Whether we think of certain concepts as tools or technology (see Peter Hershock on this distinction; a discussion of it can be found here), concepts allow us to see and do things we couldn’t without them. The concept of mental health is much more than simply the modifier “mental” to the preexisting concept of bodily health. Mental health comes with a number of assumptions and values that inform how we see persons and evaluate their well-being, who is responsible for it, and how, and how we should respond.

You can see what I mean, in part, by looking at the history of psychology and the evolution of the concept of a person in light of that history. But the main point I want to make is that the concept of mental health allows us to see things we would not have seen without it. For example, prior to it, a person’s odd behavior might have been explained by some sort of possession or manipulation by the Gods (only two of many possibilities). And viewing things in those ways has clear implications for how such a person might be received by their peers and the larger community.

Along these lines, the concept of catastrophizing came into my life ten or so years ago. However exactly it might be defined in the field of psychology, how I understand it is:

To catastrophize is to take a small thing and follow through with a quick chain of reasoning (often immediate and in need of unpacking) that understands the small thing as really indicative of something catastrophically big.

For example, I know I have two bulging discs in my lumber spine. When I detect the slightest sensations of discomfort in my lower back (which I am able to do so very well because of years of training my perception to foreground such things), I immediately imagine horrible pain and being made unable to do so many of the things I, up to that point, had been able to do, especially without pain. Life is about to be over; my body is old and breaking down; I’ll never do X again, never do Y again, never do Z again, etc.; Etc.

From something so phenomenologically minor the worst consequences are immediately before the mind and guaranteed: inevitable; all catastrophic thinking feels justified; the reasons unassailable.

But with the concept in hand, I have been able, though with varying results depending on my overall level of depression and anxiety, to recognize that I am catastrophizing and that the expectation of a guaranteed cascade of terrible things to come is not well-founded. The concept is a technology that enables me to gain some distance from my mind’s worst fears.

Regarding my mental health, recent years have been the most challenging of my now 50 years. Philosophy is helpful sometimes; other times, it enables me to find the worst possible implications of what I seem to be feeling, mentally and physically. Turning back to music since the spring of 2024 (in the late 90s I was planning on getting a degree in music production after falling in love with it while recording my own music), I have been grappling with problems in a different mode. That is, instead of trying to argue with myself or analyze an issue to the point where I feel liberated, “simply” expressing what I’m feeling and thinking in song, both the music and the vocals/lyrics, has produced a different sort of liberation. (For now, some of my other music can be found here.)

So, here is “the Worst Catastrophe.” I won’t explain the lyrics, as the power of music is often in the listener’s ability to enter into their own understanding of the song.

Thank you for giving it a listen!

There’s no blaze on the mountain I’ve got to daze,
There’s just my mind taking me to hell

There’s no dam threatening watery graves,
There’s just my mind tolling its glass bell

There’s no rigid, quaking earth making waves, 
There’s just my mind breaking at the well

The worst
  catastrophe

The worst
catastrophe
of this life

There’s no abysmal flood of floods I need to brave,
There’s just my mind’s flowing inkwell.

There’re no deaths of the beloved I need to grave,
There’s just my mind caught in its own spell.

There’s no man, state, or God: thus, behave!
There’s just the perfect ‘pon which I dwell.

The worst
  catastrophe

The worst
catastrophe

The worst
   catastrophe

The worst
catastrophe
of this life

There will come the time when we cannot stay
But know the life will come back to us
Our body-minds are carried on the tumult
Ride the tide, the engine steams ahead

We mustn’t belie the chance of some old
Seeds emerging in a newly sprouted spring

We mustn’t belie the chance of some old
Seeds emerging in a newly sprouted spring

We mustn’t belie the chance of some old
Seeds emerging in a newly sprouted spring