Had I not just listened to Ross Sbazo's lecture, I would have gotten much angrier at my computer. I had just finished typing out a wonderfully argued and rich--and complete--entry on my reactions to the "What Happy Faces are Hiding" lecture when my computer screen goes white. I didn't even know there was a white computer screen at the time (black and unresponsive and even blue, yes, but white...what does that mean?!)...believe me, we are well acquainted now! After shutting down and rebooting, and dealing with several minutes of Internet Explorer's who were not responding, I got back here, hoping at least that some version of my entry had autosaved. Of course, I was back to square one. What a sense of humor computers have!
But Ross Sbazo came into the back of my mind then, reminding me that stress was one of the biggest mental health problems on college campuses. I didn't want to mess with my mental health! I took a deep breath and began to rewrite...
Walking into the lecture hall, I felt a bit awkward to be honest. I wanted to stand up and validate myself in some way: "I'm not here because I have a problem, ok...I just need a bit of extra credit..." Listening to his lecture, however, I was very interested and found it applicable not only to my own life but in how I may help others. Ross stressed that mental health isn't as taboo a term as people think, associating it with only extreme cases. Mental health is something we should all strive to achieve.
He also talked mainly about dangers that we commonly associate with mental health, about depression and suicide, and bipolar disorder, and interestingly enough he did it in a hilarious way. Walking out of the lecture, I was struck by how appropriate his levity was. You might think, as I did before I listened to the lecture, that serious topics warrant serious tones. Sbazo was able to smile through grim statistics, and joke about himself--to ultimately make the audience feel hopeful and not overwhelmed.
Onto some interesting statistics:
- Military personnel attempting to interrogate someone, to essentially break their minds down, don't deprive them of sleep for days on end. They limit their sleep to 2-5 hours a day. College students sleep about 4-6 hours a day. GET SOME SLEEP! (I say this as I'm anticipating another late night.)
- The most dangerous year in a young person's life is freshman year of college.
- Almost 70% of college students with mental health students don't seek help or talk about their problems. They may be afraid of being judged, blame themselves for their problems, feel that it's a weakness or purely don't know their options.
Katherine
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