Things I’ve Learned From Listening to Taylor Swift

I am a huge Taylor Swift fan; always have and always will be and I feel like she gets a really bad rap for no reason. The two most common complaints I get about her are a) all her songs are the same (untrue) and b) all her songs are basically about her messed up relationships. However, to me that’s what makes her songs so freakin’ relatable. She dated a jerk, I dated a jerk and now I have a song to sing along to while I’m going through the break-up. How can this be a negative? Furthermore, I’m not sure what T. Swift songs y’all be listening to but her lyrics are sweet and clever and very insightful. I might be in the minority but I think she truly is a gifted songwriter and her lyrics are what I love about her songs so much. This chick has a song for every mood; she’s like the Drake of country music, basically. Anyway, here are a few take home points I always got after a T. Swift jam session that I thought I’d share with you guys, so read on even if it’s only so you can laugh at me attempting to find deeper meanings in a Taylor Swift song.

1. Don’t ever settleIf the dude you’re dating isn’t worth it; kick him to the curb and don’t look back is the message I always got from Taylor. On the other hand, even if the guy is perfect in every single way imaginable, if you just don’t feel that spark then keep searching until you find the right one. Love is not meant to be ordinary and in many ways I always got a Carrie Bradshaw type of vibe from many of T. Swift’s songs (incidentally, she also always gets a bad rap unnecessarily. Is it the curly hair? Do people have a vendetta against girls with curls?) Wait for the guy that you can definitively say is “the best thing that’s ever been mine”. 
2. Breaking-up is hard to doThis may seem really obvious but honestly it was through Taylor I understood the intricacies of break-ups and the barrage of conflicting feelings which come along with it. You can love someone with all your heart and yet know that it just isn’t meant to be, or alternately you could have thought that this was the guy you were going to marry and then one day he just changes his mind (like poor little, red-headed Abigail in Fifteen– if you don’t know the song please YouTube it right now; it’s profound). Sometimes a guy will just stop calling for no reason and suddenly you find yourself in that position of having to get over a breakup-not-breakup because you were never actually together. Regardless of the situation, the point is that you need to feel all these emotions as deeply as possible; go through them, experience them and own them because that is the only way you will get past it and you become a better person for it. I’m probably reading way too far into some country songs but I’m an English major, I can’t help it.

    

3. Be FearlessNothing worth telling ever happened to the girl who waited for things to happen to her. At some point you have to be able to confront your fears, whether it’s leaving your little town for the big city or letting love happen to you again after having your heart broken. Life is a big, scary place and there will be countless instances where we are confronted with situations that make us sick to our stomach but you can’t be afraid to take a leap of faith; Taylor Swift songs make me feel like taking that leap. Many of her songs have this underlying just-go-for-it vibe so when you are having one of those moments where you are confronted with something that you are super afraid of, listen to a couple T. Swift songs and I guarantee you will shut your eyes and send that text or skinny-dip or whatever crazy thing it may be. 
4. Someone out there is going through exactly what you areNo matter how many people dislike Taylor Swift, the reason her songs are hits with angsty teens (and young adults!) is because she gets what it’s like to feel everything so deeply which basically comes with the territory of growing up. I guarantee there are at least 5 Taylor Swift songs that you know exactly what she’s singing about, whether it’s that tentative feeling of hope when you finally meet someone you click with after a long time of being single or watching the love your life being stuck in a dead-end relationship when they should be with you. We all know what Taylor means, whether we care to admit it or not and I think that speaks to the universality of human emotion; there is always something in someone that you will be able to relate to. (Again, maybe I’m extrapolating but the girl is a visionary!)