Be Conscious That You Are Unique By Wiese,Christian

Genius or madness—dare to be different

Be Conscious That You Are Unique “We enjoy lovely music, beautiful paintings, a thousand intellectual delicacies, but we have no idea of their cost, to those who invented them, in sleepless nights, tears, spasmodic laughter, rashes, asthmas, epilepsies, and the fear of death, which is worse than all the rest.”
(Marcel Proust)

Dare to be different

From psychological business studies we know that the entrepreneurs perceive the risks of failing much smaller and the likelihood of succeeding very differently than the 'normal' folks. Just have a look at Elon Musk and how he has single-handily taken on the two most powerful global industries, cars and oil, and has brought on a revolution in green technology helping the world in the process. Would you or I have had the guts and vision to do so? We could call entrepreneurs like Elon Musk mentally deranged, or we could call them visionaries instead.

Fact of the matter is that many of us benefit because our intrinsic differences produce innovators, visionaries, and movers of shakers all because of their different neurological wiring. We think of the entrepreneurs as the successful outliers in our human race but in all this celebration we shouldn’t forget that there are many entrepreneurs who never quite get the break despite their inspiration and boldness. Risk-loving entrepreneurs will only be celebrated when they are successful, the many shattered and disappointed life stories of those who are not so lucky, or who run out of funding before their innovation can see the light of day, no one ever talks about instead. That’s a real cost of being a risk lover. You could say that their misfortunes is the price to pay for the spectacular success of the few ‘geniuses’.

Dare to be different

We can debate how advantageous it is to have an overdeveloped risk tolerance, but when it comes to the so-called 'pathological' mental conditions such as depression, psychopathy, or bi-polar disease, surely we would eradicate these disorders if we could, wouldn’t we? Well, maybe these abnormalities have their important role to play as well, in politics, history and in spiritual life as well. Nassir Ghaemi in 'A first-rate madness' argues that many artists and political leaders are wired differently than the ordinary folks. Even for challenging afflictions like bi-polar for example, Nassir Ghaemi argued that these exceptional people accomplished what they did because of their different wirings, not despite of them - no 'sane' person could have, is his point. His most famous example was Winston Churchill whose super-human staying power in his fight with the nazi’s may well have been a product of his manic depressive state of mind. Kevin Dutton argued along similar lines in 'The Wisdom of Psychopaths' that his father was an excellent salesman because of his different state of experiencing reality, while he wasn’t a bad person at all, as it is typically associated with psychopaths.

I know something about the disease bi-polar as my father suffered from this affliction over decades. Without taking any medication, he spent endless days in deep depression, with the occasional highs that were so out of character for him. There was a time when I feared that I could be at risk too. This was around the time when I worked in the stressful world of financial markets. I was sweating the market moods so to speak and sometimes wondered whether the days of excessive exuberance when the markets were on fire, and the depth of melancholy when markets would turn against me, were the onset of the dreaded disease. Soon, however, I realized that there was simply an inner imbalance that needed addressing. As it turned out, my stressful job was merely the catalyst to bring the mood imbalance out in the open. I can assure you that I am as serene and stable as they come, but I thank my stressful job and my genetic disposition for having launched me on this Awakening and healing journey. I often wonder if my spiritual Awakening was launched by the pain I experienced at that time. Similarly, many of my spiritual friends started their journey because of an trauma that needed addressing.

I know from personal experience how hard it is to embark on an Awakening process because something inside needs healing. Pain does not have to be the trigger of Awakening, but it often is. Many of my spiritual friends had traumatic experiences that likely set the spiritual Awakening and healing journey in motion. Painful as these dark night of the soul episodes are, it is important to face them and not wish them away, or worse, trying to escape from them. Eckhart Tolle is perhaps the most popular modern day spiritual teacher and he was rudely catapulted towards his spiritual Awakening when in one very dark night of the soul episode he was thrown into a vortex and literally awoke the next morning as a changed man. Chances are a similar transformation is in store for you as well if you suffer today. Though a multi-year uphill climb is likely necessary for healing and spiritual transformation to take place, just from my own experience I can tell you that every step of this journey is worth it!

Spiritual folks are as sane as they come but it sometimes takes a little struggle to get to that stage. Accumulated karma gets thrown overboard in a series of dark night of the soul episodes. Neural networks get rewired along a healing and Awakening journey and new energy centers open up. Genius, madness, or spiritual Awakening are but a step apart, so we should be patient with ourselves and with others when for a while it looks like we don’t have it all together. If there is any perceived pathology, let your spiritual path show you how to transform the coal into a diamond. Dare to be different—you are born with the mission to be your own unique self.