So, here's the confession.
Sometimes I wish I had a mental disorder. Y'know, a cool one. Like Dissociative Identity Disorder. Or being bipolar. Or having temporal lobe seizures so I could have auditory hallucinations.
First, let me just state that I am perfectly aware how irrational, bizarre, and downright disconcerting it is for me to want these. Please don't think I'm being unkind or purposefully treating these diseases lightly; I know they deserve respect and concern and most of all, a deep understanding and dedication to helping those that have them. That doesn't change the fact that,
Second, the only real reason that I want some of these is the benefits that,
Third, SO many authors seem to have reaped.
Take Virginia Woolf. Gustave Flaubert. Tolstoy. Dostoevsky. Lewis Carroll. Dickens, Tennyson, Poe, Scott, Dante, Moliere!
They all had some form of a mental disorder. I have to admit that I'm particularly fascinated by the manic-depressive stages of the bipolar disorder. Virginia Woolf and Sylvia Plath were both incredibly manic and incredibly depressive throughout their entire lives and their writing is so incredible.
This leads me to my (acknowledged) erroneous conclusion: those with mental disorders are automatically better writers, artists, and more creative in every way, shape, and form. Picasso had a mental disorder; Van Gogh did, too. Look at the huge contributions they've made!
Really, the message that I should take from these is that artists who manage to struggle past the smothering blanket of depression and the giddy, irresponsible, frightening highs of mania, who move beyond their auditory hallucinations and seizures and write despite it, write to thwart it, write because it is the only thing holding them to reality -- I should only respect them and be glad I am not one.
But sometimes I envy that passion, that burning need to write. (It's called hypergraphia -- interesting article there.) Sometimes I wish writing was my one true lifeline so I would pour more of myself into it. Sometimes I wish it was the only thing about my life that seemed real, that "I could not stop...sensations outside of language dried up: music became irritating discord, the visual world grew faint."
Caveat: again, I don't think I actually want that, but the romance of it is strong.
Which leads me to the book that led me to all of these thoughts in the first place: The Midnight Disease by Alice W. Flaherty. She is a neurologist writing about creativity, writer's block, and why some people NEED to write and others don't. I'm not incredibly far in, but so far it's a fascinating, scientific, and relatable read.
