One aspect of insanity is NOT thinking one is insane. — Yohan

My limited experience is that the insane, if they know anything - and they may not - know that something is wrong. And the what it is absolutely no joke at all, and among the most difficult and terrible challenges any person can face.

"Insanity" itself, however, is not a helpful term, and lacking a specific definition is more harmful than helpful. Better to ask yourself if you have persistent problems in living of any kind, and if yes, then hie yourself to a medical professional. And before you go, write down the what you think and why you think it.

And sometimes the crazy one isn't crazy, but is instead being driven to act crazy by the real crazies (usually) in his or her family. Bottom line, the crazy person knows better than most people his (or her) status.

Insanity is coming here everyday thinking you'll find answers. :worry:

[Deleted]

EDIT: Sorry, I didn't even read your OP, just the title. Given what you say, you probably should see a professional. It doesn't look to me as if your insane, you are aware of what's going on, if you weren't, that would be a big red flag. But, yeah, got see professionals here.

If you have concerns, best to seek out a qualified medical doctor for clarification and support, not an internet forum. Insanity is an old-fashioned word used to describe a range of mental illnesses that result in significant impairment around appropriate decision making, personal safety and the safety of others. There might be a delusional component, auditory hallucinations, along with personal distress and paranoia. People may also have moments of lucidity.

Insanity is action incongruous with truth, so yes I'd argue everything human is insane to some degree. We don't have perspective to know the wherewithal of ourselves, others, or virtually anything.

I'm saying we're both insane, whether God exists or not. I do happen to be a theist, but how can I live in congruence with that which I cannot fathom? And if God doesn't exist, I'm just that much more insane.

I'd tell a doctor the same thing you said in the OP.

No point in suffering when there's help available.

-I have multiple voices in my head. Eg, one voice says "do what you want" another says "better be careful". Sometimes I talk to myself, even fight myself. Some voices say things to me like, "you are an awful person." while other voices say megalomaniacal things to me which I am too shy to share. — Yohan

Do you ‘think’ this thoughts or actually hear ‘voices’? There is a HUGE difference and some experience the first believing it to be the later.

There are people who hear voices and they live perfectly normal lives without any medication. In fact many report the use of having these voices to solve problems. Hearing voices is not necessarily a sign of insanity. If you hear voices (I mean really hear voices) that are independent of you then …

I would highly recommend visiting a psychologist - NOT a psychiatrist - and discussing your concerns. It may well be merely an episode of psychosis (it is more common than you think) or it could be the sign of a more severe underlying brain condition such as schizophrenia (in which case get second and third opinion before consulting a psychiatrist if possible).

I’m not qualified at all but what you’re describing sounds a lot like what they classify as hypomania, but in all honesty such labels are vague at best. Chances are you’re just having an episode that will pass but you should probably still seek out a psychologist to discuss this with for your own safety and peace of mind.

Just to emphasis having strange thoughts and drives vying for attention is not the same as hearing voices. Either way the voices are You so don’t get lost in them.

Book an appointment and insist on seeing a professional rather than filling out some nonsense form and being dismissed without speaking to anyone.

I feel cut off and alienated from nature and the world at large and from myself. — Yohan

Feelings of alienation are not signs of insanity. A lot of us live in circumstances which are very alienating. Alienation is unhealthy, but a psychiatrist can't cure it. You have to find meaning and purpose in your life.

When I sleep, I have crazy dreams — Yohan

Everybody has crazy dreams.

I feel like most of my thoughts are subconscious. — Yohan

Your thoughts come from the unconscious, a place to which consciousness has little access.

My mind is constantly moving and agitated. ... Some voices say things to me like, "you are an awful person." while other voices say megalomaniacal things to me which I am too shy to share. — Yohan

This is the the sort of thing that you should see a psychiatrist about. How dangerous do these voices get? Do they tell you to do something harmful? I can't tell for sure from your description, but it sounds like you are having aural hallucinations, which is not normal. "Hallucinations" are different than mental chatter, which can be bothersome in itself, but which usually is not a sign o anything serious.

Knowing you are crazy just means you know you are crazy (to use your terminology). Some people have symptoms of mental illness which are very unpleasant, and they very much desire to get better. Some people can not identify the irrationality of their mental state on their own. A very depressed person may not recognize that they are depressed.

The proof that you are not stark raving mad (to use the highly technical medical term) is your OP. You were able to write a sensible description of how you feel. But you should still get evaluated at a mental health clinic. You should, ESPECIALLY if what you experience becomes debilitating or more frightening to you.

