A Conversation with Dolores O’Riordan

K: Hello there.

D: (sits in the chair while she’s talking to me) Hello. Good morning. Have I persisted enough for you to take notice of me?

K: Well…coming into my dreams is one way to do it.

D: Oh, now, that’s the easy part. (smiles getting comfortable)

K: Not everyone does it. It’s been a while since that’s happened. It’s nice to see you…to meet you.

D: (nods) Likewise. It is a pleasure. How are you getting on?

K: I’m getting on pretty darn okay. Opened a book. Reading said book. I’m thinking it’s kind of a mistake. I’m emotionally invested now.

D: (chuckles and nods) Books have a way of talking to a person differently than how another person can. Same with song.

K: Now that you’re here, I’ll just put out there that I haven’t done a life review in a while.

D: (waves me off) Oh, God. I’m not looking for a life review. Absolutely not.

K: Then what are you looking for?

D: (shrugs) Is it really life reviews that you do or is it the opportunity to…give those of us the opportunity to offer something that…we didn’t know in our lives?

K: I think that comes with a life review anyway.

D: (shrugs) I guess it does, but I thought…hhmm…(pause to think) I don’t really know what I thought.

K: No one ever really does. Dead or alive.

D: (tips her chin) Quite profound of you.

K: Honored. (grins) I don’t know a lot about your music but when I thought about you, it was kind of like a Sinead O’Connor from the 90’s. You’re gorgeous.

D: Awe. Thanks very much. Thank you.

K: So, the rumor, and I’m pretty sure it was a rumor…was that you ended your life. Let’s start there.

D: It wouldn’t have been a complete surprise if I did. I was a bit fucked up at that point.

K: The bipolar?

D: That and the drinking. It was getting harder for my brain to…balance those extremes and when you live with an illness for so long and try to work with what happens to yourself as it’s continuing and progressing, a person gets tired. I got tired. I wanted silence. I wanted quiet and stillness so I was better able to connect with how I felt when I wrote or sang…played music and that did fill something in me at the start but it was harder to maintain as my mental condition deteriorated.

K: You believe your mental condition was deteriorating?

D: Yes. But I don’t believe that it was getting worse and worse. I think that my…desire to live with it and keep it at bay was slipping rapidly.

K: Wow. So, the condition was being maintained but your desire or the steps you needed to take to do that…I feel like you were getting tired of the maintenance of some sort of mental stability.

D: I was getting very tired. I thought that this idea of “normal” (finger quote) mental health was my aspiration especially with bipolar. I constantly lived in extremes, and I constantly showed extremes and it took a very special person to understand why those extremes happened but when I couldn’t find that special person or if that special person got tired and I could tell, it would cause me to react with shame. I carried a great deal of shame and anger for what I brought to relationships and connection because I understood that I wasn’t always easy to connect with.

K: I get a very distinct…I don’t know why when you came into my energy that there was this feeling of ritual or ancestry…like Pagen and I know that you were Catholic.

D: I respect the Catholic religion. I know that not everyone does. I know that people pick out the awfulness of it…and what it has done. But it was not the religion that did that. It was the people within the religion. I respected the religion. I did not have to respect the people or the power they attempted to carry using the Catholic words on their tongue. Yes, it’s political and it’s manipulative but a religion doesn’t do that. The people of the religion do that. I tend to…I have always aspired to look at the beauty in whatever it was that I was a part of. If a person is continuously drawn into the drama of politics or religion or love, it will simultaneously take their attention away from the beautiful.

K: Wow. That’s wonderfully said.

D: What you feel in the sense of the Pegan energy…that is the beautiful. That is the raw. That is the unfiltered and unfettered.

K: Ancestry also comes in. I feel a lot of ancestry from you.

D: Everyone contains that. But not everyone connects with that. I wanted to follow the line of my spirit. I wanted to follow the map and connect with all aspects of myself, personally. I wanted to understand where I came from…who I was. Not as a person or how I lived as Dolores. I wanted to know more than Dolores. I had this inkling, after I died, that I wasn’t just living as Dolores. I felt the ultimate culmination of all that I had ever been. In a religious sense, Dolores was Catholic but who was I in a spirit sense and how far did that reach?

K: Were you surprised at what you found out?

