I went into a massive funk over the last week, which really had been building for several weeks. I wasn't sleeping properly, felt unhappy all the time, it was horrible. For some reason, probably for combined reasons, that has lifted now. It's not like everything is going to be plain sailing from now, but I am my real self again. I think I will be able to use my mental resources to do the work that has to be done. The problems are out there, rather than inside my stupid brain.
I don't know if other people feel like this - I sometimes step on a mental accelerator (or go into hyperdrive or whatever metaphor). Work better, faster, harder than normal. But only getting into a total panic will make me do it. WTF. So this last weekend I had to write a book plan and some sample chapters, and plan four courses to start teaching this week. And I did it, with time to spare. But the way I got myself to that point was my own idiotic Via Dolorosa. Pardon my flippancy, I am really shaking a finger at myself for being such a loopy that I can only get from rational point A to rational point C via irrational misery-fest B.
BTW I was thinking about how much I like scenes in films where you see a person suddenly power past everyone else. I am thinking of that scene in Life on Mars when Sam runs past Gene and the other overweight cops. Or you see someone half way down the field of an Olympic race suddenly come powering through. Or when it happens mentally - that's one of the joys of Breaking Bad - suddenly someone is operating at a new level, and from the new angle all the old problems are soluble, even trivial. It's a bit like hearing a joke: you have been immersed in a mental context - with thoughts like overweight cops struggling to catch up - and something happens to bounce you out of that context - like a new type of cop who can run in a new and better way. Joy.
