My Mind & Me by Selena Gomez (Analysis)

[Originally Published by Me in My Mind & Me – Selena Gomez – Is Less More? (wordpress.com)]

 

On November 4th of 2022, the singer-songwriter and actress Selena Gomez released a documentary titled ‘My mind & me’ documenting her life for the past 6 years. More specifically, it shows her vulnerable side through raw scenes; we get to see her struggles with body dysmorphia, bipolar disorder and the autoimmune disease lupus. While She puts you through a roller coaster of emotions of what feels like a visual journal, the intention was to bring emphasis on how major events in her life impacted her relationship with her mind, having to live with the dreadful symptoms of the bipolar disorder. As Selena grows and faces these struggles, we are left with the outro of the song with the same title ‘My mind & Me’, which was written in her journal while she was in rehabilitation center.

There are a lot of things as a listener you’d notice in the song from the way it was composed, recorded and written. The song starts off with stripped back piano following Selena’s vocals, later in the song we get to see a buildup of acoustic guitar. The production was kept light to pave a way for the vocals and the meaningful lyrics to be the emphasis, while the usage of the stripped back instrumentals is to speak on a raw and vulnerable level that we’re intended to be put in and alarmed of.

As the song plays, we get to experience multiple different personas of Selena, her past self, her current self, and her mind. The narrator being her current self who is continuously mentioning her past self through lyrics like “Wanna hear a part to my story? I tried to hide in the glory”, while also alarming us that her story is not done yet, and she is still evolving as a person (her current self). The third persona we get introduced to in the song is her mind, through the background vocals and the piano notes at the beginning of the song, they’re both a key element that sets the theme of the song. These 2 characteristics, play a big role in impacting the lyrics going back and forth resembling how your mind overthinks while thoughts can keep running in around, feeling anxious and unable to breathe (anxiety attack), confirming the unsettlement to the lyrics “My mind and me, we don’t get along sometimes” later following it with line “And it gets hard to breathe”.

In the second verse we get to experience Selena overthinking, even when she is talking about her fight with her mind, she is still self-doubting whether she should confront it or not with questions and excuses. First line we get to see her question negative outcomes and excuses “It’s hard to talk and feel heard when you always feel like a burden, Don’t wanna add to concern I know they already got”. But immediately follows a positive outcome and a possibility of ‘what could happen?’ with line “But if I pull back the curtain, then maybe someone who’s hurtin’, Will be a little more certain they’re not the only one lost”. In general, we see her grow as a person and improve herself while still being the imperfect Selena.

What also correlates with the lyrical content in the verses and especially the chorus, is her amazing breath control. while in lines where she gets reminded of her past, her voice gets narrower giving the feeling of being choked, but later at the end of each line, we get the feeling of relief. The relief can be noticed when her voice gets wider and calmer, almost as if she is her letting out and coming to terms with things, in other words she is confronting her mind and making amends.

The relationship Selena is trying to unravel with her mind is depicted as dark, full of layers she hasn’t uncovered and swayed away from doing so. We can notice that in the pre-chorus where she says, “I’m constantly, Tryna fight somethin’ that my eyes can’t see”, this line confirms the struggle she is going through not being able to come to terms or not knowing what is it that you’re dealing with, due to the thought being pushed down into the dark. We get teased of that darkness in depth by looking at the cover art of the single, where the area of forehead is dark covered with shadows while other features like her eyes are not; this contrast creates a sense of isolation and distance between Selena and her mind, which also adds to the nature of her relationship with it, full of the unknown.

Whether you’re a follower of Selena Gomez or just listened to the song after watching the documentary, we can agree that a newer perspective has been unveiled, not just to us but to Selena herself. She described this moment as a chapter of her life that is valuable into making her who she is today, a time capsule that was once words on a journal, to something the world can play on their phones at any given time.

Photo credits to Interscope Records(Selena Gomez)/Apple TV