A Visitors' Guide to Crazy

First of all, that thing you're doing now: it's not crazy. It's normal. Everyone talks to themselves. People might cast some funny glances in your direction, but they've all done it, too. It's important to remember that: the way you're feeling now, the way you're behaving, though slightly unusual, is also slightly usual. You think that there will be a moment, a crossing over from being one of us, to being one of them. But it's not like that. There's no boundary. There's blur. You might not always know where you are.

Don't forget that. It's important.

You realize you're in an almost-constant state of dialogue with yourself. Most of the time, you don't mind: you're pretty good company—never at a loss for words, and a good listener. In fact, most of the time, you don't even notice this is going on—not till it's very quiet, and you're trying to sleep, and you can't sleep because you're in the middle of a heated argument, with yourself. Then you realize you've been having this argument for hours, for days. Like many arguments with loved ones, you can't even remember what it's about, exactly. But you don't want to go to bed in the middle of an argument, so you keep arguing. With yourself.

You're not exactly sure how much of it happens inside your head, and how much happens out loud, for all the world to hear. But it doesn't matter. Everyone talks to themselves. That's normal.

* * *

That thing you're doing now, it's normal. Everyone does it. It's not hallucinating, exactly. Call it instead a hyper-active imagination. When you walk by those stone lions outside the museum, you don't really think the lion has just moved, come to life, taken a swipe at a passing child. Of course you don't. You don't really think the lion has just roared; you know that was actually just the sound of a passing bus. You know you're just indulging your rich fantasy life, trying to make your otherwise-routine day a little more lively.

You know this, but it doesn't stop the adrenaline from coursing through your bloodstream. It doesn't stop your feeling a panic that you're actually about to be attacked by a lion.

Likewise, when that yellow cab cuts the corner a little too close and nearly hits you, walking across the street, you know it hasn't hit you. Of course you know this. So when, in your imagination, you bifurcate the possible futures, and indulge, for a moment, the alternate reality in which the cab has hit you, you don't actually feel the searing pain of the smashed bone in your legs. You don't hear the sound of crunching bone, not really. And you don't experience that crushing wave of sadness when you realize that you'll never get a chance to say goodbye to the people who love you. None of this is real. The cab has gone and you're still walking, safe, two bags of groceries in your hands. Everything else is just daydream. Everybody daydreams.

* * *

That thing you're feeling now, it's hard to describe. That's why no one talks about it. It's not because they don't feel it that they don't talk about. Everyone feels it; they must. And if they thought about it, if they actually tried to put it to words, then they'd agree that yes, this is normal. It's within the realm of normal.

You're in your kitchen. You're making coffee. You've just gotten home after a day filled with spreadsheets and Gant charts, phonecalls about budget projections, analytics, metrics. At lunch, you joked with friendly people you don't particularly know. At the end of the day, you walked a familiar route through a city that feels nothing like how you think home should feel. In short, the entirety of your day seems to have no correlation to you, to the "you" you think you are. It's as if your life is happening to someone else.

This feeling comes often—while you're talking with the barista at the café, or waiting in line at the movie theatre. Really, it's persistent, but most of the time, you just choose to ignore it. Your actions seem to have no bearing on your actual self, a self which is hidden, safely tucked away; rather, you live your life through this avatar who resembles you in the mirror, and who goes through these motions on your behalf.

Sometimes you look at your hand, and you wonder if it's yours, or your avatar's. Sometimes you'll do things just to see if you will feel them, or if he will.

But everyone feels this. To call the feeling "dissociative" sounds so pathological. It's not. Everyone feels this. This is normal. It's within the realm of normal. It must be.

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