I think it's important- because much bullshit is spoken about it, and we are likely to see a lot more of it as the planet slowly hands our poison back to us in spades.
I said a few days ago that I felt most of the species is bi-polar in nature.
I have not been diagnosed as such or anything...but my research leads me to conclude that I have many of the features of the so-called 'illness'.
In fact, I think to a certain degree we all have it.
I was chatting with a friend last night- someone I trust- & she agreed with me.
She comes from a place of pure compassion- has admitted that she has 'not given up on humans'- & of course this much is clear, in her thought, word and deed.
I'm about half and half; sometimes I have given up on them...other times, not.
I'm with Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, as indicated in his amazing poem, "Ill Humour";
Enough to drive you crazy!
Time and again I swear to God
I'm finished! through! with people.
They're God's affair. Their own affair.
Especially the devil's. But then I see a human face
And - back in love with people
I feel exactly the same.
Depending on how I feel, what sort of day I've had, and what fresh hell it delivered unto me
But my friend...
Nary a harsh word uttered against her brethren.
100% unshakable faith in her species.
Would that I could muster such unrelenting faith.
Too many cruel things have they rendered unto nature for me to be so totally forgiving.
And yet?
Some days I feel as though I can be.
Like I said...depends on the day.
How many among us not actual practicing, card carrying saints can say otherwise?
But my friend can.
She talks the talk...& walks the walk. The walk so very few of us can do.
I know I struggle with it.
But in order to run...even fly...we have to learn to walk.
I trust her...because she has persisted with me.
She has seen my passion, my intensity...& my loathing for deception, duplicity and lies that seems also to be a feature of human behaviour.
I have treated her...harshly...as a result of my abhorrence for any kind of lies or subterfuge...
& in the process dismissed her unfairly. She reminded me of exercising care in what might seem like dishonesty- but is a mere matter of cultural difference. A cultural difference, or a difference in interpretation, or perspective in the wrong hands can be dynamite.
She saw it in me, had the patience to lead me through it to a better place of understanding.
I have a lot of respect for that.
In my opinion...if you have been hasty in your judgement with a person...& you dismiss them, and they return to try to repair the damage done by the exuberance of your righteous indignation...
That says a lot to me.
She saw something in me that was worth persisting with...& only a true mental case with no chance of redemption would dismiss someone like that again without working the issues through.
THAT is a gift.
This is all important to understand, if we are to continue with the phenomena that is mental illness.
Because it sets a keynote in terms of patience.
I know first hand the importance of patience...& I try every day to be patient with others.
All I ask is that you be patient with me...& what I regard in myself to be NOT an illness or an affliction...but simply a peculiar personality trait.
& hence...not something to necessarily be rectified.
I admit...I have anger issues; the reasons I have gone into many times in previous blogs.
I am working on them.
Many (most?) people are time bombs waiting to go off.
Attuned and fine tuned to be on the lookout for the slightest hint of sabotage.
It's curious; we are beings who often loathe ourselves with a breathtaking passion...
& yet if anyone else dares to support our view of ourselves by attacking us?
We explode.
We are complicated, contradictory beings, for sure.
Further to this...we are at all times on the lookout for dishonesty.
In fact, you could argue we regard it as a full time job- mainly in my view, because it is the one thing we fear most in ourselves.
We are so sensitive to it, largely I think because we have seen the damage this conduct has done in our own lives. At least- this is the case in my own case.
Hence- in order that we do not see this damage repeated outside ourselves, we smite it.
Swiftly, decisively.
Arguably hastily, in some cases.
On FB...this is known as blocking.
Recently...an ex-friend of mine said of me, "you burn bridges like a pyromaniac."
& of course- this came from a woman with severe mental issues, who was unwilling or unable to deal with those issues...or anything else I might urge her to do...
because the mentally ill will not be told.
How many times have you heard an ill person refuse to take their meds because they are 'fine now'...when it is obvious to anyone else they are not???
Now...I don't dismiss what people with a mental disorder say outright.
Because very often, they are people who have SEEN the truth...& it has put a zap on their brain from which many do not recover.
When we confront the lies we have lived...the inauthentic lives we have led in order to not rock the social boat that has carried us on the seas of cultural expectation & obligation...
