Our stories
Paris happened. And I spiralled into deep melancholia. Some desperate and tenuous thing in me has me plugged into the world's harm and hate. I am a canary in the coalmine. I fall, and fall and spiral down in the maelstrom of the world's brotherhood of hatred, and land not gently in the fire-pit they create. Then, moments later it becomes unseen to me that the conditions that caused my anxiety, fear and worry for others took me there. Maybe my brain gets flooded with those bio-chemicals, throws the switches where seeing my 'state' becomes hard. But I DID, this time I did see my state, on and off through the past fortnight, I was outside of it while living inside of it too. I had insight into my condition. Melancholic, and terrorised, feeling useless to help. Somehow, I identify with the victims of every atrocity, it is in my DNA - laid down by the experiences of childhood.
So two weeks of the deep humming unhappiness and fear, two weeks, of the brain take-over. I do not constantly 'think' about these terrible things, just the initial event is enought to tip me over the edge. Then topping up with the News everynight keeps me there. But I feel as a person with empathy that I want to know what is happeneing to others-in-the-world, but the news is perhaps, driving me litterally crazy...
Then once there I struggle in the quicksand, every mental-struggle driving me deeper, and deeper.
But this time, I saw it, I was able to witness it, sit outside myself a bit (from time to time) and see myself in it. I was articulating to others that "I am in a state of depression" that I was feeling confused, losing words, having difficulty concentrating, in a fog, my physical pain rachetting sky-high. This is a first for me. Having insight like this while IN IT. There is (still) a me in here who is not all my mental illness, who can observe. She is not strong yet, has not had a lot of practice - but she did it. (I have been practicing naming and articulating the experience of any given state in hindsight, and this is probably what brought me to the intersect of being able to see it while I was in it.)
Yesterday at 8.30 ish I was having my second coffee. Sitting fogged, struggling to think, glum, a slight rocking motion happening and I hear the voice (not another 'voice) but a clear thought reverberated through my brain on its own, my gnarly critic - What's the point, you are a waste of space." - I (me in here, the clear, shiney, lovely one) heard it and said back "Oh! That's not helpful, that's harmful" and I went on to do other things on my computer and with a bit of housework, not thinking much about anything. Just being for a little while.
Suddenly, at about half past ten, I was aware that I felt better, not manic-better, just gentle happy, lighter, my brain was working again. I could hear the birds singing. I was so close to seeing and experiencing the transistion from one state to the other in this Bi-polar life. And it is without a doubt taught me clearly - everything passes, this state, that state, this thought, that thought. I hope to remember that every day no matter what the internal weather is doing. I have been weighing myself down with the permanent and all pervasive enduring of "its always bad". It's not, it's not always, ALL WAYS bad, it is sometimes, light and healthy.
Sometimes, a lot of the time, I am in a state, desperate, lonely, hurting, despairing - and if i really reflect on it I can tail spin myself down to the quicksand again, so i do try to watch my thinking. It's not all just what I am thinking though, there is this broken brain thing, but I really want to live the best i can with it, and if getting up after a big fall down, faster and more fully, is possible by grasping my thinking-nettles and moving on, letting go. Then I hope to do more of that. It's good to have hope, when I can.
I let go of that harmful/unhelpful thought, and it passed. That is hopeful.
Everything pases, everthing is temprary and transient, even me and my conditions.
In the past few months, have stopped trying to 'heal', stopped my desperate search for the holy grail of 'cure' and am accepting, it is just like this. Just like this. Go with the flow, let go as soon as I see I have my fists clenched. I think I am coming to Acceptance. Just go with the flow and try to stay present as best I can.
So, today I see that... everything does pass, as will this feeling better, also pass, it all passes. every feeling, every thought, let 'em go - good or bad. I remind myself - Just go with the flow, MoonGal, make like the tides. 
Wow @MoonGal, I absolutely love this post! It sounds like you came to two amazing realisations:
- You (your clear, shiney, lovely self!) are separate from your mental illness, and can observe whatever state you may be in at any given time
- Everything passes, is temporary and transient, including the states you sometimes experience and the negative thoughts and feelings you sometimes have, and identifying those that are unhelpful and holding them lightly allows them to pass
How incredible that you were able to see the state you were in while you were in it! It sounds like practicing naming and articulating the experience of any given state in hindsight really helped prepare you for that, how did you come up with that idea?
“Everything passes, this state, that state, this thought, that thought. I hope to remember that every day no matter what the internal weather is doing.”
What you wrote reminded me of a mindfulness metaphor that really resonates with me. It has a really similar message to what you just articulated so beautifully:
(If anyone is interested in reading more about it, it’s from one of Dr Russ Harris’ books on Acceptance and Commitment Therapy)
Thank you again @MoonGal for sharing this wonderful post, I’ve found it so inspiring!
Shimmer 
@Shimmer, yes, the weather and the sky metaphor is lovely - and much like one I read many years ago in the 1990's which is still a touchstone book for me titled:
The Serenity Principle: Finding Inner Peace in Recovery by Joseph Bailey.
