It is okay not to feel okay.

That is what I and everyone else have been hearing their whole life.

Everyone and their brother, sister, mother, father, and friend have known that when you don’t feel like you’re okay, you are not obligated to feel as if you cannot be okay.

Everyone including myself feels the opposite. 

Everyone I know has not felt like themselves at least once or twice in their lifetime.

Whether it be because their favorite pet has died, they broke up with their partner, they aren’t doing well in school, or they don’t want to try. 

Whenever I see someone with dark eyes and slumped shoulders, I need to ask, “Are you okay?”

To which they respond, “Yes, I am okay.”

Except they are, in fact, not okay. 

It angers and saddens me that they do not feel like it’s okay to acknowledge that they are the opposite.

Yet, I am no different.

The seniors taking their pills, the adults seeing the doctors, the young adults taking their college exams, the teenagers taking their end-of-the-year finals, and the children being excluded at the playground constantly do not feel okay.

Yet many of the problems never get solved because no one gets involved.

You may listen to this and think that it is not okay to never disclose your feelings, to which I would answer you this.

It is okay to not always express your feelings, as you are never obligated to.

But I must make you aware that once you never tell anyone that you aren’t okay, it will eat away at you from the moment that you realize it, to the moment that it’s too late. 

That, in itself, is not okay.