Tuirse croí – literally, ‘tiring of the heart’ – is a wearing down of the spirit or the soul or whatever you want to call it. It’s not really a state that’s easy to define or classify as it changes all the time, depending on circumstances, and tends to be driven by the intangibles in our lives (pressure to succeed, familial expectations, societal expectations etc.).

In some ways, it’s similar to another term ‘lagar spride’ (literally ‘weakness of the spirit’) which is the official translation for the English word ‘depression’. Both terms absolutely suck.

Lagar spride uses the word ‘weakness’ which is hardly positive or supportive. The English word – depression – is more of a clinical term which has been incorporated into everyday speech and gives the impression of a ‘drop’ in ‘spirits’ that needs to be remedied.

In my limited experience, tuirse croí is brought on through a gradual erosion of a person’s self-confidence by events or circumstances outside of that person’s control. In that respect, the Irish language concept is so much better than the English one because in Irish you’d say tá tuirse croí orm / tá tuirse croí air (I have tuirse croí on me/ he has tuirse croí on him). This really incorporates the understanding that it’s a transitory thing that’s ‘on you’, not a specific state of being.

In modern society, tuirse croí seems increasingly because, I suspect, as individuals we’re exposed to more intangible pressures than at any other time in the history of humankind (through the constant pressure of connection with mobile phones, saturation by social media, marketing etc.). I’m certainly no expert in these matters but I can’t help thinking that the Irish approach to understanding these pressures and issues would be so much better than what exists in the English-speaking world at present.

And, no – before you ask – fortunately, níl tuirse croí orm.