Not a very helpful tip: Don't know where you live, but it can be difficult to locate a clinic with openings in the near future. So, start looking before you are in crisis.

sounds a lot like what they classify as hypomania — I like sushi

That's quite plausible, provided that what @Yohan is hearing are intrusive hallucinations and not just annoying mental chatter (which a lot of us hear a good share of the time).

I would highly recommend visiting a psychologist - NOT a psychiatrist — I like sushi

Good advice. If a patient needs psychiatric help, the psychologist will refer him or her on to a psychiatrist. I've seen a number of psychiatrists over the years; their role is mostly medical management of patients with moderate to severe conditions. As an empathetic pair of ears, most psychiatrists suck -- partly because they usually don't have time (thanks to insurance companies) to give patients much personal attention.

It's a rare psychiatric practice that schedules 30 to 45 minutes per visit, and those are usually for patients with major mental illnesses, like schizophrenia, bi-polar, psychosis, etc.

I had a depression many times. Felt the same detachment from Nature. The society we live in only stimulates this feeling. What a world we live in... A big artificial LEGOland, with power structures trying to force people to live in it. Not truly inspiring for the natural mind to develop. Tell me if you want me to continue.

"Insanity" itself, however, is not a helpful term, and lacking a specific definition is more harmful than helpful. Better to ask yourself if you have persistent problems in living of any kind, and if yes, then hie yourself to a medical professional. And before you go, write down the what you think and why you think it. — tim wood

Good point. It is hard to accept an unflattering label. Easier to accept having a particular problem or challenge.

Insanity is coming here everyday thinking you'll find answers. :worry: — Sam26

Good one. I get good clarifications and new thoughts from coming here though. I enjoy the journey, even if there is no ultimate destination, other than greater clarity and information on where I am.

EDIT: Sorry, I didn't even read your OP, just the title. Given what you say, you probably should see a professional. It doesn't look to me as if your insane, you are aware of what's going on, if you weren't, that would be a big red flag. But, yeah, got see professionals here. — Manuel

Thanks for advice. I would have liked to read your thoughts on the title question too though. I didn't, consciously at least, intend for this post to be all about me, but I understand that if I'm really in bad shape that is more important than philosophizing about insanity..

Insanity is an old-fashioned word used to describe a range of mental illnesses that result in significant impairment around appropriate decision making, personal safety and the safety of others. There might be a delusional component, auditory hallucinations, along with personal distress and paranoia. People may also have moments of lucidity. — Tom Storm

I'm not having hallucinations and I don't think I'm dangerous to others or seriously to myself, so I guess I don't fit the high end of "insanity". I'm just a wreck is all.

I'm saying we're both insane, whether God exists or not. I do happen to be a theist, but how can I live in congruence with that which I cannot fathom? And if God doesn't exist, I'm just that much more insane. — theRiddler

:ok:

Do you ‘think’ this thoughts or actually hear ‘voices’? There is a HUGE difference and some experience the first believing it to be the later. — I like sushi

They are just thoughts. And they are basically my own voice. But I recognize voices represent different parts of myself, if that makes sense.

Book an appointment and insist on seeing a professional rather than filling out some nonsense form and being dismissed without speaking to anyone. — I like sushi

right

Not a very helpful tip: Don't know where you live, but it can be difficult to locate a clinic with openings in the near future. So, start looking before you are in crisis. — Bitter Crank

I'll see if I can get myself to do it.

I apologize if I gave the impression of being "crazier" than I really am. I think I am in a bad enough condition to need help, but not "clinically insane" as the term goes.

I have a friend who has mostly the same issues I have. Constantly feeling bad, hard time with discipline and decision making and so on.
He is seeing a psychologist.
I'm not seeing that its made a big difference. I get the impression the psychologist mostly sits back and listens. It is therapeutic in itself to express oneself. But I can't stand the idea of paying a stranger just to listen to me.

They are just thoughts. And they are basically my own voice. But I recognize voices represent different parts of myself, if that makes sense. — Yohan

OK. You're human. Congrats! It is a madness in and of itself in times like these. You might come to recognise this 'insanity' as sanity that is probably what is needling you :)

-My mind is constantly moving and agitated. I'm never fully at peace. Never fully present. I feel the need to keep myself constantly distracted from my own thoughts and feelings. At the same time, I try to hide this fact from myself. — Yohan

This is the burden of freedom. Many ignore it and suffer as a consequence, some don't ignore it and suffer actively. Choose the later if you have the fortitude.

