[Serotonin]

That's not to say that many people without mental illness are not OK too, just that in my personal experience people who have been through the psychological and emotional treadmill of mental illness seem to have a better grasp and appreciation of the more important things in life, like mental and emotional health for example. Mentally ill people also seem to have a humility and humanity which many erroneously termed "normal people" seem to be without. They come across as friendlier and more genuine, and there's a likeability about many of them which you just don't usually find with people who have not experienced the pain and anguish of mental illness.

Of course this is only my personal experience and perception of many of the mentally ill people I have come into contact with, and I have also encountered people with mental health problems who do not fit this picture. But it seems that the mental and emotional pain of mental illness can act as a humbler of the ego, letting us know that we are not invincible or super-human, just human and thus imperfect and fallible. The experience of mental illness has a deleterious effect on our self-esteem and sense of self worth, sometimes causing an inferiorty complex; making us feel like lesser persons and thus not as good as everyone else.

But mentally ill people are normal. It is normal to experience mental illness, in fact you could legitimately be labelled "abnormal" if you did not experience some form of mental illness at least once in your lifetime. The body gets ill, the brain is part of the body, so it naturally becomes ill sometimes too. The mind is the totality of our neural and synaptic connections; our accumulated thoughts, memories, and self-concept. In mental illness sometimes we lose our self-concept and forget who we are, perhaps even feel that we have lost ourselves for good, but at our core we are always there.

Mentally ill people are the best kind of people because they are normal and real, they have manifested their foibles and fallibilities, have found the humility to accept that they are not perfect, and have displayed the strength and courage to battle their illness and not allow it to defeat them, and that is what I like about mentally ill people.

Three cheers for the mentally ill!

Hip-hip! ....you know the routine.

[mcl6136]

Some people who have experienced mental illness ARE the best kind of people.

But some are not.

Some of them are violent offenders, horrible parents, sociopathic politicians, serial killers, bad actors on the world stage who are responsible for the extermination of millions of innocent people.

I understand wanting to remove stigmas. I understand that struggling with mental illness does not mean that you're a bad person. But it does not mean that you're NOT a bad person, either.

Three cheers for the mentally ill? Not all of them. Not by a long shot.

[Serotonin]

Originally Posted by mcl6136

Some people who have experienced mental illness ARE the best kind of people.

But some are not.

Some of them are violent offenders, horrible parents, sociopathic politicians, serial killers, bad actors on the world stage who are responsible for the extermination of millions of innocent people.

I understand wanting to remove stigmas. I understand that struggling with mental illness does not mean that you're a bad person. But it does not mean that you're NOT a bad person, either.

Three cheers for the mentally ill? Not all of them. Not by a long shot.

There's a positive and a negative to every phenomenon. I put forward the positive, and you put forward the negative; and the negative contains a lot of truth. If I had initially put forward the negative, perhaps you would have viewed it as an opportunity to put forward the positive? I think it's called "being contrary", or you may choose to call it "offering the alternative point of view" or "the flip side".

Both negative and positive are right within their own right, together providing a more balanced and comprehensive view. But for the purpose of this forum, where there are many mentally ill people who are not violent, sociopathic, serial killers; I chose to offer something exclusively positive at the expense of ignoring the negatives, and in an attempt to help mentally ill people feel just a little bit better about themselves.

[mcl6136]

Originally Posted by Serotonin

There's a positive and a negative to every phenomenon. I put forward the positive, and you put forward the negative; and the negative contains a lot of truth. If I had initially put forward the negative, perhaps you would have viewed it as an opportunity to put forward the positive? I think it's called "being contrary", or you may choose to call it "offering the alternative point of view" or "the flip side".

Both negative and positive are right within their own right, together providing a more balanced and comprehensive view. But for the purpose of this forum, where there are many mentally ill people who are not violent, sociopathic, serial killers; I chose to offer something exclusively positive at the expense of ignoring the negatives, and in an attempt to help mentally ill people feel just a little bit better about themselves.

yes, your positive view contained a lot of truth....So did mine. Some forms of mental illness are characterized by pain, confusion, and lives lived at the margins in ways that I don't feel like celebrating. And I did load my statement down with caveats and qualifiers.

I think of this particular forum as those in therapy. I do think that plenty of people are in therapy, are NOT mentally ill, but are seeing professionals in order to better themselves, achieve goals, understand themselves and others. Some of those people have suffered mightily at the hands of people who ARE mentally ill. SOME mentally ill people leave a trail of wrecked relationships in their paths. Not all, but some.

Thank you for your notion of a comprehensive view, and I agree that plenty of people who do struggle with mental illness of many kinds should feel good about their efforts to help themselves, and help each other!

[Serotonin]

Yay! < Look, Face is happy!

[mcl6136]

Originally Posted by Serotonin

Yay! < Look, Face is happy!

right backatcha

[CantExplain]

Mentally ill people who seek help are the best kind of people.

[growlycat]

I think there is a difference from those who are ill but seek self improvement, and those who go on and on damaging others without a care of the impact on others.

[mcl6136]

Originally Posted by CantExplain

Mentally ill people who seek help are the best kind of people.

You, at your concise best!