D: I felt as if…I was reading from a huge book…I was reading in a large library and simultaneously living it while reading it. The whole idea of books is an interesting thing. People read them and if it’s a good read, it captures them, and they become immersed in it like an extension of their lives…what they breathe. It’s the same here.

K: You are very Discovery of Witches energy.

D: My music…my artistry became somewhat of a prayer for me. It kept me on path and on point. I guess for anyone that wasn’t religious, their artistry would be a spell. I suppose that’s what you feel from me.

K: I think so. For sure. What do you think your music give you that the world couldn’t?

D: (nodding and biting her bottom lip) Stability. A sense of belonging. A sense of escape, sometimes. A safe space. Do you know…the only reason why I say that is because…I was all of that, but in the attempts to balance the extremes I felt…it was something that I wasn’t able to believe. My mental awareness of life was always in extremes and when someone feels as if they live extremes all the time…it doesn’t feel safe. When I wrote, I felt safe, and I would write all the time. Anything I could scribble, I would scribble because when I scribbled or wrote…especially at night…it was my safe space. I suppose that’s why I wrote and scribbled frequently. It was because I had a desperate…at times desperate…need and desire to feel safe. My music did that for me. It was somewhat of a lifeline. It was my friend and confident. I supposed that people feel that way about their journals or authors may feel that within their stories. A sense of understanding and feeling safe.

K: Wow! Amazing!!!

D: I can be honest to a fault.

K: Nev-ah!

D: (chuckles and picks something off her pants) 

K: Did you think that your voice protected you or did you think that it exposed you?

D: (raises her eyebrows) Shit.

K: Ha! I have help.

D: Good. (nods) That’s good. Can I ask you something?

K: Absolutely.

D: Do you ever feel like you have…like you would run out of questions?

K: I’ve been doing this for so long that sometimes it’s hard to come up with questions. I could, if I wanted, use standard questions…like a script but it would get repetitive. So, my interview is my curiosities as well as some help that I gather.

D: It’s good. I do believe there is a time for help and a time for personal…what comes about after the assistance which creates personal responsibility in how that’s presented.

K: For sure. Integrity in this work is huge on my list.

D: (nods and thinks while playing with her fingers) I guess, to answer your question, it would be a little of both. It would have to be.

K: Yes.

D: I was protected and exposed. If a person carries an opinion or a way of thought into the world but doesn’t feel safe just speaking it, it’s always forgiven when put in song. There may be an initial reaction to it…but the thought or the idea is let loose and, eventually, dust settles. The song protects because the tune is the energy of the truth. In the same way, song creates the exposure. I guess…it would go hand in hand. A safe place to expose yourself. It would be both. Did I rely on one more than the other for safety? I guess it would depend on what extreme I lived at the time. If I was in a manic state…and I say manic very loosely…I would expose. If I was down and in the dark, I would need protection. I suppose that’s with anything.

K: Oh, absolutely. Did you feel misunderstood?

D: Doesn’t everyone?

K: Every day.

D: (grinning) Yes. More than most, at times. I was celebrated. I was successful. I was loved. But can anyone who doesn’t live with an illness…can they really be understood completely? I don’t think they can.

K: Your diagnosis came later in life?

D: Yes.

K: Did you always live with it? And it just wasn’t diagnosed?

D: I believe so, yes.

K: Then the artistry…was the medicine for a bit?

D: It was. Sometimes…I think…the more fucked up someone is, the more creative they are.

K: Ha! What does that say about someone like me???

D: (tips her head back and laughs) There are so many more people more fucked up than you are.

K: I don’t necessarily believe being fucked up is always a bad thing.

D: I think that the way others view that is completely personal. What do people call that…a resonance?

K: Yeah. Like…if someone can understand someone else’s fucked-up-ness…they resonate with someone more and it turns…okay or safe.

D: Yes. People, in general, are a fucked-up species.

K: (laughing) Oh man, I’m gonna get my wrist slapped.

D: I don’t think so. I think that we are protected while exposing opinion.

K: Or what we see.

D: (nods) Yes.

K: Did…what do you feel like you needed most in your life that you didn’t necessarily get?

D: (thinks) Help. I think that I needed help. It was there. It existed but I was particular.

K: Did you ask?

D: That’s the point, isn’t it. A person has to ask for help to get it. I received love. I received commitment. I received…so much. Isn’t it funny or ironic that the thing we need most is what we push away or feel too much pride to receive?

