Imposter syndrome is not considered a genuine medical diagnosis, and yet I suffer the worst case of it. I never thought of myself as a great writer. I was, and am, afflicted with obsession, which was attendant with the ADHD. That’s also dismissed as a fake disease, yet I had all the symptoms: obsession, hyperfocus, distractibility, disfluency, impulsivity, panic attacks, anxiety, and forgetfulness. The hell its fake. Maturity helps a lot, but it never gets fully untangled. Nowadays, with all my effort, I try to see it as something of a superpower, while keeping in mind that to romanticize the condition is to imply, insincerely, that we’d all be better off with the diagnosis. Peter Gray buttresses the point, explaining how creativity is a positive side effect of ADHD. “Divergent thinking” is the shorthand. The talent is not so much in solving problems, but rather finding problems. It’s the endless line of questioning – “why-why-why,” the grip of adolescence – and trying not to be afraid when you begin seeing patterns.
Inquiry, I think, fulfills at least one journalistic essential. As for the other part – presenting one’s findings – it has often allowed another person’s eyes to be jolted open, because I’ve just revealed something amazing. I was good at this, even if it wasn’t so much my specialness but because so many live in a mental box – one that I’ve glazed into. The accursed part that came with it was an internal monologue that rarely shut up. All those long walks that allowed endless mental ramblings to cycle through the badly-knotted neuro-wiring. As of late, I feel that the voice has shut up. It’s become eerily quiet. I search Hoffer’s diary, and am relieved when I come across this entry:
The fact that I accomplish little when I take time off disqualifies me as a writer. I do have an original idea now and then. If I hang on with all my might, I eventually put together a few thousand words. It may take a year. I lack a flow of words. The most crucial words are never at my service. I have to search and recruit them anew every time.
In another entry, Hoffer wrote: “The weakening of my memory frightens me. Unless I note a thing down it slips my mind completely. The effort to remember what I forgot results in actual pain.” That was in 1959, when Hoffer was approaching 60. As I inch closer to 40, I sympathize with the loss of mental acuity, the actualization of agony, like its right there in that sinus-infected forehead (maybe some sinus rinses would help me out; hey, there is a connection!) There’s been a lot of recent talk about cognitive decline, what with a president who doubtlessly suffers from it, and a former president who likely does as well. Maybe dementia will eventually find its way onto the list of fake ailments, that as a pushback against all those raging paranoically about it. Doubtful. There is something very harmful taking place. I have my guesses.
My previous obsession was the realization that none of this was worth it. Why, I’ve concluded, do I even bother? “Hundreds of thousands of words,” I fume. “Fifteen years,” I repeat, often beating my fist against the steering wheel. “It’s gotten me” – as I regret to recognize – “nowhere.” No readership, no money. Now I face the paradox of trying to please an online audience while also ridiculing the entire notion of such a thing. Resultingly, my latest obsession stems from the last, now implicating the internet as a whole. Planet Earth is being entangled in the World Wide Web. I wonder if that was my problem all along, wanting to be “free from the influence of other people’s attention,” as Freddie DeBoer recently put (whose essay I’ll come back to). The dilemma before me is how to find an audience and get paid for it without being stuck inside the screen.
This problem seems far more serious once you’ve seen online folk say that they know someone “IRL.” In – Real – Life. A depressing acronym that shows how quickly the Metaverse is being pulled over us. Prior to this era, that was the only way to know someone. In the Data Age, so many relationships are phony, like so much else. Fake friendships and the ensuing fake feuds. We now witness a general blunting of society.
I remember when I was in prison: The picture of a tree in a magazine could bring me to tears. My senses were deprived. I smelled no sweet air, saw little that was vibrant, tasted hardly anything delectable, and rarely touched anyone. When I had any of these, the faucets turned on. Even the feel of blood dripping out of my nose, the result of an angry knuckle, reminded me of my humanity. Somehow, a part of me misses that deprivation, as it could be the only thing to reilluminate a soul gone faded. Now, everything is on the Screen.
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