Alexander Smith quote

We hear the wail of the remorseful winds
In their strange penance. And this wretched orb
Knows not the taste of rest; a maniac world,
Homeless and sobbing through the deep she goes.
- Alexander Smith, Unrest and Childhood

Grim, but beautiful in its own right ... it's the first quote I've read that makes me feel like, with the bipolar disorder and other issues I'm dealing with, I can truly, intuitively understand what our Earth goes through ... which leads me to the understanding that our Earth is truly reflected in each of us; and to truly understand one is to understand all.


Categorized as: Manic Depressive | Nature | Psychologic | Stultiloquence

The nature of the maelstrom, p. 2

In my previous post, The nature of the maelstom, I basically said I felt like the metaphoric 'maelstrom,' that shadow's my progress and threatens at any point to suck me down and bury me, was caused by my swallowing down my emotions. I said that these emotions, in turn, attempted to swallow me down. Well, after further reflection and conversation with my therapist, I think I should modify this view; even if the implications of it make me nauseous. It turns out that there may be something like two me's, and just as surely as I see myself locked in a battle for my survival, it's possible that this other me sees things quite the same.

My therapist doesn't view all the emotions I've tried to bury these years as independent, inanimate emotions. Instead, he views them as living pieces of me, pieces I've been trying to supress, pieces that have been trying to hold on for their own survival. That seems weird to me, but I'm pretty sure I understood my therapist correctly when he explained his perspective on this. He doesn't see these emotions, or the energy they generate, as good or bad ... he sees it simply as energy that threatens to overwhelm me if I don't find a better way to handle it. So, against the imagery I've conjured up in my own mind, the maelstrom isn't really bad. In fact, I'm supposed to somehow use the energy from the maelstrom to help me sail better (again, in keeping with the sailing metaphor I've grown so fond of using for my mind) ... similar I guess to how some sailors use the currents from a storm to make extra time on a voyage.

To say I feel woefully, inadequately equipped to deal with this energy would be an understatement. I wish I could climb a mountain and psychically realease all of this supressed energy and muck into the wind with a primal roar. I accept that I can't do that ... but I don't know what the next best thing is, my therapist and I sort of ran out of time when we were talking about this, because we'd been so busy covering other grounds that he felt were more critical. But those are a matter for another post ... this post is about me's, maelstroms and how I keep from swallowing myself up like some bloated Ouroboros. Because that's what will happen if I can't stay out of the maelstrom ... a living chunk of my mind will swallow up another living chunk of my mind. I can't help but think of the matter - antimatter theory here, basically that for every particle of matter in the universe, there's an antiparticle, and when they come into contact with one another they annhillate each other (think of Marvin the Martian and his 'Earth-shattering kaboom'). I know that's the wrong reaction to have, because it's combative and antagonistic in its very nature ... I should be looking for ways to better integrate all of this, I should be seeing the potential for balance and energy. Instead, my mind is twisting in on itself like a fresh bowl of buttered noodles ... but do I stop this, do I supress this, too? Where do I draw my lines on what emotional responses to supress and what emotional responses to allow? Oh, my therapist is going to have a hell of a time with me next week.


Categorized as: Manic Depressive | Psychologic

The nature of the maelstrom

This evening it just became clear, and made so much sense to me ... I think I have at last grasped the nature of the maelstrom that shadows my progress through the waters of my mind. A key facet of my life and personality involves me swallowing down a lot of emotions, mostly negative but also positive emotions at various times. Recently I have swallowed down pretty hard on some reactions and emotional responses; and today in particular I've felt the maelstrom yawning open, trying to swallow me down. The correlation can't be ignored: what I swallow down eventually tries to swallow me down. I'm shadowing and fighting my own self. That's why, in my mental imagery, my evolving mindscape, this thing always opens up from beneath me.

With understanding the nature of this thing, I think the solution to it is also within reach: not swallowing down so much emotion, and somehow learning to express my mind in a more healthy and balanced manner. That's going to be a lot of work for me; but I've got a good therapist for a reason, the way I see it. I'm willing to row my boat, but I need a proper course heading.


