Many years ago, I went through therapy that uncovered a very deep and traumatic childhood wound. I fell into a depression after that. This lasted years. The first year was the worst. On some days, I could not get out of bed. I felt lazy.
Thinking about that now, I realise that I wasn’t lazy. I was recovering from a trauma that had hobbled me my entire life. Exhaustion and depression can be an indication that we are healing an emotional wound. The internal narrative that we are lazy, or not doing enough, might not be true.
This reminds me of a student that I’d taught many years ago who’d lost his father to suicide. Needless to say, the young man was struggling to perform academically, and from what I could see, he was also engaging in destructive behaviours. I confess that before I knew his story, I did think he was lazy.
But it wasn’t the right time to focus on academics. Instead, he should have focused on support (therapeutic, spiritual—anything that could help really) and self-care. But this is often not how we deal with emotional problems. Often, the tendency is to say, let’s just move on.
But emotional trauma is burdensome and internally destructive if we don’t resolve it. It is hard to get things done if we have to carry a bag of burdens in our hearts. And, contrary to our own destructive internal narratives, we might not be lazy.