On April 28, 2017, rapper Logic released a song called "1-800-273-8255" ahead of his third studio album, which would be released a week later.

I was never a huge fan of Logic, not because his music wasn't good, but because I just never got into it. When the song was released it kind of flew under the radar in terms of what was being given airplay. As the summer approached we were in the beginning stages of Ed Sheeran's third album successes, the summer of The Chainsmokers, and Kendrick Lamar's hijacking of the rap game. As I drove around in the piece of crap my old job referred to as "the company van," I was exposed to the same twenty songs and Logic's new one was not one of those.

I first started hearing about this song when the video was released in mid-August. I think that's when most people, aside from Logic's true fanbase, also started hearing about this song, but I'm not entirely sure and I don't want to assume anything. All I know is, I didn't want to listen to the song.

There was something that was extremely uncomfortable, for me, about a song that was named after the Suicide Prevention Hotline. I can't really put my finger on why that was so uncomfortable. I mean, there are people that literally attempted to commit suicide and people that are still alive thanks to that phone number, and from the looks of it, they're the people who advocated this song the most.

I'm someone who suffers from depression and anxiety and has had to deal with extreme circumstances multiple times in my life. I've thought horrible thoughts and I've been down the road that I'm assuming all of those people have been down. However, I've honestly never gotten to the point where I thought that ending it was the best option, so I really don't know what it feels like to be there. So I'm not sure why I didn't want to listen to the song. I felt like it was almost offensive but not to me. It was offensive to the people that had been there. It's pretty safe to say that I was wrong in my assumption.

I finally listened to the song, watched the music video, and watched the live performance at the VMAs (I had walked out of the room when I was watching it live over the summer) on January 1st (took me long enough).

The song was beautiful. Logic's words were extremely relatable to me. The song, in general, was relatable to me. It goes from the protagonist wanting to end their life to having a desire to keep on going. There are lyrics in there that pretty much cut me open such as "I'm hurting deep down but can't show it" and the fairly obvious "it can be hard, it can be so hard." Those are obviously two things that I can relate to.

The video was a whole different battle. For starters, bravo to whoever cast this damn thing because they did a phenomenal job. But the storyline and the progression of the video was just unreal. And again, the storyline is not something that I can relate to. I have no idea what it's like to be gay or to have to deal with the cruelty of high schoolers when they find out that you're gay. I don't know what it's like to have to face your parents and tell them something like that (you get the point).

I imagine that what the main protagonist goes through is probably what happens to a certain extent. People are extremely cruel. A person can only take so much emotional trauma. When the protagonist gets to his breaking point and starts pointing the pistol around, I actually cried. I am not the least bit ashamed to admit it. It really got to me because I realized that so many people go through that every day, for a number of reasons and it's horrifying to think about.

Watching the live performance of the song was another tough task. It started off like any other live performance did but then as the song progressed, actual suicide survivors came out on the stage. It was honestly one of the most incredible things I've ever seen. And naturally, just like in the video, when Khalid's part comes (the protagonist starts pointing the gun around), everyone really started to get emotional. The camera flashed to Logic's wife, Jessica Andrea Hall, and then to Julia Michaels, both wiping tears out of their eyes. This part really hit everyone hard.

And then to top it all off, Logic gave one of the best speeches of 2017 (which to be fair, isn't hard when you consider who gave the majority of those speeches). This also happened at a time where the music world was mourning the loss of Chester Bennington. And let's not forget that Kesha also introduced the performance and given what she's been through over the course of the last seven or eight years, that was truly beautiful.

I think the statistic at the time of the VMAs performance was that calls to the suicide prevention hotline went up by 50%. That's just amazing. And I think Logic's goal was to spread some sort of awareness to this particular situation, but I don't think he thought that this would be as impactful as it was.

He says in his speech that he wanted to shed light on something that the media doesn't want to talk about and that is mental health. When listening to him say that (although it was obviously five months later), I fist pumped. I literally just finished writing a paper about major depressive disorder and mental health for my abnormal psychology class. It was a ten-page paper and it was a final, and for 75% of it, I absolutely trashed the general population and the media for its treatment and portrayal of people with mental issues, disabilities, and handicaps. I thought I failed the paper to be honest because that wasn't really the assignment, not that I cared.

My ex-girlfriend (whom I've mentioned in my writing a few times), called me a child and told me to grow up when I had the worst anxiety attack I've ever had. Looking back on my life as a whole, that is easily the meanest and most hurtful thing anyone has ever said to me, and believe me, people have said some hurtful shit. Logic made it clear that he was standing up for people who suffer from these issues and he did a phenomenal job. The song, the speech, and the overall message are something to behold.

I feel bad that I judged this song before actually listening to it. It made me uncomfortable but after listening to it, probably close to one hundred times, it's actually made me feel a whole lot better about life in general. And if that was also Logic's goal, he definitely succeeded. He shed light on a huge problem, told a great relatable story, probably saved thousands of lives, and gave people a new brand of hope.

Music has always been powerful for a lot of people. I know in my life, it's always been powerful to me. This is the most powerful message music has sent in a long time, and I feel horrible that I was so late in reaching this conclusion.