Monkey Mind Leaping on its Leash

Hoo boy, Internet, if this makes absolutely no sense then please don't worry/send hate mail/decide I'm really a robot.  (If I were a robot I would call myself Peter Erlang.  ;)

Just think of it this way:  At least this post is on time.  Silver linings, yo.

Truth is, I'm so manic I'm surprised I can string words into sense at all; I mean, I can write, and in fact have been doing so compulsively, but as is common for these mental-spaces most if it makes no sense except in the sense that the 000000x0001B4:0080 data on a blue-screen does; I am the spider on drugs spinning crazy webs, sometimes while screaming, sometimes while thinking, "Whee!"  My word-faucet goes on full and yes, often there are very pretty metaphors or awesome ideas as a result, but nothing can actually be built in this phase.  More often it's about resisting the urge to knock everything down.

I want to mention that I say "manic" very carefully (well, as careful as I get now anyway) — I am not a sufferer of bipolar disorder, but I know several people who are, and I would never want to minimize what that's like.  But as with all things, there are bigs and littles; and I do have a lifelong tendency towards a bit of emotional instability, and I'm under pretty ridiculous stress (not again, but still; it's like the gods are laughing while they crank the volume and I try to figure out how high the dial goes…"23?? 24?!  25????") and trying to prepare for a change that's record-breakingly big for me, and…yes.  So the symptoms are very similar to the heightened states of people with other mood-disorders that also cause big swings.  I dream wild and fly out of bed when I wake; I go long whiles without food and then hanker after a box of donuts and a pizza; I get suddenly crumble-into-tears upset over something that just occurred to me and forget it ten minutes later.   Aren't you SO jealous of the people who live with me?

I am far, far more often depressed than manic; so in a sense having these big manic swings (this is the second, and the first was twice as long as a "normal" one) is sort of fun.  I do like the energy, when it's not making me act like an idiot.  Moreover I've had a lot of self-work on managing my brainstates and so I am not worried, not really, that I'll do anything super-stupid or dangerous.  I will just write lots of bad poetry and talk too fast and concoct huge schemes and massive catastrophes in my mind that I will then have to stamp down — symptoms like the urge to drive 90 miles an hour all the time, or spend lots of money at once, I can generally control.  (I have kind of raided Amazon.  But the damage is well within tolerable limits.)  Mostly I will stay near home and try to keep healthy and not make any big decisions while I'm feeling all COME ON, FALCOR, WE CAN TAKE 'EM! –and I will try to stay out of fights and confrontations, because they make me turn into Tank Girl while I'm like this.

Sometimes having a mind feels like having a very unruly pet.  Beast on a leash.  On the ugly side, it can be scary enough that we'll ignore it, try to block out its bites and peeing, its constant need for training and supervision.  Often we try to put leashes on other things so we can pretend our own rabid monkey doesn't exist:  men, tanks, snakes, churches — whatever we can feel the power of and feel in-control of.  Underneath, all striving and power-struggling may in fact be a helpless fear-reaction turning away from the out-of-control power that is the AUGH BRAIN WHAT THE HELL.

I'm going to go do pushups.  ;)