K: Did people offer?

D: Yes. Absolutely. People offered. But it doesn’t matter how much is offered, a person does need to receive it. I felt like I hid a lot of what I didn’t express. I feel like I tried to numb what I didn’t want to express. When it came down to it, the drugs and alcohol were there to numb what I couldn’t express.

K: What you felt you couldn’t express or what you could?

D: What I was too…scared to express. I hated being misunderstood. By the end of my life, my expression was a result of my addictions and not my fears. Substances turned into my courage and my rest. My escape.

K: When you died, was there any intention behind it. Even the littlest?

D: Did I ever have thoughts about ending my life?

K: Yes.

D: Yes, but am I the only one? Certainly not. So many people wonder or think…at least once, if it’s worth it. Was there ideation? No. I was very conscious of the fact that I had so much to live for. Alcohol or drug use wasn’t to escape what I was living. It was trying to maintain that balance on the high tightrope of extremes that were my emotions and my thoughts. I was either walking upside down on a ceiling or I was spiraling into a whirlpool going down and down and down. Meds only work to an extent. They only worked to an extent for me. Medication are only…for me…it was a maintenance regimen. I was still required to do the work and the work was hard.

K: I’m so happy you said that. I so agree with you there. Absolutely. There is still work to be done like taking the correct dose, talking with physicians, joining groups…all of that.

D: Yes. Which…I could…I was guilty in lapsing.

K: Nah. Everyone does. For me, I think I’m better, I cancel an appointment and then wonder why the arf is everything feeling off again. Regular maintenance is super important.

D: It maintains the human spirit. It’s the help others beg for but are too lost or…stubborn to ask for it.

K: Could you be stubborn?

D: Are you joking? (laughs) All the time. I could also get angry. Very angry.

K: What do you think people romanticize about pain that they shouldn’t?

D: Oh…(nervous chuckle) so much. The tortured poet…the tortured soul…it’s sexy, isn’t it?

K: Sometimes.

D: Creating this idea that to be tortured is romantic. It adds to the alure and the mystery that people crave out of life. It’s the example of romantic alure and it places it on a stage and calls it okay because it’s dramatic and addicting to watch. It’s very dangerous. It tells people that pain sells something, and the payment is attention. The tortured don’t want payment. They crave help to escape what tortures them. They can feel stuck in some sort of middle where if they continue…they can be a leader of something and gain attention from others that, most likely, need the same help. If they are outcasts and not popular, they can self-harm. Romanticizing trauma and pain…is so dangerous. It is so dangerous to the psyche of life. Romanticizing pain makes it the whole picture of a person when it’s not the person. It’s the behavior and a critical separation to make.

K: Yes. I have to keep reminding myself about behavior vs. person and sometimes the behavior is not who they are at all. It’s the pain they’re in. For me, though, that doesn’t give them permission to be a dick.

D: (grins) No. Of course not. It does hand them responsibility for their actions regardless if there is pain or no pain. The person is the one to carry the responsibility of their behaviors as they live their lives.

K: What would you share with highly sensitive people who are creative in these times of now?

D: Keep yourself in check. Keeping yourself in check doesn’t mean that your creative abilities go away. If anything, keeping yourself in check and being responsible for your sensitivity or whatever pain you carry with you…broadens that creativity and allows it to work in amazing ways for your life. Self-responsibility has a growth effect on anyone. It matures people in unbelievable ways.

K: Do you believe that you could have taken more responsibility?

D: Responsibility is always there to take. It’s never-ending. So yes. I could have taken on way more self-responsibility. Everyone can. It’s ownership. It’s self-ownership and it’s within the daily. It changes constantly. Big or small…a lot or a little.

K: That’s big.

D: It’s huge. In a world full of blame and judgement…that sort of rhetoric…it’s a very big thing to own behavior and whatever the outcome of that behavior is…good or bad.

K: Wow. Well said!

D: Now it’s easy for me to say it. Did I live it? Not always.

K: It’s this type of situation where…hindsight…especially in spirit…is always 20/20.

D: Absolutely.

K: Was there anything that you, personally, understood about the idea of suffering that other people didn’t?

