04 june 2019
i've been thinking a lot lately about mental health. it's been coming up a lot around my friends in a lot of scenarios. i've also been seeing it come up in things i've been reading a lot more, but maybe that's just baader-meinhoff speaking.
the biggest set of points i want to address is my relationship with mental health. i have a pretty long family history of issues in that realm, but have been pretty resolutely without problem in the department of mental health for my life up to this point. on the one hand i feel extremely blessed, but on the other i can't help but be a little skeptical. is there some intense mental health emergency on my horizon? is there some neurotransmitter ambush lying in wait or only congenital after a certain age?
but even with those possibilities, the only real consideration i've ever had to give to mental health has been through the lens of my own self-awareness. i consider one of my better traits being able to empathize with others. i do a good job in interviews and talking to people at getting in their heads and understanding how they perceive me, but maybe this ability to leave my own head is its own problems involved. i wouldn't mark myself as having any indication at all of what would be sociopathy or antisocial personality disorder, but i feel a bit strange about the lack of trouble i have assuming a third party perspective on my own situation.
one other issue with this understanding of my ability to perceive myself as others do is that it begs the question: if i'm able to adjust my behavior and empathize with others so well, how could i possibly be diagnosed with a mental health issue? the only way i guess, would be some sort of intense mental chess performed by a therapist in attempting to diagnose me. they would have to be able to pick up on things that i don't realize they are noticing, which in the situation i would likely have trouble not being privvy to. but i think that defeats the purpose of therapy, as it's obviously not meant to be some sort of strenous game of emotional chess and i acknowledge that. i think i probably have some sort of skewed view of what therapy even is if my first thought is just that they attempt to diagnose you right out of the gate with something, but from experiences i've heard friends divulge i can't help myself from seeing it as something along those lines.
but regardless of these thoughts, at the end of the situation i'm still just trying to understand the best way for myself to have a satisfied mind. whether that's with some sort of ailment or not somehow seems like a secondary consideration in my opinion. if i'm content than there's no reason for concern on that front, just as there never really has been for me up to this point. i thin the best part about being intensely self-aware is that i do a good job of being able to tell when i'm thinking constructive, positive thoughts, and when i'm worrying needlessly. for now it feels better to be empathetic as an exercise in being a better person, but i hope that someday i'll be able to separate that empathy from the possibility of being something more malignant.