Categorized as: Manic Depressive | Psychologic

The siren song

I've been in a strange place lately. It's as though I'm sailing in my metaphorical boat, powered by a wind I can't feel, with a strange keening sound and what I'm convinced (although I can't actually see it) is another maelstrom lurking beneath the surface of the water, shadowing my progress. I'm trying to smile in the face of all this, but I it's difficult. This isn't without its value, though - it seems in this state of mind that my head is clear, and that things sort of make sense to me.

An example is the siren song. Continuing with the sailing metaphor, the siren song is something I view as tempting me to my own ruin, something that tempts me to sail my boat right into the rocks. Right now, it seems mostly confined to binges ... eating, smoking (I quit smoking a few years ago, but the temptation to start back up again has been particularly strong since I've been feeling better). My task, then, is to recognize this song as soon as it begins, and engage all of my will in resisting ... so far, it seems my best solution is to simply sail my boat back out of range of the siren song ...  I've discovered that distance, though no immunity, is a help in resisting unwanted temptations.

Another thing that is becoming more clear to me is the nature of the 'boat' I'm in. I thought about this at some length today, and it has to be something in my mind that is less dense than water, yet strong and flexible enough to withstand the waves. Despite various accusations to the contrary, I don't have wood in my head. That my boat is made from thoughts of some kind is clear to me, and has been for some time. For a while, I was tempted to say my metaphorical boat was made of hope; but I don't think this is the case. Hope for me has never been all that strong, and has proven a fleeting and fickle friend. Knowledge, however, is much stronger for me; and I think my boat is built from the knowledge that things can improve, and the knowledge of how things 'feel' when they have improved. I believe I lost that knowledge sometime during my battle with psychiatric illness and injury; and when I lost this knowledge, I delivered myself right into the churning waters of manic depression. When I experienced an improvement, something that was more 'real' than hypomania, I regained that lost knowledge and found myself on its forecastle.

Understanding this gives me more strength, and it gives me more resolve to safeguard what I've recently gained. I have an appointment with my therapist tomorrow, and I plan to run all of this by him to get his reaction and insights. What I'm interested in are ideas as to how I might more effectively outsail my companion, the maelstrom; and ideas as to how I might better resist - or defeat - the siren song.


Categorized as: Manic Depressive | Psychologic

Favorite posts

In past blogs, I've selected ten of my favorite posts - posts I felt reflected either myself, my blog, or just posts I really liked - and posted links to them from my navigation menus. I would like to do the same with this blog, but this time with a twist: I would like to go with only five posts, and I would like the majority of them to be reader favorites. The reason I'm doing it this way is, one, I'm genuinely interested in what you will pick; and two, I don't use Web counters or trackers to keep logs on which posts receive the most hits.

I've picked one already, and linked it in the sidebar menu labeled "-Categories / Favorite Posts" - that leaves four more posts to be picked by you readers :-)  The post I picked was "Photo - Immortal Moo" ... I owed it to the poor cow, whose fate I never did learn.


Categorized as:  Questions to Readers | Stultiloquence

Visit with the therapist

My therapist was back from his two-week vacation, bicycling along the Rhine river; but I got the sense in our session at several points that he wasn't 'all' back, that some parts of him were still out there on his bicycle. Still, there was enough of him left over to conduct a session, and that's what we did today. Some of you might remember me writing last week about sailing my happy little metaphorical boat right into a metaphorical maelstrom, and only coming through it by luck. That was the main point I wanted to address with the therapist, and I'm still not quite sure what to make of it all. My main concern is that I'm still no closer to identifying the causes of these episodes, which means I'm no closer to being able to predict them.

