Maverick City Music’s Naomi Raine On Learning To ‘Step Into New Seasons Gracefully’

Mental health struggles can sneak up when things seem, at least from the outside, to be right in track. Such was the case for Naomi Raine, breakout star from Grammy-winning worship music collective Maverick City Music, who chronicles her experience last year with depressive episodes on her new debut solo album, aptly titled Journey.

“I think it was Biggie who said, ‘More money, more problems.’ Sometimes we believe that when you have success that is going to be the answer to all your problems and wrongfully blame our financial situation and where we are in terms of reaching our goal as the reason we are not happy. And I just don’t think it’s accurate,” Raine says.

“I thought when I was struggling to pay bills that was the thing. Now I recognize that most wounds, money can’t heal. And when you get to a certain position and your dreams are realized and you think you found the answer to what you thought your problems were, you actually have to step back and look at it again and realize most of this was just some internal character stuff and mental stuff. And you have to learn how to step into new seasons gracefully.”

Raine’s depression manifested itself in several ways.

“I stayed in the bed. When I was home, I was in bed. And it took a lot to drag myself out. I didn’t know what I wanted to eat. Things that were normal were just exhausting at that point,” she says. “And I wanted to drink. A lot. At one point, I realized, it was a probably two-week span and I was drinking every night. And I’m not drinking with people, l’m drinking alone. And I’m like, ‘Hmmm, this has moved from something social and fun to I need to drink in order to go to bed.’ It wasn’t something I really wanted to admit, even to myself.”

After some encouragement from a concerned friend, she began to engage in some deep introspection. “A lot of changes were happening. I had just recently found more success with Maverick City and that was beautiful, but some of our relationships were changing as a result, and some of them were changing without my control. Like, some people didn’t want to be my friend. I was also having to be out of the house more often and was dealing with the transitions and readjusting home life and family life, and that was difficult.”

Ultimately, her internal journey brought her back to music, and not only what she was working on with Maverick City but some songs of her own she’d been working on for more than five years. The songs now started pouring out, their lyrics soaked in vulnerability. Single Not Ready was among the first songs she returned to. “I just prayed, let me write from where I am and when that happened I was like, ‘Oh, I have to put out Journey,’” she says.

“I’d been thinking about solo work but I was just doing it as it came along,” Raine adds. “There’s been a lot of evolution of the songs, some I’ve had to rework and repurpose sonically. And now I have more of the story. I know more of where I am, and there’s been more development and as I developed.”

Raine says she’s been surprised to discover that as well as serving as a personal catharsis, the album is striking a chord with many of her fans.

“I thought people were going to me more like, ‘I don’t understand this. Why are you doing this?’ But people are like, ‘This Is exactly what I’m going through. I can relate to this. Thank you so much for being vulnerable, thank you for being honest, thank you for being real.’ I am overwhelmed by the response because I just didn’t… I didn’t know everybody was going to be there,” she says.

“Most of my fan base are Christians and I think sometimes Christians, we don’t have grace for humanity. I think God didn’t just create our spirits. He made us human, so I think it’s important that we’re allowed to be human. I was a good robot. I was able to do the right things but still feel terrible. But now I have a piece I didn’t have before. I am free, like for real, and I’m OK with me.”

While she’s not 100 percent free from her mental health struggles, Raine says, “I’m at a strong 88 or 92 nowadays.” Some of that stems from a more mindful wellness routine, which begins with purposefully staying off social media when she first wakes up.

“I wait at least two hours, because it distracts me from focus. The first thing I do is I pray. I say three to five things I’m grateful for. Gratitude is important. From there I jump on a morning meeting with my team. And that helps me, the routine of it. That’s while I’m on tour. Before that I was taking a walk, and just letting in the nature—birds chirping, the greenery, smelling the morning dew. All that was so good for me.”

Another key anchor is connection. “I started strengthening my friendships and not being so isolated. I call my friends, ask ‘How are you doing?’ I had become super isolated and only speaking to people if it was work or if they needed something from me. I stopped a lot of that and started to really be a person and a friend.”

Hollywood & Mind is a recurring column that lives at the intersection of entertainment and wellbeing, and features interviews with musicians, actors, athletes and other culture influencers who are amplifying conversation and action around mental health.