I have travelled long and hard on many paths since my late 20's - so I have had over 25 years experience, seeking-aways-seeking some resolution to the brokenness of me, wanting to be better - the perfectionist, I must be the best I can be (with a big stick beating myself up most of the time). Hard on myself, often punishing instead of caring for myself. a life long way of being that is changing. I have the room to change that as I am not thrown into the melstrom of work every day now, having withdrawn from the workforce, or having come to a point where I truly can no longer do it, too many broken bits to stick back together every morning to go and do it over and over. <sigh>
The diagnostic psychiatrist who assessed me and provided the diagnoses of Bi Polar (OCD, Anxiety, PTSD) last July (2014) said it would be good for me to try to identify my moods, changes, prepare for the different states, or having identified them do something to ameliorate against the worst excesses. I tried but was not catching any changes, but I did start to attend carefully after the fact - analysing the conditions, relationship, events (macro and micro) that might have been catalysts for change from reasonably healthy to hypo-manic, irritable, melancholic, anxious, compulsice etc. So, I was looking back at what happened, over and over. I would identify the state I HAD been in, what might have impacted on that, what shifted me if it did and have been trying to that asiduously for a year.
also during this time....
A wonderul psychologist who helped me last year and early this year with my pain management, brain management strategies uses a mix of CBT and A.C.T. I think. She was very helpful in recognising my 'clear, shiney, lovely self". Although those are new words today to describe that part of me, that ME who IS despite everything unscarred, whole, loving, kind and happy.
A few months ago I was referred by a friend to a video by a teacher named Jeff Foster, she was responding to some posts I had made on Facebook that unintentionally showed how terribly hopeless I felt about the state of my life and the world. In the video (linked below) Jeff spoke of the struggle to heal, and asked (paraphrasing here), what if we are not meant to heal? And to just "hold' it all, hold it with love and attention. I have experience in that because I am a wildlife carer, a dog rescuer - when it comes to helping broken little minds and bodies - just having no expectation of them, just holding them, looking after their needs, being lightly loving towards them giving them space and time and love. I KNEW how to do it, had jjust never considered to do it with mySelf before.
I finally saw - when I watched that video that I could just "Hold"all my broken bits. And as the weeks have gone on i have practiced that, it may also have been a cataylst to my latest melancholia because there is a lot of sadness and hurt to 'hold', really. Too much, but what is too much? It just is, it just happaned to me, it is not ME - it happened to me.
He said "Sadness does not want to be healed it wants to be held...." so hold it I have. Risking in the doing so a spiral down into the depths. And I did, spiral, but here I have spiraled back up to a blue sky/calm ocean.
Good huh?
The talk I mentioned, Jeff Foster's talk on YouTube is here Why haven't I healed yet?
____________________________
and then this yesterday.... which reminds me that it is my story, my life, my strengths, MY DANCE...
I like Jeff Foster's idea of feelings as a child coming to visit ... keeping the heart open ... the sadness child will come and go and maybe also ... implied, but not stated ... the joyfulness child may come and go.
Yes transience of feelings and acceptance seems importance in not getting stuck in a negative loop.
Thanks @MoonGal for your thoughtful and delightful posts.
I like that you care about what happened in Paris. To be untouched may mean we are a little less alive.
@grubbytoes - 
So glad this resonated for you. isn't it wonderful when we connect around hope and understanding, eh?
Makes me feel much less alone with it all, to have had such a genuine, excited response.
I LOVE juiciness, and trying to dig for joy. When I am well(ish) I try to lead myself out of the wilderness-of-mind, so anything that inspires me to hold my own life in my own two hands with a stout heart and visionary eye - I will do. This conversation is reminding me to do that, I have been lost and felt like a flipped over turtle for a month (or months...).
This conversation has led me to think this morning about what we do to be our own Leaders, being our own Mentors, being our own Strength...and two pieces of writing surfaced as I thought about that...
INVITICUS ("Unconquered")
Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.
In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.
Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds, and shall find me, unafraid.
It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.
William Ernest Henley
1849–1903
and
with a view about leadership in our own lives...
Rely on your own strength of body and soul. Take for your star self-reliance, faith, honesty and industry. Don't take too much advice — keep at the helm and steer your own ship, and remember that the great art of leading is to take a fair share of the work. Fire above the mark you intend to hit. Energy, invincible determination with the right motive, are the levers that move the world.
Noah Porter (paraphrased)
This last one, speaks to me of resilience and the conditions (the attitude - which is a sailing term) we need to set our sails to to be safe in our own lives, safe and moving forward when we can. of course when the storms come, best to put down anchor in a quiet cove and wait it out. I have seen something here, i must remember when I have come through a storm - to reset my jib, as quickly as I can, to reset my mind to that resilient, star-child, with hope in my veins and dig for joy, get stuff done while I can (the old saying make hay while the sun shines).
because if I have learned that everything passes, and we are all mortal with finite time allotted, then I want to make the most of the times I CAN, make the most of. Setting intentions, having small goals. Oh I so needed this conversation!
Right! I am going to go and set myself a goal or two... and mind my mind that I don't ramp up into hypo-mania to get them done better than they have ever been done before <laughing>... as is my wont.
Steady as she goes.
and this...
COMPASSION
Have compassion for everyone you meet,
even if they don’t want it. What seems conceit,
bad manners, or cynicism is always a sign
of things no ears have heard, no eyes have seen.
You do not know what wars are going on
down there where the spirit meets the bone.
Miller Williams (1930-2015)
Thanks again @MoonGal
Well crafted and intentioned words are Inspiring.
O captain my captain ...
Holding my life in my 2 hands ...
With a stout heart ...
Sorry if I get it wrong .. I hope I get the spirit behind your words ... my pleasure in reading reduces me to parroting it back ... as a mantra
I have a watery side too .. dad and boats and learning to swim at Bondi.
