As the crowd was chanting “More,” Taylor Swift obliged by releasing her latest masterpiece: The Tortured Poet’s Department, her eleventh studio album. TTPD is teeming with the blues, anguish, disbelief, and self-proclaimed moods of “teenage petulance”. She paints over that damned shade of blue with a dreary, gray sky in her disintegrating dreamland. Taylor strikes back with a venomous bite, even though they thought they “took out all of her teeth”.

In her new song “I Can Do It With a Broken Heart,” Taylor Swift admits that she was not as happy as she appeared to the public — nor to her friends and family. We all saw her gleaming every night of The Eras Tour, so bubbly with high energy and a tattooed smile even as headlines emerged her 6-year relationship ended a year ago this month. 

Taylor closes out the upbeat sounding yet depressingly worded piece (a signature move of hers) with an ecstatically, sarcastic “I’m miserable and no one even knows!” Understanding that Taylor has dealt with depression and an eating disorder helps us see that putting on a smile was her method of coping: “I was grinning like I’m winning.” Putting up a front may have felt safer to her than being honest about her pain. It’s unhealthy, but also a valid means of coping. 

I personally cannot buy into the “fake it ‘til you make it” mentality. While Taylor Swift and others say that they paved their path towards joy by first pretending they were happy, I die trying. As a teenager struggling with anxiety, trauma, an eating disorder, and undiagnosed bipolar disorder, there were a few times I put on a smile and pretended I was okay. It absolutely killed me. I can’t live my life in lies; authenticity is a breath of fresh air to me today.

When I feel anxious or uncomfortable, it is difficult for me to hide it. I’ve been told it’s hard to read me at times, but it can be obvious to those close to me when I feel off through my body language, facial expressions, and speech. I wear my heart on my sleeve much of the time and it’s important for me to be honest when I don’t feel well. 

I find that I can be more private at times, but I am more forthcoming with the people close to me as they are more aware and can support me best. Truly, from my perspective, what is the point of life if I am not honest? We get our needs met quicker and can feel more secure when other people are holding our pains and keeping them safe. 

At the same time I can’t hide how I’m feeling and don’t find it worth it to pretend to be happy, I sometimes utilize a skill from DBT (Dialectical Behavior Therapy) called Half Smile. In moments of anxiety or sadness, if we just form a half smile on our face, the chemicals in our brain respond to the expression and release dopamine and serotonin. We essentially can trick our minds into thinking we are happy. This works for me well in moments I feel I am dragging by at work. Sometimes at work, if I smile a bit, I then feel more inclined to compliment a patient or make a joke with a coworker, which then keeps the momentum and brings me more joy. So, in theory, “fake it ‘til you make it” can sometimes work. The lesson is that we must still work with others and ourselves to feel better soon. 

The caveat here is that “fake it ‘til you make it” in small doses in the short-term can lead us to more peace; however, “fake it ‘til you make it” in practice long-term (what it sounded like Taylor Swift was operating from) can create devastating consequences where we further dig a wedge between trusting others and trusting ourselves. We feel as though we have nowhere to turn when we deny our reality. If we can’t trust our own intuition when we need help, how will we ever feel better? I’d imagine somewhere in the timelines of Taylor’s love and loss is that she learned she had to let some *trustworthy* people in so she could heal her wounds. 

In my example about Half Smile, I would feel overwhelmed and like my entire life was a lie if I constantly smiled instead of being honest. In moments I need to be sad and let out my emotions, I honor that today. If I need to cry, I cry. Bottling up our truth will only lead to the ship capsizing; those emotions need to be released. 

If we can strike a balance between smiling at the small, mundane joys in life so we can heal and working to be honest in the moment with ourselves and those close to us, I believe we can be happier, more fulfilled people. I’ve found that when I denied my innermost feelings, they only grew fiery and stronger until the flames began to burn down my patience. I would grow deep disdain for others when I felt they couldn’t see through my facade and I felt bottomless guilt when I lied through my teeth about how I felt. This does not serve me and it clearly did not serve Taylor Swift either. 

Taylor Swift accredits her new love, her “tattooed golden retriever,” as what brought her to a steadier ground of healing. There is a part of me that wants to fault her, but my heart completely understands. There are people out there who declare that we cannot be loved if we do not love ourselves, but I don’t fully believe this anymore. I’ve been loved back to life by loved ones. I’ve been loved deeply before I saw the glow of my own light. I’ve been held wholeheartedly in a warm embrace before I felt the purpose in the beating of my own heart. We are never weak for leaning on others until we can stand up straight and explore peace again. It’s a valiant effort to find home in others until we can find home in our own minds and bodies. 

There is something to say here about each of our methods to coping with the madness: none of it is wrong and neither of us is stronger or weaker than the other; getting back up again after falling to the ground is each of our individual fights and there is no right or wrong way. No one is perfect and we must lend each other grace and a listening ear in order to reach the safety we so desperately need.

As a writer and artist, there is so much healing to be found in self-expression. Listening to TTPD at this time in my life where I feel held, strong, and empowered makes me better understand why I share my past pains: they are lovely traces of where we’ve been and who we were so we can love that former version of ourselves back to life. As Taylor so eloquently put the road to recovery, “I’m just getting color back into my face”.