Currie's Gratitude 28 October 2014

I like the scientific spirit—the holding off, the being sure but not too sure, the willingness to surrender ideas when the evidence is against them: this is ultimately fine—it always keeps the way beyond open—always gives life, thought, affection, the whole man, a chance to try over again after a mistake—after a wrong guess.   [Walt Whitman, Walt Whitman's Camden Conversations]

When I “go missing” for a few days, when I simply don’t want to engage myself in any sort of conversation, for fear of the landmines that lay on that path, when I just BEgin to shutdown systems one-by-one, then I know it is time for surrendering.

Surrender rarely looks like waving a white flag whilst the enemy descends, but it surely feels similar.

Soon madness has worn you down. It’s easier to do what it says than argue. In this way, it takes over your mind. You no longer know where it ends and you begin. You believe anything it says. You do what it tells you, no matter how extreme or absurd. If it says you’re worthless, you agree. You plead for it to stop. You promise to behave. You are on your knees before it, and it laughs.    [Marya Hornbacher, Madness: A Bipolar Life]

I’m still here looking for my flashlight.

I love you, Currie