Am I bipolar?

Sometimes I'm wondering why I fluctuate so much between being super energetic/unstoppable, and feeling completely exhausted. Usually aware of the fact that I'm working towards this exhaustion, yet still doing it. 

These were my thoughts a few months ago. In the meantime I've realized some things about this, which I wish to share with you. 

So the thing is, when you’ve once experienced a deep and long depression. Once you get out of it, you want to run as far away from it as you can. You want to forget all about it, and wish to never feel like it again.

What I experienced, and am still experiencing, is periods of manic. Periods of bursts of energy, and trying to completely overuse all the energy I have, as I'm afraid there will be a scarcity again. But the funny things, and a thing I often forget, that actually this manic way of doing things, creates a scarcity. For I'm using up all my energy, and then fall back into tiredness. 

The things that get me out of the tiredness, such as exercise, socializing etc. I do every day in excess. As it makes me feel super good at the beginning when I've gone through this period of being very down and filled with aces and pains. But as I start seeing this as the full remedy (forgetting about the rest and relaxation I had) I start overusing them again. Then I start seeing them as bad, cause everytime I use them, I start burning myself up.

As a child I never had this. This is really something that I started to develop after my graduation at the art academy. 

Most of my middle school and academy years I see as one exhausting, depressive blur. With some good moments and days. (Usually the ones that involved alcohol or weeds.)

So yes, I do have a history with the wrong kind of self medicating. And even though I wouldn’t recommend it to anyone. I feel as if it were those things that did save me at that time. The alcohol to numb my senses in an atmosphere my nervous system is not built for. (Too many impressions, too many people, too many tasks, too many questions.) The weed to release tension, from the oppression I felt from society and my school environment. And also to numb my emotions, as I had no way to release them, or had no place where I felt safe to express them. 

This is all past now, but it has been such a large part of my life, I think it was about 9 years that I experienced deep troubles within myself. And after that it’s been 3 years of recovery now, of going back and forth. Step by step, every time. Still experiencing some burn outs, but most of the suicidal thoughts are gone, and i’m even feeling a bright future coming ahead. I even dare to make plans for the future. I’m starting to trust myself and my body again, which makes me able to dare to make promises and plans. 

I usually couldn’t do this, as I was afraid I would lose my energy again. Fall back into the hole. The thing is, when you’ve felt like this for so long, part of you starts to believe that you’ve been doing it all wrong. Part of you thinks that you can’t take care of yourself and never will, that all you make and will make are the wrong choices. As the choices you’ve made before led you towards self-destruction etc. So you start to listen to others more then yourself, which in the beginning is actually a good thing. But here a new vicious circle could start, of not listening to yourself, and your dreams. Which can lead into a new depression. XD

Yes this really makes it seem as if there is no hope. That every decision you make is bad or wrong. That all good things are actually bad things in disguise. And that we’re completely doomed once you’ve stepped or fallen into this spiral. 

But I’ve come to tell you that this is not true. And I’m here to tell you something so absolutely trivial that you might not even want to hear or read it. As it’s been written over and over again through the years. But it might be something that we as a society have forgotten, and haven’t implemented yet. No, I'm not here to tell you that good and bad don’t exist. Bad choices do exist, not in the sense that it makes you wrong, but in the sense that they could hurt you. I also won’t tell you that you should only make good choices from now on. And that you aren’t allowed to make mistakes. As our wrongs make us learn, make us grow, and our “goods” give us motivation to keep going. So what do I want to tell you?

I would like to ask you a question… Why should we be so stressed about our wrongs and rights, why can’t we collectively observe them as they are. As a process of growth, a process of evolution, an experiment in which we experience front row what kind of influence we physically have on existence. If good and bad are both neutral in the sense that there is always a way back to another, a way back to harmony a way back to the middle. A place where we come to understanding why it all happened, or what it all meant or could mean. That the actual existence of both parties implies a divine balance of the two. 

This might be a quite abstract description of the energies that take form in our everyday life. And you might be asking how to practically apply them. I think this question you should first  ask yourself. Where is my balance? How do I find my balance? 

And remember that in every situation, harmony is at the door. You have the choice to make it escalate in an instance. You have the power to make things terribly miserable for yourself, tremendously pleasurable at the other end and harmonious in the middle. Where you take a sneak peak at both sides. To check what the situation is teaching you. 

This is everywhere. If you’ve made a mistake, one simple word, or question or deed can bring you back to balance. 

If you feel like all is going so well, you’re doing nothing wrong, but the feeling starts creeping up that you can’t keep up. Just allow yourself to be vulnerable. Trust in the idea that it will come back eventually. But the more you keep it up it will turn into a bad thing anyway. The more you’re resisting the more strongly it will come up. As the resistance is already a symptom of tiredness, of the flipping time, of the other side of the coin.