Walking in the Shadows of Psychosis

The line that separates artistic genius and complete madness is a thin one. In fact, many of the most talented artists have struggled with some form of depression, psychosis or schizophrenia. I have found myself often drifting across that line in search of a deeper meaning to life. In my thirty years, I've done it all -- traveled, had sex with beautiful women, had rewarding relationships, watched as family members have passed away, graduated, worked numerous jobs and all the while I have strived towards some form of self-actualization.

At some point in life, I believe most people will eventually ask themselves, "is this all that I am?" This is an interesting question, because the basis for asking such a profound question is rooted in an even deeper desire -- the need to take in the entire world on a much deeper level than I ever have before.

As I was riding the Metro into DC today, I looked around and saw a few cute couples talking to each other. Although I try not to stare (or make it obvious that I'm observing them), I can't help but to engage my mind and emotions and inject myself into their situation. I hear and feel inside of my mind a thousand various questions raging simultaneously. Questions such as:

"What is she like?"

"How long have they been dating?"

"Are they a happy couple?"

"When will they eventually break up?"

The last question is not meant to be a depressive one. In fact, when I looked into their eyes, I suddenly saw all points of time coalescing to just one point. I saw her as a baby, as she was on the train and as an old woman about to die. I realized that it was only time that kept all these points separated, yet the inevitable conclusion is that all moments and experiences reach towards some aspect of finality. I then looked around the train and realized that everyone would be somewhere else tomorrow, still somewhere even further a year from now and all of us would be completely removed from the present in a decade.

"Stop ... Stop ..."

I had to shut the thoughts out of my mind because I realized that I needed to dig even deeper. I suddenly saw everything as complex systems of atoms and molecules -- with those thoughts demanding to reach down into the quantum level. I could feel that line coming closer in my thoughts -- I can't dare cross into it because that is where order begins to break down and replaces itself with chaos.

It also happens when I sit in a bar while having a drink. I can't escape the fact that all my senses are forced into a certain locality. I am but one person within one bar among thousands across the globe. As I look around observing others, I can hear the millions of others within my head -- they are not local yet I know they are out there.

What I am trying to express is a sense of loneliness that is inherent to the human condition. It is a type of loneliness that cuts us off from others due mainly to our inability to extend our consciousness to a higher level where we begin to understand that terms like "ego" and "id" are irrelevant to a far greater whole. This fleeting realization seeps deeper into my soul and begins to permeate into my very core. I look around and begin to realize that I am much more a part of all things than what my own senses can conclude is local and applicable to me.

There are far greater implications from this. For one, once such an expansive mode of thinking takes place, there is a greater desire in one's heart. It is the desire to feel what every other person has felt. It is the need to know how it feels to kiss every other person in the world. Suddenly I find myself as "him" on the train hugging "her." Then the noise within grows louder as I realize that my conception of space and time is too limiting, and that I must break through to a higher plane of realization. That's when I begin to walk in the shadow of psychosis. Because it is at that very point where I begin to realize that a billion thoughts are in process across the world -- a billion worries, a billion laughs, a billion shades of every aspect of emotional experiences.

"Stop ... stop"

At some point I have to stop and regain my individuality and accept that I can not at present enter that frame of existence at this point. Not yet, anyway. It would be much easier to remain a simple person. It would be a relief not to have these thoughts demanding countless answers from almost infinite questions. I do believe, in some strange way, that a part of what we may refer to as G-d may simply be an almost universal point at which all things, all experiences, all points in time, all moments, everything within the universe that ever was or will ever be begin to converge into a singularity of magnificent realization.