We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Matt Woodson a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Matt, we are so deeply grateful to you for opening up about your journey with mental health in the hops that it can help someone who might be going through something similar. Can you talk to us about your mental health journey and how you overcame or persisted despite any issues? For readers, please note this is not medical advice, we are not doctors, you should always consult professionals for advice and that this is merely one person sharing their story and experience.
How did I get here? I was living a life that my younger self wouldn’t have ever thought possible. But I was suddenly crippled by this invisible monster that wouldn’t let go of my emotions. Anxiety? Nah, not me – “I don’t get anxious” was one of my favorite phrases. Panic attacks? C’mon, those aren’t actually real. Depression? Alright well yeah, I was prone to mild depression but I never called it that. All three of these mental health buzz words happening to ME – at the same time? Not possible. Except it was possible because it was now a reality I couldn’t deny thanks to the physical pain an intense panic attack can bring.
At some point I realized that I wasn’t going to ever outrun anxiety by popping a Xanax with my morning coffee and another at bed with a couple glasses of wine. Sitting around a campfire at night, some friends and I came up with a recovery plan to get me back on my feet which included therapy, medication, consistent exercise (lots of walking), and travel (historically, I always felt the least anxious when traveling to new places). I set out on a physical, mental, and spiritual journey to figure out how the hell I ended up in such a miserable state of existence – one I often referenced in my journal as “a life not worth living”. I sublet the room in my house in Denver, packed what I needed into the back of my Jeep, said “see ya in a few weeks… or maybe months” to my roommate, and let my employer know I was going to be working remotely from another city for a few weeks.
The first stop in this journey was Taos, New Mexico – where I met up with some buddies for a ski trip. From there, I ended up bouncing all over the US and even Mexico – working out of co-working spaces, renting airbnb’s or subletting rooms from people doing the same thing as me. I was meeting twice a week with my therapist over zoom, walking or running 5-7 miles/day, eating as clean as I could, and celebrating the days without anxiety attacks. I spent as much time outside as possible, finding peace in nature. At first, I thought I was running from all of my “problems” but with each new place I visited, I started to realize that I wasn’t running away from the pain, I was running towards the healing.
Everywhere I went, I shared my journey with whoever would listen and started to realize that nearly everyone was going through something or had gone through a season of life that felt like an uncontrollable tailspin. I was introduced to the powerful human bond that is created when 2 or more people realize they share the same pain. I started to realize that I had lived all of my life up to this point not knowing it was OK to talk about being sad, anxious, scared, etc. with other people – especially other men I had years of compounded loss built up in my memory that eventually just erupted with a relationship that didn’t work out.
I read books like, “The Body Keeps The Score”, “Unf*ck Your Brain”, “How Emotions Are Made”, and countless others. My therapist started to implement EMDR Therapy into our sessions – a practice that uses rapid eye movement to desensitize your neural responses to traumatic events and help you reprocess them in a clearer way (essentially replaying the same horrible memory over and over again until you’re able to see it in a way that doesn’t elicit an unwanted emotion anymore). I started to dig further in to my faith and learn how to gradually trust that God was not trying to destroy my life. I put together my own little team of doctors to find the right medications that would allow me to create the space necessary to process and heal a lifetime of unresolved trauma without becoming dependent on the pill as a band-aid.
I was in the best physical shape of my life and a new confidence in who I am as a human slowly started to form. I was learning and studying my body holistically for the first time in my life. It’s crazy how much we don’t know about ourselves until we actually break everything down and pick up each piece to reassemble.
When I started the process of trying to figure out how to “fix myself”, I didn’t realize that I wasn’t necessarily broken – I just really never took the time to get to know myself and what makes me tick. Mental health is never something we “overcome”, it’s something that must be a continual practice and check-in with the self -a pursuit to understand why we experience anxieties in certain situations and scenarios and how to adequately navigate our emotions with ease.
Great, so let’s take a few minutes and cover your story. What should folks know about you and what you do?
I quickly found community and fresh purpose in Nashville. I left my cushy tech job and pursued a career in music, which had been a dream of mine forever. I started touring full time with artists from around the world – finding purpose in my career while continuing to travel as a Artist & Tour Manager. Mental health is a massive part of what I do now. I get the opportunity to check in with my artists and teams that I travel with to see how we can best support each other as we live a life of planes, hotels, buses and concerts every night. I also get to meet fans from around the world who share similar stories of how music has had an impact on their mental health.
If you had to pick three qualities that are most important to develop, which three would you say matter most?
The ability to network and talk to people naturally helps in every situation including this one. I went to nursing school (surprise), so having an education in the anatomy of the body, as well as a basic understanding of psychology helped me navigate the scientific side of mental health (which I’m now a geek on). Organization is probably what saved me in the lowest points of my journey. Being able to have an organized and clean space is crucial to my mental health.
The best advice I received during my slump of depression was from my friend Nick. He looked at me and said: “Matt, the only person who can actually make the decision that enough is enough and start focusing on growth and healing is you”. This shook me to my core. So simple that it was embarrassingly obvious. I got home from that trip and started working towards the other side of the hump.
Awesome, really appreciate you opening up with us today and before we close maybe you can share a book recommendation with us. Has there been a book that’s been impactful in your growth and development?
Matthew Mcconaughey’s “Greenlights” changed my life. A book of stories from a guy who walked through some real sh*t just like the rest of us. I learned how to “just keep livin'” through his experiences and personal journey.
Contact Info:
- Instagram: instagram.com/mattboymagic
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mawoodson/
Image Credits
Trea Allen, Jay Wennington, Kaiser Cunningham,
