Goin’ sane

In modern culture, it was still normal 80 years ago to gas or inject poison into physically and mentally handicapped people, homosexuals or people with psychiatric illnesses.

The Nazi regime separated them from their families by the thousands, killed them, broke out their gold teeth and then burned their bodies. The ashes were poured by the ton into rivers such as the Danube, from where it was spread all over the world.
The argument was that these people were not viable, not worth living and a burden on society. They had to go because they were a danger; their genetic material could not be passed on under any circumstances.

I worked with mentally ill people for several years. I met a man in a forensic ward for mentally ill offenders who got up at 2 a.m. and killed his mother, father and little sister by stabbing them all over their bodies while they were asleep. Afterwards he went into the kitchen, fried himself some fried eggs and enjoyed them.
I know this so well because these acts are being closely investigated. Even the size of the eggs is recorded. Everything is documented in detail, there are weeks and months of research.

Police, doctors, psychiatrists, psychologists, nursing staff and all kinds of therapists talk to this man. Then he is found not guilty. He is sent to a forensic psychiatric ward. He is given the most severe psychotropic drugs and all kinds of therapies.

For the rest of his life, he lives in an environment where he has to spend an hour discussing every cigarette with a social worker who plays his power games with him. He is surrounded by other mentally ill people and lives in a house for which he has no key and which is surrounded by high electric fences. The windows are bulletproof, tables are bolted to the floor and the TV is on all day.
If he is unobtrusive and cooperative, he is allowed to go to the nearest supermarket again after a few years. However, he is only accompanied by two care staff who keep an eye on him and check what he buys.
Apart from psychotropic drugs and basket weaving, modern culture has no way of dealing with insane people. Apart from separating them from the normal people, looking at them with curiosity and documenting what they do, there is nothing they can do.

I actually thought that I had been on the side of normality all my life. I was the one with the key who went home at night and was free to decide what to do. I was popular with the inmates during my time in the psychiatric ward. They liked me because I always tried to talk to them normally and not treat them like crazy people. I thought that if I was friendly and fair, they would be friendly too and realize that their lives could be better if they behaved normally.
I left the psychiatric ward after being attacked by inmates. A huge Russian man cornered me in his room and stared at me with his eyes wide open. I quit my job the next day.

I then worked with mentally ill old people. They had spent their whole lives in institutions and were harmless. They didn’t hurt anyone. They made funny sounds, drooled, smeared their excrement on the walls, laughed for no reason, rocked back and forth on their chairs for hours, washed their hands twenty times and kept talking to you with the same words: “Are you doing? Are you doing? Are you doing?” The whole thing in an endless sequence that only ended when they ate or slept.
Even then, I was the normal one, the healthy one, the sensible one, the controlled one, the educated one, the gifted one, the trained one, the expert. The one with the key who went home at the end of her shift.

It is completely unthinkable that I am crazy. That I laugh for no reason or say something incomprehensible. It is out of the question that I lose control of my facial features in public, that I pick my nose while others look on, that I scream loudly when I’m on the train. I never allow saliva to run down the corner of my mouth and I don’t stare at people. I only touch others if I have asked permission. Sometimes I would like to burp loudly, but I don’t do that.
I control myself. I pull myself together. I try not to look ugly. I’m ashamed if I accidentally fart when others are in the room and might hear it. I fart when I’m alone. Then I fart loudly. It’s normal to fart. When no one is around.

This is so crystal clear to me that I have given it ZERO thought. Not a single one at all. Get well, go sane, get healed, they recommend in modern culture.

The process we did in the Possibility Lab from Possibility Management (https://possibilitymanagement.mystrikingly.com) is called “Goin’ sane”. It took me a few minutes to really understand Clinton Callahan and I asked the person sitting next to me, “What’s the process called?” “Goin’ sane,” she replied. “How?”, I asked again.
“Goin’ sane” is where you hand in your key. You sit on a chair bolted to the floor for 7 minutes. To your left and right are 6 other crazy people. You are strapped to the chair, your hands are fixed to your thighs.
Sitting opposite you are a large number of experts. Psychiatrists and doctors. They look at you and study you. They don’t speak or laugh. They are watching you.

When the 7 minutes began and I went crazy, I first slipped into a role. I played the crazy woman. I had been around crazy people long enough, I knew how to move, how to talk, how to laugh and scream. I knew how to roll my eyes, how to slur my words, how to annoy the neighbors and how to sing crazy songs.

When the 7 minutes started and I went crazy, I really went crazy. It was like a little black switch was flipped in my head. A part of me came alive and came to life. A part that doesn’t care what others think. That doesn’t care if I look ugly. Or old. Or insane. A part that doesn’t try not to scare others. Not to repel them. A part that doesn’t care if others turn away in disgust. A part that others are afraid of. A part that stinks and drools and is assaultive.

In the course of these 7 minutes, this part came to life, which was a real part of me. Something alive. Something that was locked inside me, locked away, sedated with medication and kept in check with hundreds of woven baskets.

It was also a part that saw the truth and spoke it. And that knew the truth was so crazy and insane that no one would believe it. Who knew that she would be declared crazy if she spoke it. She suspected that she would make herself really unpopular if she said what she saw. What was there. What had happened. I realized how afraid the normal people are of the insane ones. How dangerous it is for a society when the insane ones speak.

During the whole 7 minutes I knew that this was a process, that I would bow afterwards, get applause and sit back down in my chair. And so it was. I sat down again.
But it wasn’t the same person who sat down again. My view of myself had changed. A blind spot was now sitting in the spotlight. Something that had been hiding and living in the dark for a long time had woken up. I no longer wanted to go back to my old normality. I no longer wanted to be the sensible one who held back and swallowed the sentence.
no longer believed the voice that said: “You can’t say/do that. The others will think you’re crazy. They’ll be scared of you. Better not say it. Stay in the background. Give me the key. Weave the next basket.”

The next day I discovered an implant in my brain in a “brain split” process. This implant had prevented me from going insane. I had received it as a small child. The implant probably prevented me from ending up in a psychiatric ward or killing someone. But it certainly also prevented me from running to my mother and telling her: “Uncle Ewald has stuck his finger up my vagina.”
There’s a saying: children and crazy people tell the truth.
In a society where children are not insane, adults are safe. Safe from the magic, the enchantment, the clairvoyance, the imagination, the cheerfulness, the ruthlessness and the deep wisdom of children. Safe from bursting into tears at the infinite vulnerability and immortality of the child’s soul.

I have removed the implant. A 9 centimeter long and 2.5 centimeter wide stainless steel plate that is now on the shelf in my lab.

I am insane.

I now have the ability to go crazy on purpose and responsibly. My aliveness has lacked the crazy resource of non-linear creativity for all these decades. I don’t know who I would be now or what my life would have been like if I hadn’t been locked in my own private inner psychiatric ward for so long.
I look forward to the next few years of discovery.
I have taken back the key and let myself out.
I am now free.