Saturday, December 30, 2017

Hypermoral, hyper-religious

One of my mental illness symptoms is hyper-religiosity, which I have truly managed as well as I could, no matter how much people might still point out that I am annoying and uptight sometimes.  I know I am, and I know that my scrupulosity is a fault as much as it is a burden and source of pain. But I was thinking today that some of my excessive moralizing might have served a practical purpose, and as much as I have had to fight it, I have also had to use it.  I have a theory that it isn't just part of my brain on overdrive, but it might be something I have had to do to try to counteract other weaknesses that seem like character issues.   Both my mental illness and the medicine I take cause lethargy and reduced motivation and alertness, so I really have to convince myself that chores are important in order to exert any energy whatsoever.  I mean I practically have to view everything as some integral part of the whole world's salvation or at least my own survival and behavior record to even get up from a chair and fix some cereal.  And I am actually wondering if this might be a theory about schizophrenia, which sometimes includes extreme negative symptoms of apathy and inertia, as well as grandiose delusions for some people.  I mean maybe the herculean effort that it takes to get out of bed does make people think they must be some kind of important hero.  I do not know if that is how the delusions form, but I just today started wondering if some of my hyper moralism and excessive religious thought is from building too much strength as I have had to continually tap into my moral reasoning and religious faith in order to do any basic chore at work or at home. The fact is that there might be a reason why people like me imagine ourselves getting a reward on Judgement Day for merely considering doing a load of laundry, or find ourselves quoting the band of brothers speech on the way to the coffee shop.

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