After being called on the negativity in my recent posts, I’m questioning my philosophy. To date, I’ve committed to being open about my true spiritual and mental condition; when I’ve been excited and confident it has come through in my writing, and when I’ve been discouraged and pessimistic my words have reflected those feelings. Between May of 2009 and January of this year, my only public forum was this blog. Since I’ve looked at this site as an online journal, it has made sense to report the ups and downs of my mental condition. It seemed consistent with what I read in other mental health blogs, and it fit the pattern of all my personal interactions: throughout my entire adult life I’ve been very open about my problems and struggles.
More recently, I’ve started writing for the Bipolar Advantage blog on PsychCentral, and I also gave a public presentation about mental health and consciousness. I see now that presenting a message of growth and recovery to the world may mean accepting the burden of being a good example. Is it fair to write about how well one can do by attending to humility, acceptance, ego suppression, etc., and then spill out all my neurotic fears and insecurities? Am I undercutting the message by my own inability to live it perfectly? Until recently few people read this blog or knew my name. But one of my Bipolar Advantage posts went through a short run of being viewed over eight hundred times a day. Although that is a pittance compared with the kind of readership truly popular voices attract, it still makes me far more public than ever before. I’ve been getting comments and personal emails that show me people appreciate my message. Is my greatest obligation at this point to the elevated consciousness that I hope to maintain and help others reach? Or do I still have the luxury of admitting that I’m a flawed, insecure person who sometimes feels enlightened and sometimes doesn’t?
The most important question is: what will most help others? Do people get more out of believing in a teacher who never falters, or out of seeing that another struggling human manages to find moments of clarity? Am I on the road to becoming some kind of leader, of all things? In the past I looked at myself as a loner, a tormented soul who thinks a lot about life and then writes. Do I need to rethink my role in the world? Does the gift of speaking publicly about growth comes with a price tag?
These are all questions I am asking myself today. I don’t expect to answer them right now. My hope is to gradually gain enough emotional maturity that a state of insight will predominate, and I can write honestly about my feelings while sustaining a positive message. I appreciate those who have confronted me about my recent complaints (you know who you are), and set me thinking about what path to take from here. It may turn out that the best way for me to achieve the improved state of mind I aspire to is to edit out the negativity in my thoughts and writing. Maybe maintaining a positive message will help me maintain a positive direction. This is not to say I want to write only things that are sweet and light; it’s not a question of unvarying happiness. But it might be best for both me and my audience if I at least remained committed to looking at life as a worthwhile adventure, in spite of its pain and disappointments. Like I heard someone say recently, no matter how dark and cloudy the weather, the sun is always shining.
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1
jss at http://jssfive.blogspot.com
Interesting thoughts. Sounds like you’re trying to decide whether to be yourself or turn yourself into something that better fit what others want you to be. It’s an interesting dilemma, one that any person who ends up in any kind of leadership role has to work out. Good luck with that.
By the way the sun may still be shining when it’s dark and cloudy but that doesn’t mean it isn’t dark and cloudy.
Posted at March 5, 2010 on 8:44pm.
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Colette Power at http://YourWebsite
Hi Will,
I would agree with the above: most certainly interesting thoughts.
As far as I can ascertain from your writing, you are in a perfect and most unusual position to offer insights into depression. Your invitations to contribute to other websites and make presentations attest to this. And yes, I would agree that you can offer leadership to others whilst remaining authentic to what depression is. Depression management isn’t easy to implement, even if you have the luxury of knowing effective strategies. Honesty about this is reassuring for all of us as we struggle to find our way. You have an extensive knowledge base on psychiatric illness from a scientific as well as a philosophical background. All of this and you know what depression is in very real terms…to say the least. You are a survivor and a success. It’s important to be authentic. If you didn’t have bouts of low mood, you wouldn’t have depression and you wouldn’t be in a position to write about it. But, as you have stated, depression can be controlled and there are even benefits to having depression – if you choose to perceive the condition that way. So, I think it’s important to include bouts of low mood but with a metacognitive kind of awareness of what is happening. That would be interesting to share.
I would make a few modest suggestions for your blog.
1) Never apologise for posting a blog, or for how long that blog is
2) Never interpret the volume of your readership as indicative of the value of your writing. If you want to expand your readership, isn’t that a marketing issue?
3) Never doubt your credibility as having something extraordinary to say – if writing helps you too, it’s only win-win.
So…I look forward to further posts from you. I’d be interested in the whole issue of neuroplasticity, for example.
Best Wishes and keep writing!!!
Colette
Posted at March 6, 2010 on 12:38am.
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Will at http://willspirit.com
Colette–
I’ll try to get to neuroplasticity, which is without doubt important. Thank you for the suggestions about (in essence) self-doubt and self-effacement. As for marketing, I’ve never placed emphasis on it. I see slow progression in the interest shown in my work even without much effort to bring in an audience. Since I don’t really know where I’m going, I’m in no hurry to get there. On the other hand, at my low points it’s easy to use numbers as clubs to make myself feel like the whole project is pointless (i.e., self-doubt.)
–Will
Posted at March 6, 2010 on 6:05am.
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Will at http://willspirit.com
jss-
Good point about the sun, et. al. What I meant (to the extent I thought it through) was that depression is a state of mind. This doesn’t invalidate the experience, but it is a kind of mental clouding. If I allow myself to believe that light is gone rather than understanding that I am simply unable to see it, I feel worse about being alive. My goal for the next depression is to feel the sadness, but continue to see the value in life. To do so would mean recognizing that depression is a quality of mind, not Earth.
–Will
Posted at March 6, 2010 on 6:09am.
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lostinamaze at http://inamaze.wordpress.com
Life for me is about trying to find a balance and trying to balance the opposites. Negative vs positive, light vs dark, up vs down, etc. I learn the most by seeing human-ness. When I read what you have written the word ‘negative’ doesn’t enter my mind. I am reading about a person who unfortunately struggles like me although maybe not in the same way. I am reading about someone who is trying to find a balance. I personally cannot relate to someone who never falters. That doesn’t give me any hope at all. How can I relate to them and they to me. And how will I know if a message is positive without its opposite?
I enjoy your insights towards life.
Posted at March 8, 2010 on 10:20pm.
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Will at http://willspirit.com
lostinamaze–
Thank you for that. Personally, I don’t learn nearly as much from people who seem to have evolved above the fray as I do from those who continue to engage their demons and talk about the struggle. It is good to hear that others feel the same way. The importance of balance prompted me to include the word in my new tagline. That change, by the way, came about because of prompting by a visitor; we all help one another along this road by reading, responding, thinking, and growing.
–Will
Posted at March 9, 2010 on 7:39am.
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Lili at http://YourWebsite
Be yourself. The end. One message may not work for everyone. You can walk, ride, fly,bike, or motorcycle yourself somewhere but in the end you get there. Not everyone appreciates a certain kind of communication. Thus they need to find whatever works for them. You stay true to what works for you.
Posted at March 26, 2010 on 4:17pm.