We love you, Space Mom - What I Learned from Carrie Fisher
“I tell my younger friends that no matter how I go, I want it reported that I drowned in moonlight, strangled by my own bra.” -Carrie Fisher
1. Honestly accept yourself, mental illnesses and all. Carrie was always very open and honest about her struggle with mental illness, as well as who she was as a person. Her authenticity was inspiring.
2. Don’t give a fuck what everyone else thinks of you. Carrie did not give one iota of a fuck of anyone's opinion of her. She did her thing and you could either love her or hate her, but either way she wasn't going to lose any sleep over it.
3. Take your meds. Carrie was always very open about being medicated for her mental illness. She encouraged fans not to feel shame but to take their meds with pride and acceptance. She did a lot of work to try and remove the stigma around mental health treatment.
4. Take life less seriously. None of us are getting out alive, so chill out and have some fun with life.
5. Laugh. At yourself. Carrie wasn't afraid to make jokes at her own expense and it's just another reason why we all loved her.
6. Beauty is just not important. Carrie was considered a beautiful woman by conventional standards in her youth, but as she aged she often spoke out against society's beauty standards. Beauty just wasn't important to her. Time and time again she put people in their place who tried to impose their beauty standards on her.
7. Take no shit from anyone. Not critics, not fans, not your mother, and definitely not from men. Carrie would tell off anyone who tried to give her shit, even her own mother. She wasn't afraid of conflict because she knew what she was worth.
8. Believe in yourself. Shoot for the stars. Have hope in your dreams. Carrie followed her dreams. In addition to starring as Leia Organa in Star Wars, she was also a writer and worked on hundreds of scripts. She encouraged her fans to dream big.
9. Mental illness is a bitch and attacks even the best of us. Carrie Fisher was one of the strongest women I have ever seen and she fought her mental illness with a tenacity that many of us only ever hope for. Despite her incredible strength, she still struggled with her mental health for her entire life. She never gave up, though. She never stopped fighting.
We love you space mom. Thanks for everything.