lives.
Even if in our case it’s not about giving up the stages of a world tour, knowing how to stop, knowing how to carve out a break, a moment of attention on ourselves, may not be as obvious as it seems. And this for several reasons: for the sense of guilt connected to the prejudice according to which stopping means wasting time or be unproductive but sometimes also for fear of facing our emotions.
In fact, we often tend to get stuck in a thousand commitments just for avoid stopping and looking insidehowever ignoring that by doing so we end up seriously jeopardizing our well-being psychological.
In an article that appeared on Guidapsicologi.it, Dr. Silvia Brocca underlines how too anxiety and panic attacks can be interpreted as a alarm bell that our mind activates to force us to stop.
«Maybe there are situations, emotions, experiences, traumas or routines in your life that don’t allow you to feel serene – explains the expert – And despite everything you are frantically trying to move forward. L’panic attackinstead, it forces you to stop. Of course he does it violently, he doesn’t give you a choice. But, perhaps, seen from a different perspective, it gives you an opportunity. The opportunity to make sense, give a name and a location to what bothers you. Maybe it gives you the chance to reread your life and find out how many useless and harmful actions you do regularly and how much by modifying them you might be better off».
One aspect that Mendes focused on when speaking of his healing journey is how this process has allowed him, not only to find himself, but also to learn to set boundaries.
Not surprisingly, stopping and becoming aware of yourself also means reconnect with your needs and learn to respect your needs. In fact, in everyday life we are often led to always say yesa habit that it ends up seriously undermining our personal space. The tendency to satisfy the needs of others it does nothing but jeopardize our well-being, moving further away from who we are and from what we want and then forcing us to come to terms with L’anxiety. That’s when, only by stopping and reconnecting with ourselves, we can learn to set boundaries.
«The ability to say “no” is strongly related to how we perceive our borders – the founders of Psychoadvisor.com – A border represents a limit, a barrier. All the times we make choicesthat we say yes to some things and no to others, that we orient ourselves towards some people or situations and away from others, we are setting boundaries».
The famous people who brought attention to mental health
Mendes is hardly the only young star to have pointed out publicly the importance of taking care of your mental healtha topic on which today, as the singer himself has declared, society finally seems much more open.
Among the celebrities who have turned the spotlight on this very important issue too Demi Lovato who said he had come to terms with suicidal thoughts and suffered from depression, and also the singer and actress Selena Gomezwho said she is steadily coping with the bipolar disorder that she has been diagnosed with.
Without going too far, even between the young Italian singers there are those who wanted to testify how important it is, beyond the fame gainedalways put mental well-being at the center: the rapper Saint John in fact, he told of how therapy helped him to face a moment in which, despite the success achieved, he found himself feeling lost and sad. «Asking for help is not weakness – said the singer in an interview – Therapy helped me fly again (…) I understood that you never reach the top, when you reach your goals and radically change your life, then the darkness can return».
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