...Aaand this is where I go to yell into the Void.

I feel like a less-surface theme of the show is that they’re all in a situation where they have been forced into bad patterns by forces outside their control - Chidi has SEVERE anxiety; Eleanor was forced by abuse and neglect to adopt a self-centered attitude from early childhood and, like many people with traumatic pasts, responds by not dealing with difficult emotions; Jason was very overtly raised in an environment where he got no education and all his models for behaviour were criminal and/or self-destructive; and Tahani has been raised in an environment where everything is performative and she is shot down for any genuine expression of unhappiness or non-material want. Just as Michael and Janet are made one way but changed by their experiences, the moral of the story is that things outside your control shape you but you can move away from them. That could easily be really insulting, in a sort of ‘just get over it’ way, but the idea isn’t that they change solely because they decide to be better - all six of them change because their circumstances change and give them the OPPORTUNITY to be better, because they’re finally given the support system they lack.

OBSESSED🩷

I think one of the kindest things you can do for people with various mental health struggles is just... let people back into your life after they've been absent for a while.