Tuesday, March 03, 2009

THE TOTAL PERSPECTIVE VORTEX


The following – sent by our pal Elf Hellion – is kinda long, but is does confirm some things I have always suspected.

”Most people think of the "mentally disordered" as a delusional lot, holding bizarre and irrational ideas about themselves and the world around them. Isn’t a mental disorder, after all, an impairment or a distortion in thought or perception? This is what we tend to think, and for most of modern psychology's history, the experts have agreed; realistic perceptions have been considered essential to good mental health. More recently, however, research has arisen that challenges this common-sense notion. In 1988, psychologists Shelly Taylor and Jonathon Brown published an article making the somewhat disturbing claim that positive self-deception is a normal and beneficial part of most people’s everyday outlook. They suggested that average people hold cognitivebiases in three key areas: a) viewing themselves in unrealistically positive terms; b) believing they have more control over their environment than they actually do; and c) holding views about the future that are more positive than the evidence can justify. Thetypical person, it seems, depends on these happy delusions for the self-esteem needed to function through a normal day. It’s when the fantasies start to unravel that problems arise.
Studies into clinical depression have yielded findings leading to the development of an intriguing, but still controversial, concept known as depressive realism. This theory puts forward the notion that depressed individuals actually have more realistic perceptions of their own image, importance, and abilities than the average person. While it’s still generally accepted that depressed people can be negatively biased in their interpretation of events and information, depressive realism suggests that they are often merely responding rationally to realities that the average person cheerfully denies.Lear's Fool speaks wisdom disguised as madness. Those with paranoid disorders can sometimes possess a certain unusual insight as well. It has often been asserted that within every delusional system, there exists a core of truth—and in their pursuit of imagined conspiracies against them, these individuals often show an exceptionally keen eye for the real thing. People who interact with them may be taken aback as they find themselves accused of harboring some negative opinion of the person which, secretly, they actually do hold. Complicating the issue, of course, is the fact that if the supposed aversion didn’t exist before, it likely does after such an unpleasant encounter.As one might imagine, these issues present some problems when it comes to treatment. How does one convince a depressed person that “everything is all right” when her life really does suck? How does one convince an obsessive-compulsive patient to stop religiously washing his hands when the truth of what gets left behind after “normal”washing should be enough to make any sane person cringe? These problems put therapists in the curious position of teaching patients to develop irrational patterns of thinking—patterns that help them view the world as a rosier place than it really is. Counterintuitive as it sounds, it's justified because what defines a mental disorder isnot unreasonable or illogical thought, but abnormal behaviour that causes significant distress and impairs normal functioning in society. Treatment is about restoring a person to that level of normal functioning and satisfaction, even if it means building cognitionsthat aren’t precisely “rational” or “realistic.” It’s a disconcerting concept. It’s certainly easier to think of the mentally disordered as lunatics running about with bizarre, inexplicable beliefs than to imagine them coping with a piece of reality that a "normal" person can’t handle. The notion that we routinely hide from the truth about ourselves and our world is not an appealing one, though it may help to explain the human tendency toostracize the abnormal. Perhaps the reason we are so eager to reject any departure from this fiction we call "normality" is because we have grown dependent on our comfortable delusions; without them, there is nothing to insulate us from the harsh cold of reality.”

The secret word is Acuity

6 comments:

  1. Yea,verily, and amen! Not appealing, I agree, but absolutely crucial if we ever hope to Get Out Of This Mess.

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  2. Yeah, that's why I get high & play video games, get a sense of accomplishment... like the dreamer that lives a thousand lives, except I've got cheat codes & better controls.

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  3. Strange, why not trying to live without pink & rose glasses... to see the world as it is? What a conformist defence today...

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  4. I dunno, I've spent a fair amount of time in states that qualify for entries in the DSM-IV(r). I've known quite a few crazy people too. My experience with madness, certain organic disorders excluded, is that crazy people are morbidly self absorbed and have mistaken their inner reality for the outer world.

    Or to put it another way, having managed to get my head all the way up my own ass, I took to telling people that I was at last in a position to see the big picture.

    The truth is, I have no idea what the ultimate nature of reality might be. The possibilities are infinite. I am finite. I do know that people buy winning lottery tickets, meet the love of their life, derive satisfaction from their jobs and have wonderful adventures when they weren't expecting them. People even find profound meaning in the simple facts of their own lives.

    I am likely going to grind out my own remaining years lonely, sleep deprived and slowly working myself into an early grave. I know that. I also know that swell shit happens all of the time. I also know that it is perfectly sensible to assign meaning when we can't 'find' meaning. Finally, I know that I am happier when I assign just as much meaning and validity to other people as I assign to myself.

    Nowadays I can even happily tolerate people who want to tell me that they and they alone truly know just how bad things really are. Oh. Uh huh.

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  5. I worked that out myself before reading this. I thought that maybe some depressed people are just more tuned in to actual reality.
    I wonder if that's what antidepressent drugs do; sort of put a smokescreen over harsh realities.

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  6. This is a somewhat dangerous thing to say. There are people who are alive today because of anti depressants, but I hate the fucking things because what they do is smother your emotions, good and bad, you are unable to feel paralyzing grief and destructive self loathing but you are unable to feel pleasure and joy too. That said, I have to add, if you are on anti depressants, do not go off of them lightly or without help. Do plenty of research and talk to more than one doctor.

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