Born With a Funky OS?

Until I talked to my friend V recently, I realized I'd never put together - out loud - a more complete picture of why I've felt so hindered my whole life. As I get older, and as we learn more about the science and psychology of being human, I have begun to mesh together what feels like satisfactory answers. Of course, we can never know the whole truth of anything - the Universe and its workings are too profound and mysterious for that. (Then there's all the possibilities of past life issues, spiritual contracts, and your astrological profile, if you are open minded about that sort of thing.) But each of these points below, arrived at via both hard work and sudden intuition, resonate like little tuning forks for me. You can click on the graphic to enlarge it:



The trick is, how to manage not only your psychological programming, but your biological challenges as well. Whether hormonal sensitivity is a main culprit (one reason dysthymia and cyclothymia occur more in women), or other bio aspects contribute equally, it's very hard to pinpoint the problem - and thus know what to treat. It does feel as though my physical frailties have prevented me from getting a good leg up toward fulfilling my "potential," whatever that may be.

Bottom line: I've never had adequate, regular windows of time that I've felt self-knowledgeable and clear headed enough to get a handle on what I want. It seems for me life has been all about managing what I call the "bee's nest" in my head and attendant depressive symptoms; just staying afloat enough to get through the days. (Months, years . . . ). My hope is that the "coming home to oneself" of midlife will free up enough energy, self-knowledge and wisdom to help me push through some of these obstacles and become the late bloomer I think I'm meant to be.

Body Wisdom

Last time, I mentioned the concept of overexcitability but didn't explain what it was. Before I do, let me first say that the concept solved another part of the mysterious puzzle of my temperament.

On the SENG website (Supporting the Emotional Needs of the Gifted) is an article by Sharon Lind called "Overexcitablity and the Gifted." In it she describes some of the work of Polish psychiatrist and psychologist Kazimierz Dabrowski (1902-1980).

"Overexcitabilities are inborn intensities indicating a heightened ability to respond to stimuli. Found to a greater degree in creative and gifted individuals, overexcitabilities are expressed in increased sensitivity, awareness, and intensity, and represent a real difference in the fabric of life and quality of experience. Dabrowski identified five areas of intensity - Psychomotor, Sensual, Intellectual, Imaginational, and Emotional. A person may possess one or more of these. 'One who manifests several forms of overexcitability, sees reality in a different, stronger and more multisided manner' (Dabrowski, 1972, p. 7). Experiencing the world in this unique way carries with it great joys and sometimes great frustrations."

After reading the article, I realized I'd been born with four of those five OEs. And on top of this loaded stack of sensitivities, the four had never been adequately appreciated, developed or even articulated. No wonder depression. (This would also explain why travel is so deeply rewarding for me.)

The definition of "gifted" has evolved from the narrow realm of intellect and IQ to a wider range of creative talents and inter- and intra-personal sensitivities. Whether you believe Elaine Aron, developer of the Highly Sensitive Person theories, or Dabrowski, or neither, it's obvious that some of us are more sensitive than others. And though the debate between nature and nurture has good arguments for each side, science of late seems to demonstrate a biological basis for much of why we are how we are. (See the recent popular works on mirror neurons for a fascinating example.)

The short story is this: I spent thousands of dollars and a couple of decades thinking it was all in my head, this restless depression that's dogged me since adolescence. And clearly I wasn't alone: lots of people were happy to take my money to try to get to the psychological bottom of things. There were psychological issues, to be sure, and I've done more work than most people to address them. But even with the advent of antidepressants in the 1980s, when I was in my twenties, none of us saw the biological possibilities, because that big picture is only now getting properly researched and paid attention to. (Don't get me started on the prevalence of antidepressants as a solution to our whacked-out culture.)

Sure, I've always known I was sensitive. And I've always suspected there were other reasons for it besides my "original family." But because psychology has been the dominant model to explain our unhappiness, it became popular belief that the way to good mental health was through the psyche. I bought into it hook line and sinker, like a good, dependent citizen. Now there's lots of talk about the mind-body connection, and smart people realize that we still know very little about being human.

The body, it seems, has a mind of its own. It's wiser than we are, because it knows things we can't remember, or refuse to. It knows ancient things that served - and still serve - a purpose in maintaining the health of our humanness. This is why the Hand-Movement-Depression info below and this idea on overexcitability are so… well, exciting to me. The first addresses a bodily basis and non-AMA sanctioned partial cure for my blues; the second affirms that my "excess" sensitivities are innate and may actually have a worthy purpose in my development, if I allow them freer reign. (On a side note, this reclaiming of original Self is a large part of the often intense work of midlife.)

Next time, I'll write about more biological pieces to the mysterious puzzle - recent research on estrogen and depression.

The Hand-Movement Depression Connection

One of the most time honored suggestions for beating the blues has been to "keep busy." I sometimes balk at this advice because a) our culture overvalues busyness and b) staying busy is often a way to avoid addressing problems.

Recently, though, I came across a more convincing argument for keeping yourself occupied: the book Lifting Depression, by neuroscientist Kelly Lambert. She discovered a brain process she labels the "effort driven rewards circuit." From her website: http://kellylambert.com/index.php

"Drawing on innovative research (with rats, whose brains are similar to those of humans), Lambert identifies a circuit in the human brain—connecting movement, feeling and cognition—that is responsible for emotional emptiness, negative thinking, and other symptoms of depression. She reveals how stimulating this “effort-driven reward circuit” with hands-on physical activities that yield tangible rewards builds resilience against the disorder. Involving the hands is especially effective, since so much of the brain is devoted to hand movement.

Lambert shows how when you knit a sweater or plant a garden, when you prepare a meal or simply repair a lamp, you are bathing your brain in feel-good chemicals and creating a kind of mental vitamin. Our grandparents and great grandparents, who had to work hard for basic resources, developed more resilience against depression; even those who suffered great hardships had much lower rates of this mood disorder. But with today’s overly-mechanized lifestyle we have forgotten that our brains crave the well-being that comes from meaningful effort."

What I like about this approach is that you are not required to go out and change your life dramatically, or do things that feel too beyond your ability to cope at the moment. Preparing a simple meal… that's pretty do-able. Do that once a day or a few times a week, and perhaps you're on your way! What I also like about this information is that it connects the dots regarding my restless temperament. More on that – and the concept of "overexciteability" – next time.

Lambert's website and book also discuss the impact of our increasingly passive lifestyles have on our mental health – something I've been thinking about for years. Countless sources have pointed out that humans cannot evolve fast enough to keep up with our ever-changing technology. The unintended mental and emotional consequences – stress and depression - are rarely discussed and problem-solved in our everyday societal life.