Think I am stable right now (after horror episode so a bit fragile) so I will give it a go. For me being stable is being able to feel a wide rage of emotions in a healthy way. For example I may tear up significantly sharing moving lyrics with a friend. Or, I feel a sense of well-being that doesn't fly into euphoria. When I am in an episode my emotions are deeply impacted, as is my mood.

I guess what makes up my normal periods is 'me'. My normal is not going to be yours. I rapid cycle so I understand what it is like to feel like you're going into and out of episodes so often it can drown out the stable bit in between. Actually, I used to be a lot more unstable and my episodes seemed to just run off each other. But over the last two years I have made progress and the 'mess' is being cleaned up leaving me with less episodes and more stable time in between. Now this is still at least five (e.g.hypo-mixed) with each episode lasting a total of about 6 weeks. So, yeh that is over half my year unwell and a bit more recovering.

But then I still get to be stable more than a few years ago. Having this time stable has helped immensely in getting to know myself, my 'stable', 'normal' self. Maybe you are not getting enough stable time yet to know. Hang in there. This could be a bad run and your stable days are around the corner. Do you have any ideas as to why you might be unwell so often? e.g. another illness like PTSD.