D: Personally, for me, it was in doses. Suffering, in my mind, wasn’t a general term that was across the board…the same. It was dependent on the day or the circumstance or the moment. Suffering can’t be generalized. If it was generalized, it would be more understood…wouldn’t it? But suffering isn’t understood. It’s a blanket term for the varying degrees that people find themselves suffering within. Suffering in doses and not just in general was…something that I understood as truth but felt that others didn’t always understand that in a way that I would trust they could.

K: Like a pain scale.

D: Yes.

K: Was there a cost to your…outspokenness?

D: I believe a better question would be…if I cared that there was and I didn’t. I would tell myself I didn’t. Of course there was a cost. Underneath the…sometimes tough exterior…there was sensitivity and rawness that was penetrable. I think artists, for the most part, get away with being outspoken until it disrupts some sort of proclaimed higher power. Then there’s trouble.

K: Ruffling feathers.

D: Yes.

K: Did you ever feel imprisoned in your life?

D: No. (shakes her head) If I ever felt as if I was a prisoner…I understood why…in the end, I understood why. Did I always act with that understanding? No. Was I capable? Yes. Was it more difficult? Absolutely.

K: Thank you for that. That’s amazing self-reflection. Everyone’s capable of that, I’m sure.

D: Capability comes with awareness and not everyone wants to be aware. But that, a lot of the time, comes with the harboring of personal pain…undervaluing yourself. I find people have a tendency to undervalue themselves more than value because it’s easier to do that. It’s less risky. Stirring pots isn’t so easy when something about yourself…truth…is on the line.

K: Proving to a noisy outside world.

D: Yes.

K: Is there a simple message that you want out there?

D: Simple…(laughs) simple is self-dependent.

K: True.

D: People tend to busy themselves on reflecting on the actions of others and not necessarily their own. I think that a bit of self-reflection every day would create something more. A deeper sense of awareness in a world that’s only just starting to understand that getting their shit together would be an honest first step into something peaceful. There is a busyness of concentrated effort on what’s outside of someone and not necessarily what’s inside which has a snowball effect on mental health. If it’s not self-reflection than a timely check in with yourself would be best.

K: Yes.

D: And it’s easy. Did I do right by me today? Did I do right by others today? When I wake up, will I be proud of yesterday or do I start with a clean slate today while offering apologies or asking for help…that kind of thing.

K: Wow. For sure.

D: That’s the simple. Does the action behind that equate to simplicity…not always.

K: Were you happy with all that you experienced and learned living the life as Dolores O’Riordan?

D: I got what I gave. I received what I put out. When I understood that, then I could be happy with my life. It’s just an understanding of the workings of that…I suppose that would be energy to you.

K: Yes. Yeah…what you give you receive. Again, simple in writing but action is a bit harder.

D: It is. It is.

K: So many amazing covers of Zombie. You dropped one into my lap last night.

D: The covers are because people understand the message. It was a way for people to grasp the underlying meaning and they took that as something to carry forward while adding more depth to it than I ever could. I suppose that’s the sign of the times.

K: Absolutely. I really believe that.

D: Things of the past morph with the times of now in an intricate and fascinating way. I suppose that would be something like a trendsetter or a legacy that continues to move forward with humanity.

K: Yeah.

D: And isn’t that the point of creation?

K: (laughing) You’re good.

D: Oh, well, so are you. You made me scratch my head a bit there. I’m impressed.

K: Years of practice.

D: It’s been an honor to be a part of your specialty.

K: Thanks for popping in.

D: It’s been a to-do for quite a while. Apparently, some things needed to fall back into place when I checked back.

K: Yeah. There were some things that needed to be explored, tried, done, garbaged.

D: (laughing) It’s a normal thing, for anyone. Even here.

K: That’s what I hear. Dolores, you’re beautiful and amazing and just this absolute example of bad ass strength. Teach me your ways.

D: (laughing) It’s just spell casting in a different way. We all cast our spells and stones and cards…our prayers…but it’s personal. It really is. How it manifests in the real world is the treasure.

K: Agreed. Treasures abound.

D: Very good. (smiles at me) Take care. If the invitation stands, I can come and check in.

K: Would love that. Thank you. It stands.

D: Very well and good. Until next time, then.

K: Take care, Dolores.

D: Always. To you as well.

K: Always.

Stands and leaves into shadows of a backstage while curtains close.

Images shown are representational and experiential rather than historical.