The precious asset of sensitivity toward others

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Chronic illnesses can push a person into isolation.  Chronic illnesses of the mind, such as bipolar disorder tend to make that isolation both, a source of pain and relief.  In order to find answers to his own problems, a person does well to seek knowledge about bipolar disorder.  The gaining of such knowledge, if done with the intention of understanding can be a meaningful action.  It can even be life-saving.  However, like with many other things, we can tend to go to extremes.  Knowledge, instead of being a means to an end becomes an end in itself.  Bipolar disorder can make a person an isolationist.  Knowledge can become the two-edged sword that cuts away ignorance, but it can also cut away at sensitivity of the knowledgeable, whether that is the bipolar patient or someone else.

What is the reason, why insensitivity starts to develop?

We live in a harsh world.  Bipolar disorder brings its own harsh experiences.  The pursuit of knowledge, if it leads to isolation from real people and causes us to be satisfied with ink on paper - it can cause us to become insensitive toward others.  The times we are living in, there has been an incredible growth in the communication industry.  Technological advances like laptops, tablets, mobile phones, and all the avenues of social networking can give us the ease of staying connected.  But we could be deceiving ourselves.  We might be more connected to our gadgets than we are to the real people we should be connected to.

Intellectualism - the ability to only see a part of the whole

With great knowledge, pride usually comes.  No, it is not necessarily pride as in arrogance.  It could be the pride that makes one stand-offish, or distant.  Not to be judgmental, some people may seem that way.  They may be just very insecure, reticent with their feelings.  Given the chance, they might prove to have a beautiful heart, not just a good mind.

The tendency to lean toward intellectualism, distant from the emotional realities of self and others, can be a real bane.  We might naturally react that way because some pains are just too much to bear.  We might be ashamed to show our feelings, although we all have them.  It could be connected with the way we were brought up, our beliefs, our life experiences; but we need to remember one thing.  The intellect is only part of what makes us what we are.  If we erroneously limit our outlook to understanding people through the mind and knowledge alone, we are depriving ourselves of important emotional resources.

Sensitivity requires connection, communication, interaction with real people.  We may have to fight against the tendency to isolate.  It would be worthwhile.  We could gain friends, and be friends to others.  We could find reason in living, and see that people and life can be beautiful.