Journal of Sacred Work

…For that fine madness still he did retain,/ Which rightly should possess a poet's brain. – Michael Drayton

   Imagine a Christmas without Tchaikovsky's "Nutcracker," the ballet that has brought joy to millions since 1892.

   Imagine growing up never knowing American literature's finest novel: Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn.

   What if your eyes had never seen Van Gogh's "Starry Night"? 

   Without one genius our ears would never know "Anything You Can Do (I Can Do Better), composed by the legendary Irving Berlin. 

   A single soul named Michelangelo transformed the bare ceiling of the Sistine Chapel into a masterpiece.

   What a loss it would have been if there had never been an Emily Dickinson. 

   Each of these giants was labeled "crazy." Their mood swings often inflicted misery on others. It was the price of their kind of genius.  

   Today psychiatrists would diagnosis them with what the public loosely calls Bipolar Disorder. Caregivers understand that diagnoses spans a wide spectrum from Bipolar Type I at one end to Depression, a unipolar illness, at the other. 

   The illness is not limited to artists. The often energetic Abe Lincoln suffered profound bouts of depression. The mood swings of the legendary Steve Jobs made him a difficult boss.

   It is the unique energy in the positive phase of mania that can open the door to the chambers of magic. There, the disciplined may create wonders & we owe them our gratitude & understanding.

   The saying is that "not all artists are bipolar but most bipolar people are artists." 

   A few years back this illness became personal. My unusual energy had caused some to label me a "Renaissance Man." I had always wondered why I could do many disparate things at once: host an Emmy-Award winning national T.V. show while founding & running a multi-billion dollar, multi-hospital system.

   How could I attend Vanderbilt Divinity School full time while running a second hospital system full-time, then compose music, create award-winning documentaries, write the best-selling Radical Loving Care, write poetry & create photo-art?

   Strangest of all, why did I secretly suffer dark days & display irritability inconsistent with my loving care beliefs? After all, wasn't I "successful?"

   In 2008, a psychiatrist took only fifteen minutes to discover the answer. I had Bipolar Type II -  a version that enables creativity at the hypomanic level but generates mood swings.

   Of course, that might be tolerable if I was a genius. Instead, I am not multi-talented, just multi-interested. 

   Treatment helps. Understanding & appreciation help. Ever since a psychologist told me that I had an "artist's temperament" I have thrown myself even more completely into my artwork. 

   A few month ago, I asked my son, a family historian, who he thought might have been the oddest of our ancestors. "You," he said instantly. 

   I felt complimented.

   We owe deep gratitude to those who care for the "crazy." It is taxing, often confusing & can be as depressing as the disease itself.

   Thank you, mental health caregivers.

-Erie Chapman  

Photograph by Erie