The Miracle of Madness

The Miracle of Madness

The list of mad geniuses is far longer than the list of normal geniuses (whatever normal means).  Actually I think normal as it relates to anybody’s mental state or mental stability.   Really, look it up.  Name any human who has ever achieved any lasting change; cultural, political, scientific, artistic – any advance (sometimes, yes, even destructively backward) – nuts.  In some manner every one of these individuals have an aberrant brain condition.

In the case of Prophets, any religious figure of import and influence, all of them spoke with God (by whatever name you prefer to use).  God, some entity beyond the normal, everyday experience of normal people.  These Prophets spoke with something in the beyond.  In any context, or definition, other than a religious modality, this would be considered to be insanity.  And, due to simple charisma, intensity and fervor, they manage to pull the weak willed into their world and this new view becomes a general view and, therefore, normal.  

Beyond that we have all of the great artists, every damned one of them – every goddamned one of them.  Michelangelo, yes.  Da Vinci, yes.  Not just Van Gogh, of the missing ear, but Monet, Manet, Cezanne, Kandinski, Jackson Pollack, Andy Warhol.  All of ‘em were nutty as a deaf bat.  Einstein to whoever other scientist you can think of.  For me there is Einstein and Madam Curie and that’s about it.  Maybe Wozniac  (Apple computers?).  Politically from Ceasar, the Pharoahs, Geo. Washinton, Lincoln, Hitler, Truman – all of ‘em, mentally bent in some intense fashion.  If nothing else, narcissistic as God, himself.

 Logically – to accomplish anything extraordinary, by the definition of the word, you cannot be ordinary.  Ordinary goes nowhere and accomplishes nothing.  Possessing of the ability to reach beyond the ordinary, what is normal, into the miraculous world of seeing, thinking beyond normal and ordinary.  To see, to think of what might be, what could be, made from what is, or could be, into something entirely new.  An evolution, or a total invention of what has never before existed. 

And the genius giving birth to this newness must be prepared to suffer.  Often this is what happens when the madman (or woman) creates from what may seem to be, the ether.  The ordinary, the normal will often kill, or crush, any threat to the status quo.  Go beyond what they know and you put yourself in grave danger.  David may defeat Goliath, but the real world will most often turn on David and destroy him – not make him king; something that could only happen in the Bible or Star Wars.  For one thing, find the helmet from any suit of armor and show me where the forehead is exposed.  Personally, I’ve never seen one.

But none of this is particularly important, more so than to state total focus is a requirement for highest achievement.  The one who comes in first, is the one who refuses to come in second.  Totally refuses, rejects even the vague thought of coming in second. 

Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel painting of Genesis (the creation), which is arguably the highest achievement of visually telling of this story, was painted by one such madmen.  From all historical accounts to his own writings, all psychological science can attribute bipolarism and extreme narcissism to the man.  He went head to head with the most powerful man, the Pope, in the western world and won.  He was celebrated for his creative and physical artistic skills and reviled, by pretty much everyone who knew him, for his temperament and personality.

There were many cities that both the Allies and the Axis refused to bomb, because of the Art present in those cities.  Didn’t give a shit about the people.  Hitler (definitely mad) killed over six million people and yet he hauled off every significant work of Art he could get his grubby paws on.  A weird sidebar, but a truth.  The first group Mao grabbed was the intellectuals and artists.  Shot the intellectuals and forced the artists to produce propaganda.  Shot the ones who wouldn’t do it. 

The cruelty of all this is that while we justifiably despise the immoral mad men, we rarely admit the highest morality evident in the actions, the work, of the totally moral genius.  Those who walk the dark valleys, surrounded by evil and destruction, and yet emerge with only love in their hearts.  Never releasing their grasp on goodness, right action and love.  While that work is going on, being done, obstacles and persecution are ever present, when it is finished and the goodness is apparent, obvious and undeniable, it is worshipped.  The doing of the deed is reviled and the result is celebrated.

It is easy and comfortable to be the bird that hides in the nest, it takes extraordinary courage to be the bird that takes to wing.