This is the burden of freedom. Many ignore it and suffer as a consequence, some don't ignore it and suffer actively. Choose the later if you have the fortitude. — I like sushi

I could be the impact of power also.

I had a depression many times. Felt the same detachment from Nature. The society we live in only stimulates this feeling. What a world we live in... A big artificial LEGOland, with power structures trying to force people to live in it. Not truly inspiring for the natural mind to develop. Tell me if you want me to continue. — MatterGauge

Sure.

?

I had many talks with people who are specialized, so-called. Mainly they asked me questions about my relations to other people and they even asked me if I like bin-Laden! I have the feeling they try to put me in a psychological category. I had my fair share of depression. Gone now, luckily. It hase gone away on its own. I don't care anymore what others think. I'm happy with my own reality. I try not to be rude to people, not to offend them, while accepting their reality. Of which there are as many as people. And animals. In fact m, Bo, our dog, is barking right now. I come back later. Modern society has put a constraint on people as has never been done before in the history of mankind. Making susceptible minds bleed. I have the feeling you and I are its victims...Later!

OK. You're human. Congrats! It is a madness in and of itself in times like these. You might come to recognise this 'insanity' as sanity that is probably what is needling you :) — I like sushi

Sometimes I want to "go insane", in the sense of transcending the mind. I want to get raw instinct back which I feel I have been taught to repress to live as docile member of society.

This is the burden of freedom. Many ignore it and suffer as a consequence, some don't ignore it and suffer actively. Choose the later if you have the fortitude. — I like sushi

I struggle with the idea of free will. Sometimes, like AA mentions, I find it helpful to acknowledge my helplessness. Taking responsibility and admitting helplessness are both forms of facing up to reality, I guess, and very hard to do.

I struggle with the idea of free will. Sometimes, like AA mentions, I find it helpful to acknowledge my helplessness. Taking responsibility and admitting helplessness are both forms of facing up to reality, I guess, and very hard to do. — Yohan

I know what you mean. This is where nihilism sneaks in often enough. Sometimes people have to become nihilistic to see past it.

Acknowledging helplessness is usually another way to avoid a problem. Jung used an analogy about problems we face in life by referring to a storm in a valley. When we're in the storm there is no way out yet when we look back down the valley once we're out of it we know the problem still exists yet we are not exactly in its shadow.

I would go for saying 'acknowledging ignorance' rather than what I often see as 'clinging to helplessness' in order to avoid any possible recognition of responsibility. If you listen to yourself you will eventually come to understand, bit by bit, where to put your energies. Put them somewhere though rather than opting for passivity as nihilism will eat you up.

I would go for saying 'acknowledging ignorance' rather than what I often see as 'clinging to helplessness' in order to avoid any possible recognition of responsibility. If you listen to yourself you will eventually come to understand, bit by bit, where to put your energies. Put them somewhere though rather than opting for passivity as nihilism will eat you up. — I like sushi

I wonder if nihilism is the ultimate truth though.

Acknowledging helplessness is usually another way to avoid a problem. — I like sushi

A lot really is outside of control though.
Clinging to the idea of being in control can also be a way to avoid reality.

If you follow it through you'll find absurdism ... some just get stuck in nihilism though.

If you get stuck you're my enemy.

You can't ever be sure you won't do anything insane before you die.

But being insane means doing things no one in their right mind would do. For example, throwing away your iPhone 12.

If you get stuck you're my enemy. — I like sushi

At the moment trying to take responsibility feels hopeless. Like trying to control a wild horse. Gives me more pressure, more feelings of inadequacy, and the feeling like I am choosing to be stuck and that therefor I am a bad lazy person.

But I do think sometimes I am truly an evil person behind my mostly pleasant agreeable exterior. And that deep down I would rather be a force of destruction to the world at large.

At the moment trying to take responsibility feels hopeless. Like trying to control a wild horse. Gives me more pressure, more feelings of inadequacy, and the feeling like I am choosing to be stuck and that therefor I am a bad lazy person.

But I do think sometimes I am truly an evil person behind my mostly pleasant agreeable exterior. And that deep down I would rather be a force of destruction to the world at large. — Yohan

Seriously, listen to these guys.

