Battle for Yourself
“[Forget] a rap battle / this is a lifelong battle for yourself,” Kendrick Lamar, Meet the Grahams
A few weeks ago we kicked off our 3 Part Series, exploring of themes from Kendrick Lamar’s single Meet the Grahams. Possibly the most infamous drop of Kendricks’ during his beef with Drake, this song was released within an hour of the music video reveal of Drake’s single Family Matters. In Meet the Grahams, Kendrick addresses members of Drake’s family directly and ends with a verse written directly to Drake. And as of the time of today’s post, Meet the Grahams has garnered over 76 million plays on Spotify alone. Make sure to check out Part 1 Father’s Day for Adult Children of Absentee Fathers and Part 2 What if You’ve Raised a Horrible Person of this series too.
Over the last few weeks, we’ve explored themes from Kendrick’s Meet the Grahams. This week, we’re highlighting the final line of the song to talk about your life, what battles are worth fighting for, and how therapy with Future Full of Hope can support you in those battles. For each of these posts I’ve challenged you, the reader, to separate the song from the Kendric and Drake beef and instead consider it from an empathetic perspective and as a standalone track. Today I ask you to do the same as you read this blog about the last line of the song - “[Forget] a rap battle, this is a lifelong battle with yourself.”
I LOVE that last line - while wrapping up an entire song geared at deconstructing Drake’s character, Kendrick encourages Drake to engage in the lifelong battle with himself. Kendrick invites Drake into a bigger challenge and a bigger battle - one where the only audience and participant is Drake himself.
Can you relate to that line? What are you battling with right now? What in your life is worth fighting for? Perhaps you are going through a deep and challenging loss of a loved one, an unexpected layoff or substance abuse. Maybe your battles seem more mundane but are challenging nonetheless. It can be HARD to limit alcohol use and get up early for morning workouts despite all our best intentions. It can be hard to communicate clearly in your relationships and navigate corporate challenges. Maybe your battle relates to your response to a particular hardship, to your ability to be in relationships with other people, or to having confidence to cope with your day-to-day. Learning to introspect and then grow your mental and emotional capacities can feel like a battle too. The journey for growth and change can feel like a battle, and therapy with Future Full of Hope can help.
Clients who’ve worked with us have found support and success in fighting battles for:
Balancing creative and professional pursuits by defining clear priorities and establishing healthy routines and habits.
Coping with financial stress and anxiety by recognizing the factors within their control and creating a game plan to address current limitations.
Establishing rhythm and routine in personal habits to support creative pursuits.
Fighting depression and anxiety by learning to recognize and express feelings.
Navigating trauma impact though processing their past and embracing their present.
Building relationships through community connections.
Managing colleague conflict by practicing assertive communication with teams and managers and developing leadership skills.
Getting rejuvenated from burnout through setting boundaries for work responsibilities.
Finding fulfillment in work by clarifying personal purpose, dreaming aspirations and in some cases, pivoting careers.
Managing stress of leadership through developing leadership skills, preparing for “hard conversations” and coping with public speaking anxiety.
Coping with recent workplace crises by processing trauma and high stress scenarios.
Coping with loneliness by building friendships and resolving internal pain.
Developing parenting skills by clarifying expectations, practicing curiosity, and integrating relationship building strategies.
Increasing capacity for vulnerability in relationships through growing in awareness of feelings and assertively communicating with intimate partners.
Navigating relationships with emotionally immature or aging parents through making sense out of parental patterns and setting clear boundaries with family members.
Future Full of Hope Can Help
We all need help at different times in our lives. Maybe you’ve been to a doctor for a medical health concern, or taken your car to a mechanic to have it checked out, or seen a trainer for focus on a specific technique. In a similar fashion, checking in with a therapist can help you to make sense of your internal battles. At Future Full of Hope, we specialize in providing therapy to creatives, to professionals, and to men. We support our clients to process their past, embrace their present, and create their future. If you’re losing a battle, struggling in the middle one, preparing to engage in one, just need a little extra support at the current stage of one, therapy with Future Full of Hope can help. Get started with Future Full of Hope today.
If you’re ready to start therapy to make sense out of your relationship with your father, follow the link below to schedule a free 15-minute phone consultation with Kevin
AI Disclaimer: This post is original and written by Kevin Boyd of Future Full of Hope, PLLC. No AI tool was leveraged in the development of this post
