Is it just me who is insane...or is it everyone else?

[Tuesday]

This is a question I've been pondering quite a bit lately.

I guess most people know this particular feeling of estrangement and alienation from others, be it their friends, families or the rest of the world. You know that what you're doing really is the right thing to do, but strangely everybody else seems to have a different opinion and you begin to wonder if you're actually right after all.

It's such a complicated question really, because, as cliche as it may sound, genius and madness probably are only seperated by a very fine line. On the one hand history has shown that many people who were very unorthodox in their opinions and very passionate about them have became very important figures of our time. Just think of the many scientists or philosophers who have been persecuted due to their opinions and believes.

On the other hand we have mental asylums full of people who believe that they are important and special...and right.

I guess that pretty much every important person in history at one point in his or her life stood before that inevitable and quintessential question: Is it just me? Are they right, after all? I guess it might be a kind of trial by fire that decides whether or not someone has the guts to put everything at stake for the one cause that he firmly believes in.

But still it's such a difficult question for me, even in my own unimportant everyday life. How do you know that you should keep going even if everyone is against you? Is it not, in the end, a kind of naivety or ignorance that keeps people from giving in?

[PrinceMyshkin]

I would think that the very fact that you entertain that question is per se evidence that you are a) sane; b) intelligent, and c) most important of all, more concerned with your integrity as a member of society than with your need to be right.

The converse of your proposition is that there are innumerable people who are indubitably sane by the consensus view of sanity but who never have and likely never will entertain an insane idea or one that is off ther beaten track. An idea may be insane without the holder of it being so, so long as he does not attempt to act on it.

Thos. Szasz: "It all depends on who pulls the definitional trigger."

[Granny5]

My mother always said the only insane people never knew they were insane, only sane people considered it.

[Tuesday]

I guess the main problem arises when it gets really painful, though. When you actually fall out with your friends or your family due to your convictions and your own personal cosmos is torn apart. And it's at this point when the very question of the thread's title arises: Is it just me, after all?

People who actually do have the courage to follow their convictions beyond that step are probably the real heroes of our world today. I guess in a way it was easier once for people to climb the Mount Everest than it was to admit that they're homosexual, for example.

[bibliophile190]

I think one is sane when they truly consider the consequences of their actions. I think one is insane, if they truly don't give a hoot as to how it would affect themselves or others.

[Neo_Sephiroth]

Yep, it's just you.

I kidd, I kidd...Prince is right, when you brought up the question, it shows you that you are not insane...Just "insane". If you get my drift...