It’s been a trippy ride since “Day 1: 108 Days of Being Bipolar”. Originally I was going to be focused on building my company by attending classes put on by the Founder Institute. That got canceled and it left me with a lot of unstructured free time immediately after I had just gone on a wild ride of spirit with miltownkid in the US. I ended up deciding to ride that spirit out and see where it would take me. A short version would be “It took me straight to the hospital,” but that wouldn’t be telling any of the stories.
Maybe I can tell the story with some choice Instagram posts…
This is the perfect post to start with. The aftermath of the 36th Chamber Show…
Woah… and that wasn’t the half of it! I was prolifically posting on the miltownkid ZEE and Mil Town Klan accounts as well. I REALLY “let myself go” between no meds, National Novel Writing Month, and “improv everywhere”. I was creating content that I was going to use for a novel called “#IAMGOKU”.
Balance
While I was in the hospital a friend of mine (Robbie) who’s a master of emotional intelligence introduced me to the “mood meter” chart. It was created by Yale’s Center for Emotional Intelligence. He had me do it pen and paper style and what I learned was that I was ranking high energy + high pleasantness (MANIA/DRAGON ENERGY) to high. Like… the “sweet spot” to be in is medium energy + high pleasantness (as a home base). Ever since he showed me that, that’s what I’ve been trying to do. There are definitely times to be high energy, low energy, high pleasantness, and low pleasantness but “the middle way” is the way to be moment-to-moment.
I’ve always looked at Casey Abbott Payne and miltownkid ZEE like two extremes. One was a minimalist who wanted a stoic life, the other wanted to rock and roll all night. What I’ve really been looking for is the “common ground” between those two extremes and, to a large extent, I’ve found it and I train it every day (moment to moment). Whether hanging out with the wife or up in the mountains… the middle way. I have a lot to say about this. I was drawn to a philosophical book of Bruce Lee’s to find a quote to match the above. This is what I came away with…
Reworded to make my point about the “Middle Way”…
“I should consider both the Casey Abbott Payne and the miltownkid of equal importance, and not as being independent of one another. The rejection of either Casey or miltownkid will lead to separation, and separation runs to extremes.”
Three Personas to One, One to None
At the start of the 108 days, I was considering starting a new persona, “realBipolarCEO”. That new persona actually made the decision to consolidate (like a CEO would! 😉 ). That’s what started the “manic spiral” of sharing all of the different bits of myself through primarily the Casey Abbott Payne Instagram account which… you just saw. Doing that was cathartic. Being in the hospital was cathartic. Shortly after being released I was still oscillating between the two.
As I type this now… I don’t feel a two, or a one. More and more… maybe I’ll quote Bruce again…
“Let your mind, the basic reality, do the counter-movement without any interfering deliberation. Above all, learn the art of detachment.” – Bruce Lee, Artist of Life, p 16
The Next Chapter
I have a lot in store for “2019”. I put that in quotes because I’m beginning to challenge the idea of how I measure time. In Taiwan next year is 108 based on the fall of the Qing Dynasty. You can see a sampling of different measures of time on this Wikipeida page. Call me crazy (really, it’s OK), but I’m going to start a new way to measure my time based on my 108-day cycles. I think it’s poetic that I’m starting it in year 108 here in Taiwan. January 1, 2019 is going to be 000.001 for my new cycle calendar. The left will increase by one for every cycle and the right will increase by one for each day and reset to 1 after each cycle. I’ll still use the Gregorian calendar as needed, but I’ll secretly be living in my own world of flowing moment to moment, day to day, cycle to cycle. I don’t care what year it is, or if it’s the weekend. Every day I flow. I spontaneously respond to what’s right in front of me.
What I really work on is refining my personal philosophy of “Flowing to My Dream”. That reminds me… beginning tomorrow I get to work on my “Flow and Dream” document. I wonder what it will be like… This time I think I’ll post it to my website… Anyhow… see you on 000.001!
Casey's Journal 