My therapist first congratulated me on having figured a way through this episode. The congratulations sort of fell on deaf ears, because I don't believe I figured out anything - I just outlasted it. When I explained this to my therapist, he smiled and said that outlasting the episode is one way of figuring out how to get through it. I guess I can see the logic of that; but at the same time, had that episode lasted much longer, I don't know where I would be right now. I will probably take this up with my psychiatrist, who will probably restore me to my original dosage of lithium, and possibly up the amitriptyline. But if that's what it takes to keep from having another brush with the maelstrom, so be it.

We also discussed photography, and the direction mine was going in. Earlier this week, my mind was pretty much made up. What I viewed as a successful trip to the Hannover zoo put a lot of things in perspective for me, and I had it in mind to keep photography as an enjoyable hobby. I had so much fun behind the camera that day that I simply couldn't imagine putting that all at risk. My therapist heard all of this, and pointed out that there is a degree of freedom that is maintained by keeping it a hobby. I won't take pictures because I have to, but because I want to. He pointed out, with all the freedoms I've either been denied or denied myself in life, that this was an important theme, and not to be overlooked. He brought up examples of musicians who, after being 'discovered' and having their rights 'secured' by recording companies, lost all love and passion for what they were doing. He even discussed with me his own struggles with keeping the balance between the psychology and people he's passionate about, and the day-to-day administrative nonsense that comes along with pursuing his passion professionally. He did say that, if I were to go ahead and pursue photography as a profession, I should make sure I keep a personal project of my own going, to maintain the freedom and hobby aspect of photography ... this is advice I'm pretty sure I've encountered before, as I look through the comments section of this earlier post ;-)

Nothing that was said, though, really swayed my mind away from my earlier decision. I don't think I will try to apprentice myself as a photographer. At the most, I might go ahead and build a Web site to sell my photography from ... basically turn this into a hobby that pays for itself, while still maintaining my freedom to take pictures whenever and of whatever I choose. But I'm not quite sure I want to go that far, either. My therapist said I should think about this further, and not slam any doors closed yet ... that's what I plan to do.

Other than that, we didn't really discuss a whole lot. We talked about my tendency to turn dead into the wind and face the things that are haunting me. He equated it with my earlier habit of walking around in tornado-making storms, basically challenging the weather. Where this came from was that basically within one week of my encounter with my mind's maelstrom, I called my father on the phone and wrote the post about what happened to me as a child. I came to the conclusion that I should perhaps be a little more careful with my psyche. We also talked about the fact that I'm now able to not only walk around in large groups of people, but relax enough to take pictures (where last year, I would have looked at the throng of people going into the Hannover zoo last Monday and refused to go in ... or gone in anyway and worked myself into a state of rage). He explained to me that this suggests my personal comfort zone is actually shrinking a bit; which he takes as a sign that I'm getting stronger and more confident with my self. Considering that I've chosen to focus my efforts on bipolar recovery, rather than bipolar management, I'll take any improvement as good news that I'm sailing in the right direction :-)




Categorized as: Manic Depressive | Psychologic

Photos - Hannover zoo4

I think I'm close to winding up my Hannover zoo series of photos. I know there are a few more pictures I'd like to post, but I think the three in this post will do for now. This coming weekend, my wife and I will go to an Easter festival (it stays open a week late, lucky us!), and that will likely be my next real shot at taking pictures. I hope you enjoy these :-)

Categorized as: Photographic

Photos - Hannover zoo3

Here are some fauna photos - the zebras decided to all pull together, the monkey forgot which pot he left it in, and the rhino was a shady character :-) Enjoy!

Categorized as: Photographic

Photos - Hannover zoo2

Here are some non-fauna photos I took while at the zoo in Hannover the other day. I had the problem with one of these pictures that the people who run the zoo decided to build this really unique sort of fence in front of a jumbled bunch of rocks and bricks, creating the kind of background that is complex enough to swallow just about any sort of fence as a subject. My solution to was to shoot the fence's shadow (which should explain the 'weird' photo in the middle of this post); or to shoot individual pieces and then do some selective coloring afterward (which should explain the rose from yesterday's post). As with all of my photos, I hope you enjoy these :-)

Categorized as: Photographic