During The Calabash Literary Festival in Treasure Beach, Jamaica, singer Tanya Stephens, while entertaining hundreds of patrons, took the opportunity to share several stories that gave the audience an insight into her journey behind the music.
The artist shared her experience in therapy and recommended that everyone should try to get some help for their mental health.
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She shared, “Whether or not you think you’re fine, I encourage you to get yourself checked out…”Everybody need somebody to talk to and professionals are better at it, especially in a country like Jamaica where every single one of us is broken. No matter how much you see them a look or how much them a gwaan and behave like nothing nuh do dem, every single human inna Jamaica [is] broken and need therapy. Whether it is by we parents and the archaic way them grow we up, or a by the authority systems that govern we; and I’m not just talking ’bout politics, even the school system.”
Stehens, 50, known in the early oughts for her hit ‘It’s a Pity’ disclosed that getting help from a professional has been one of the best decisions she has made for herself.
She continued by saying, “We fall through the cracks, we land pon hard concrete and all a we broken. So I think every single one of we should get some help. Seek counselling. And if you can manage to get therapy, get it. If you have a pastor, siddung and talk to him. Don’t keep it inside though, ’cause whatever you are keeping inside will cause you to implode,” she said.
Stephens is quite confortable with herself as a woman now in her fifties. she said, “It was a whole heap of ‘drop and come up…I just messed up so many times, I had no options.”
She continues to perform, currently preparing for a European tour, and continues to work on herself, while advocating for others to get whatever help they can to care for themselves mentally.