We often capsize when we see how far we have drifted from the shores of our own inner truth.
So? These people often have valuable things to say.
I burn bridges like a pyromaniac?
Possibly.
But I don't see the point of leaving a damaged, dangerous bridge left standing.
Why approach a bridge in disrepair and attempt to cross it again?
So...if I see any evidence of damage in a person...
DAMAGE I SIMPLY HAVE NO HOPE OF EITHER FURTHER TRAVERSING OR REPAIR...
Like a damaged bridge, I will no longer step out upon it.
Such a person? I let them go.
WHY??
Let me tell you.
I am NOT a doctor.
Or a psychiatrist.
Nor would I want to be.
These people have just as many- if not more- issues than their patients.
I am NOT an authority on mental illness.
Nor do I CLAIM to be.
I would no more offer advice on someones mental issues than I would perform brain surgery on an aneurysm with a Stanley knife.
I am simply not qualified.
When someone indicates severe mental issues to me?
I am as patient as I am able to be.
But people...
THIS IS SERIOUS.
We are talking about people's MINDS!
Their LIVES!!
If it becomes obvious that a friend is experiencing severe mental issues...
(& you know what I'm talking about. Obsessive tendencies, inability to talk about certain issues without triggers being set and them going off on rants, losing their temper with you over issues that anyone else would regard as petty...anger and abuse...
and it tends to go on...
and on...
and on...)
You do NOT have to persist.
Nor should you.
You will only damage yourself, and enable them by persisting.
UNLESS YOU ARE TRAINED PHYSICIAN AND HAVE ENTERED INTO A CONTRACT OF THERAPY...
you have an obligation to DECLINE.
Simply opt out.
say no.
You OWE it to the person.
And DO NOT be tempted to entertain such notions as,
'oh what if he/she does something to her/himself?
I could NEVER live with myself!'
No.
What if you failed to step out of the picture, in in the course of one of your exchanges, that person BLOWS THEIR BRAINS OUT ALL OVER THE KEYBOARD?
For some people...there is NOTHING you can do.
They are in such a profound state of emotional and mental turmoil...
there is probably nothing ANYONE could do for them.
That is sad...but true.
The saddest thing of all?
Is that many of these people are masters of duality.
My father was a 'street angel, house devil' as Gothe put it.
He was a rabid sociopath and wrought severe emotional and physical harm within the family...
& yet to anyone else?
he was nice as pie.
A swell guy.
Sadly...you will not only meet these people...
& they will allow their issue to run rampant on YOUR FB page and PM board...
But when you have dealt with them?
They will go running to others to tell them about their unceremonious, unwarranted and profoundly unfair 'blocking'.
Anyone with any measure of mental health will take the blocking as a sign that compatibility is not an option...let it go...& move on.
But the mentally ill will hang onto it FOREVER.
They will run to their friends, bleat to them...
Maybe even have those friends contact you, asking
'what did he/she do'???
What they really mean is 'what did YOU do?'
Because in all likelihood... they have appeared to be perfectly sane in their wounded pride and indignation at the injustice, and told THEIR friends (often mutual friends) of how they have been dreadfully wronged.
& before you know it...the enabling continues, when they ask YOU what is wrong with YOU.
Some people simply don't mix.
that is a fact.
I might be a wonderful friend to you...
But to another?
I might simply not mix.
The chemicals simply do not gell.
Why persist if it simply doesn't work out between you?
What...are there no other people out there to meet?
Of course there are.
If it 'aint working...don't break it even more.
Walk away.
THIS is called better mental health.
For everybody.
& if someone keeps at you...the cycle of illness perpetuating...until it pulls everyone else into the spin cycle as well...
If you feel yourself being pulled into a mix you do not want to be in?
If it is unhealthy?
You have an obligation to close the lid and WALK AWAY.
You have your OWN dirty laundry to concentrate on...
& the saddest thing of all?
This blog of mine...these thoughts...
might all be the delusion of a man with profound and irreversible mental illness.
I might have the dirtiest laundry of all.
You never really know.
I have already confessed I am from questionable stock.
So?
Bottom line?
If I EVER hurt or harm you...
Physically or emotionally in thought, word or deed...
& you cannot take it anymore...
I have told you what to do.
SO DO IT.
Close the lid, and walk away.
