A Cultivated Vessel
2025-12-03
My thoughts have been getting slower, less pronounced. More than that though, there are fewer novel things for me to say as I write more in this public diary every day. I, like many others, have thoughts that get repeated over and over again. There's loops that I enjoy going through; there's a sense of comfort in my internal routine. It's easy for me to say the same things over and over again and call them self-examination, but the truth is that it's more of a masturbatory experience. I am not confined by my inner critic or restricted by artistic constraint. Here, I am free. But still, the words that come out are still a cage all their own.
In past entries, I've said that these thoughts aren't truly mine, but that I am simply just a vessel for a greater force that my discipline of writing only works to further cultivate. I still think this is true, but there's a greater sense of wrestling that I deal with every day. This wrestling, to me, is part of the greater work: refining the line between myself and the one who writes these words. For most of my life, I've loathed myself and who I am. I've seen the ego that speaks as me and I want nothing to do with it. Unfortunately, there is nothing I can do outside of suicide that will let me part with it. I wish that I could leave it behind and go back to the great divine essence that houses us all, but I also understand that there is a reason why I have to be here, even if I can't know it fully.
So with that, I hope that I can do what I can to cultivate a better relationship with myself and learn to grow more comfortable in my own skin. I have my challenges: my bipolar has been a tough obstacle to deal with. I can have all the comfort and fulfillment in the world, but for whatever reason my brain forces me to have times where I am incapable of feeling even the smallest amount of joy. I've lamented this more times than I can count. I've been brought to the edge so many times, considered what it would take to truly leave it all behind.
Despite all of the pain my brain has made me feel, there is still a fire inside of me that burns, even when I can't feel it. There is still, even in my darkest days, a drive for excellence that never fails. Even when I can't see it, the fact that it is constantly working through me is readily and unmistakably apparent. There is a price that I have to pay for a mind that is constantly connecting so rapidly and so deeply. It's one that comes with the danger of flying too close to the sun. But I know now that I don't have to be like Icarus.
I think of my heroes, the bipolar creative geniuses who fueled their work with the hot and manic pursuit of producing the greatest art the world will ever see. Hemingway, Van Gogh, Bird—they all let it consume them in the end. It was the ultimate price that they decided to pay in the pursuit of greatness. It's an offer that's been bestowed upon me, but I have a greater wisdom that I look to instead.
It's easy for me to think that I have to succumb to a great vice or suffering to achieve greatness. But I know now that's a lie. I don't have to make the same mistakes as my heroes to walk in their footsteps. Instead, my duty is to learn from them so that I can walk a better path than they did. If I'm lucky, it won't make me sacrifice everything for the sake of greatness.
If God wills it, it'll be one that brings us all just a little bit closer to Him.