How to step outside the rational box without going off the deep end. Essentially, techniques for maintaining a lifeline back to normality so you can explore the further reaches of the psyche in some degree of safety.
I developed some of these!
I had a manic episode as well, but it was induced by medication and led to hypersocial behavior. I quickly noticed that I was having bizarre and sudden convictions, and started adopting heuristics to deal with them. I thought I was normal, or even better than normal. Then I realized that such a thought was very abnormal for me, and compensated.
Mania, for me, was like thinking in ALL CAPS ABOUT THINGS I USUALLY IGNORED. It was suddenly giving credence to religion not because I ceased to be an atheist, but because WE ARE ALL CONNECTED REALLY! It was fuzzy thinking, but damned if it didn’t make people like me more for a bit. It was looking people IN THE EYE, BECAUSE THAT IS WHAT TRUST AND SOCIAL COMMUNICATION IS ALL ABOUT, all the time, when I am normally shy of eye contact.
(If you find the CAPSLOCK intrusions in the above paragraph annoying, imagine THINKING THIS WAY and you begin to see why mania is a very tiring thing and NOT RECOMMENDED unless you REALLY KNOW WHAT YOU’RE DEALING WITH.)
Compensation strategies:
Another person in the mental ward, who had lived with mania for a longer time, taught me that breathing exercises can help. Stretch arms upward; inhale. Slowly lower them, exhaling. Repeat as needed.
I realized that because I was now trusting people (read: believing everything I heard), I was susceptible to getting extremely paranoid. This is not as contradictory as it sounds. After all, if you trust people who don’t trust their doctors, you will trust in their paranoia. I therefore told myself, repeatedly, to trust my doctors. Over and over. This self-brainwashing was a good move in hindsight. Chaining myself to the mast of somebody else’s sane clinical judgment protected me and insured that I left the mental ward quickly.
I tended to think that I should try to “help people.” Mania amplified that hero complex. I therefore repeated a mantra to myself, over and over, with manic fervor: People help themselves. People help themselves. You don’t help people. People help themselves.
I was encouraged by a visiting parent to take notes of ideas, so I could pursue them later. Result: Lots of notes that I later sorted out into “reasonable” and “not worth pursuing.” This was helpful. Nothing permanently insightful, but some decent ideas.
Another mantra: Even brilliant ideas are wrong 99% of the time. No matter how good your idea is, it is probably wrong. You are probably wrong. You are probably wrong. Under normal circumstances, this isn’t a great mantra. During mania, it is essential.
If anybody ever questions my credentials as a rationalist, I think I can safely say that I tried very hard to be a traditional rationalist with an eye for biases even when I was technically not in my right mind.
Anybody curious about experiencing similar things need only use Marijuana or K-2. Analyzing and overcoming/working around altered mental states is a worthwhile practice, in my opinion. It teaches you to not trust your mind in the way that boot-camp teaches you to be a soldier.
I developed some of these!
I had a manic episode as well, but it was induced by medication and led to hypersocial behavior. I quickly noticed that I was having bizarre and sudden convictions, and started adopting heuristics to deal with them. I thought I was normal, or even better than normal. Then I realized that such a thought was very abnormal for me, and compensated.
Mania, for me, was like thinking in ALL CAPS ABOUT THINGS I USUALLY IGNORED. It was suddenly giving credence to religion not because I ceased to be an atheist, but because WE ARE ALL CONNECTED REALLY! It was fuzzy thinking, but damned if it didn’t make people like me more for a bit. It was looking people IN THE EYE, BECAUSE THAT IS WHAT TRUST AND SOCIAL COMMUNICATION IS ALL ABOUT, all the time, when I am normally shy of eye contact.
(If you find the CAPSLOCK intrusions in the above paragraph annoying, imagine THINKING THIS WAY and you begin to see why mania is a very tiring thing and NOT RECOMMENDED unless you REALLY KNOW WHAT YOU’RE DEALING WITH.)
Compensation strategies:
Another person in the mental ward, who had lived with mania for a longer time, taught me that breathing exercises can help. Stretch arms upward; inhale. Slowly lower them, exhaling. Repeat as needed.
I realized that because I was now trusting people (read: believing everything I heard), I was susceptible to getting extremely paranoid. This is not as contradictory as it sounds. After all, if you trust people who don’t trust their doctors, you will trust in their paranoia. I therefore told myself, repeatedly, to trust my doctors. Over and over. This self-brainwashing was a good move in hindsight. Chaining myself to the mast of somebody else’s sane clinical judgment protected me and insured that I left the mental ward quickly.
I tended to think that I should try to “help people.” Mania amplified that hero complex. I therefore repeated a mantra to myself, over and over, with manic fervor: People help themselves. People help themselves. You don’t help people. People help themselves.
I was encouraged by a visiting parent to take notes of ideas, so I could pursue them later. Result: Lots of notes that I later sorted out into “reasonable” and “not worth pursuing.” This was helpful. Nothing permanently insightful, but some decent ideas.
Another mantra: Even brilliant ideas are wrong 99% of the time. No matter how good your idea is, it is probably wrong. You are probably wrong. You are probably wrong. Under normal circumstances, this isn’t a great mantra. During mania, it is essential.
If anybody ever questions my credentials as a rationalist, I think I can safely say that I tried very hard to be a traditional rationalist with an eye for biases even when I was technically not in my right mind.
These are great. Do you mind if I incorporate them into the relevant post when the time comes?
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Anybody curious about experiencing similar things need only use Marijuana or K-2. Analyzing and overcoming/working around altered mental states is a worthwhile practice, in my opinion. It teaches you to not trust your mind in the way that boot-camp teaches you to be a soldier.