Cyclothymia’s name is a mental health disorder – something I feel. It also brings out the juxtaposition of the medicalization of feelings and the super hippy-dippy new-age mode of understanding, as I jump between both. I worked with this idea of mental health, cycles, and astrology because I’m really into astrology and mental health. Not just conceptually but personally. I’ve found that looking at my own emotional phases through the lens of astrology has been really healing. I’m one of those classic emotional investigators – like if I feel a certain way, say happy and excited – I’m like, “Why am I so happy? Should I be feeling this way? Are things in my life good enough to be warrant this feeling? am I too happy? Is this an episode?” And that’s really anxiety inducing for me. Astrology has a way for me to practice radical acceptance. “I’m feeling so melancholic because the moon is in Pisces. It will pass” I also struggle, like many people with specific mood phases, with thinking that I will be stuck feeling the same way forever, I’ll be this depressed forever, this crushed forever. But astrology again has been a great reminder that the world keeps on spinning, and all phases end and new ones begin, daily, weekly, monthly, yearly.
