Creative Chaos
...Yet, just as we run outside, and down the street wearing only a bathrobe, transfixed by a cavalcade of emergency vehicles’ flashing lights, urgently needing to know “what happened,” our morbid curiosity about suicide overcomes our apprehension. Sure we’re squeamish and will deal with it only if we can act like adolescents, hiding their eyes (with open hands) or covering their heads (with see-through blankets) while watching “scary” movies. Despite our fear and outrage, we are still compelled to sneak a peek!
Scientists have documented the accounts of creative individuals and mood disorders since the nineteenth century, but only in the past 20 years, have methodical studies confirmed these findings. One well-founded result strongly implied that writers, artists and composers, and their close relatives, were considerably more at risk to suffer from mood disorders, and to commit suicide, than was the mainstream population.
Studies suggest that creativity and manic depression are both genetically driven and share some of the same genetic predispositions. They also share certain non-cognitive features, such as the ability to thrive on only a few hours of sleep, acute focus to work meticulously, spirited and tenacious personalities, and the capacity of experiencing intensely powerful and profoundly changeable emotions.
Death by suicide has been proven to exist since primitive times. A volatile topic by any account, our beliefs and views about suicide have changed significantly throughout history. Geographic location, cultural attitudes, economic and social status and religious influences all profoundly impacted our viewpoint on suicide and death in general. Opinions ranged from the Goths and Celts who literally encouraged suicide, to societies where wives killed themselves to follow their dead husbands into the next life. Buddhist tradition used...
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