I'd tell a doctor the same thing you said in the OP.
No point in suffering when there's help available. — Shawn

If you have concerns, best to seek out a qualified medical doctor for clarification and support, not an internet forum. — Tom Storm

Sounds like you need immediate support from qualified and experienced people.
Stop thinking about it. Be good to yourself and take care :sparkle:

Here, the GP would be first call or an Emergency Helpline such as Samaritans.
What do you have where you live ?

https://www.mind.org.uk/information-support/guides-to-support-and-services/crisis-services/helplines-listening-services/

From the mind website, link to worldwide support:
https://www.befrienders.org/

The Mind website also advises what you need to consider before calling a helpline.

Stay safe.

Accept that certainty is impossible. Its' the same for everyone.

I have already chosen the dark side. I believe there is a point of no return which I have crossed into. I made my choice and I will try and enjoy being a force of destruction.

But being insane means doing things no one in their right mind would do. For example, throwing away your iPhone 12. — Cidat

That would be a very sane decision. I'm not saying that to be contrary, but it depends totally on how you view the phone. I once saw an English member of parliament smashing his wristwatch. I could totally understand him. His motivation was Tora-based, and that is not my cup of tea, but nevertheless I could relate to the guy.

You merely state what is normal or not. In some realities it is normal, in other ones not. If iPhones replace virtually all forms of direct human contact, at the same time directing people by algorithms and submitting them to the greedy needs of global corporations, showing little respect for Nature or the people they address, under the phoney (how appropriate!) cover of the image of personal freedom and material richdom, so inescapable omnipresent in tech-and science-based society (excuses for criticizing the so beloved science in modern society, but it's just one view of reality amongst many, with an unaccounted claim to power, with a devastating effect on Nature, including people once existing in colorful cultures and having a wide variety of views about which western man can only dream), then I can understand people who wanna throw their phone away, freeing themselves from the global imperative.

I had a moment of feeling depressed when I walked with the dog. The boundaries of a pond in which she always swims, were dag away, to create more space for the water or whatever. Killing a variety of life around the pond. Broken plants, reet, were left at the borders, waiting to be collected by a garbage truck. "Big deal", you might think. But it's a good metaphor for the society we live in. I think modern society gives rise to many mental sicknesses It is thought that depression will be the number 1 sickness soon. From child age we are put in unnatural surroundings, are thought things at school in an abstract nature-detached way, leaving the education to teachers instead to the parents themselves. To make a living later in the same unnatural, programmed, Nature-detached, legoland-like, linear, almost surreal, law-directed, science-based (ooh, I curse in the church of science, which probably gets me banned here!), inflation-directed, growth-mad, (high)tech-structured, intruding, all-pervasive, nature-destructive, materialistic, reality,.

As a result, the use of drugs increases, to escape the system. The last means possible to escape. As a result, people suffer from psychoses. I had one; I felt free, but in hindsight I was indeed mentally no good: I thought the world was 100 years later and tried to drink water from exhaust pipes, thinking only clean water came out, because all cars were hydrogen-driven. I thought the Earth was pure again. I was isolated physically, the usual approach, and given medicin, all without me wanting! And maybe the best, but they took my sense of liberty away. Labels were sought to put on me. I indeed had a psychosis. And maybe luckily I was picked up from a nightspot by the police. I could have ran under a car (which can be considered a just as mad invention as the iPhone, if you wish). It is always "to protect yourself and others, we put you in a cage". Yeah, my ass.

Now, mental illness can be seen in every culture, within the confines of every worldview or reality. You can be born with an tendency for madness (and science is oh so busy trying to find out if it's Nature or nurture, without really trying to understand the people who are suffering). Of course. But aren't we all? Aren't we all the same in that tendency?

Can you give some examples of megalomanic thoughts? I have them too once in a while, merely as a reaction of that sometimes nagging feeling of impowerlessness. A feeling more present than ever before. Do you feel depressed? My depressions are gone, I hope, because I thought that before and then the beast roared its ugly head again. Many times after a time of feeling free and wonderful. Talking with every one, no matter what anyone thought. To be labeled manic. One day the feeling bad subsides! Let's hope it subsides for you! It can't be otherwise! You are a freedom loving spirit, and your brain will surely give you that divine gift of true freedom! Which is not some abstractly defined one. We can talk more about freedom if you like. I surely don't wanna impose my truth or reality upon you!

Insanity is like that state where social competition gets the better of you and you begin to shout(at each other/at the wall). In this state you lack mental control and you often think insanely. Call it being disturbed.