To be normal, absolutely normal, one must first go to a psychologist. Only he is capable of putting a lost soul on the path to normality. Next, one must live in such a way as to spend at least half of one’s useful time working. Every day, one must expose oneself to the salutary radiation of a television. Remedies for anxiety, depression, and cholesterol should complement a diet centered on industrialized products. Social injustices should inspire the deepest indignation, and the State should be obeyed regardless of the circumstances. Next to the pillow, a self-help book. And the mind repeating the mantra: “I can”.
Psychology Ended Up Sinking…
Although they can be related, antipathy to socialization and social inability are completely different things. Introversion does not necessarily imply shyness or inhibition. Many psychologists fall into this error, and those who do not, err in judging the former to be a personality disorder—therefore, something which must be corrected. Psychology ended up sinking because it did not define, from the beginning, the scope of its work. It gave in to the charms of novelty and invaded other terrains—terrains whose complexity is beyond its means of analysis. It proceeded in this way, classifying behavioral patterns as if they were always the result of a stupid formula, as if the man had no capacity to judge and choose. Worse than that: without noticing, it established a supposedly universal scale of values to be used as a reference for what is or is not normal. Thus, it erected a human model devoid of individuality—a model, therefore, extremely superficial.
The Independence at Stake
I think of these organized literary movements, these attempts to innovate conjointly, these collusions that resulted in magazines and the like, these personal relationships founded on a supposed artistic affinity… I cannot help but conclude that the greatest blessing that can befall an artist is to never meet a single person inclined toward his art. It is the independence that is at stake; full, inviolable independence. It is to create as if no one could ever discover creation, it is to open oneself without embarrassment, without the possibility of others conjecturing unpleasant correlations, it is to never have to hear a friendly compliment and then have to reciprocate it. God, how ungrateful I have always been! Thank you, thank you very much!
Modern Psychiatry, Invading the Terrain of Philosophy…
Modern psychiatry, invading the terrain of philosophy, is already a kind of doctrine in which eminent Simões Bacamartes are taking great strides toward the end that the original one had. There is a model of normality, and this model is that of the jester. Anyone who does not fit into it is unquestionably sick and should seek professional help. There are judgments about life, about the environment, about others, there are deliberate behaviors that only spring up in an unhealthy mind. All of them, of course, must be treated. A Seneca, a Schopenhauer, fatally suffers from a disorder. So do all saints, all monks, hermits of any kind, poets, dreamers, adventurers, and many others. A Fernando Pessoa, then, is a raving madman, a lunatic to be tied at the foot of a table. And for all these, the most enlightened modern psychiatry has already attributed a mental illness. All this would be funny, if we were not in an age where freedoms are gradually stifled and individuals are increasingly forced to follow a behavioral primer. It would not be long before the State, based on Science, proposes to correct the disturbed, justifying itself by Marketing. And then the mentally ill, those harmful to the common good, are interned. It is possible to perfectly imagine the Ministry of Health that Orwell did not create, operated by today’s very powerful sociopaths, whose taste for control exceeds all limits ever recorded by history. What a catastrophe!