Hypergraphia is an intense desire to write.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypergraphia
I have bipolar disorder. I have also taken stimulants such as Ritalin to treat attention and alertness issues.
I have always been a detailed, technical, thoughtful and analytical writer. I learned to touch type early and can type quickly. In my work as a computer troubleshooter, I often thought through writing. I would often generate long emails for a single subject to a single recipient.
When I started being in a manic state, I would write in a manic state. I often thought during those times that I saw patterns and truths that others did not see. If I read in the manic state, I would often start scribbling frantically in the margins as I made associations. Many of my favorite books are disfigured in this way. It is funny and sad to see the scrawls.
Later, as the mania became more intense, I would stay up all night thinking intensely. Perhaps I would crash before dawn for a few hours rest, or I would be up into the next day. Typically that next day I would feel horrible. Some of the worst feelings I have ever felt: exhausted, fearful, hopeless and sick. That day I would have to clean up my mess from the night before. And sometimes I would have to go to work and pretend like I was fine. But very consistently, toward the evening of the second day, I would have a burst of Hypergraphia. I sometimes likened this burst to throwing up. It is as if I had consumed various ideas and writings during the previous day, then stayed up all night churning my brain, then the next day have a distillation regurgitated forth.
It was the pages of scrawling hand-text that finally tipped off one doctor that I needed to see a psychiatrist for a mood disorder.
Being also a compulsive keeper of my every written page, I saved and organized my hyper graphic work into what is now ten binders, each two inches thick. I feel it is going to be a great challenge to find anything useful in this.
I have found that mania is a wonderful thing. I feel that, when you are manic, your thoughts associate much more readily and feedback much more quickly between themselves. You are able to develop and hold marvelous theories, and you are able to reinforce your private beliefs much more easily. But the problem with manic thoughts is that they make little sense or have little utility when shown to the outside world. In short, manic thoughts and theories are not understandable or useful to others, who do not share the heightened, abstracted mental context in which they were formed.
How do you make anything out of 1000 pages of navel-gazing?
I like the early writing of Phillip K. Dick. His creative ideas have been the basis of many SF movies.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phillip_K_Dick
He may have suffered from substance abuse and mental health issues.
He developed a detailed inner mythology, which he captured on paper in periods of Hypergraphia.
After his death, these notes were compiled by researchers into a book called the Exegesis.
I have a copy of this book. It is wonderful, awe-inspiring and completely impenetrable. One would have to read over 900 pages and master his idiosyncratic language to understand him; and then have the task of finding meaning that could apply to the real world.
My Hypergraphia has stopped. I still like to write. I do a fair amount of writing in my job. The difference is that now I only write what the other person needs me to write. I don't write more than what is necessary. I have realized that my reader only has energy to consume just the text that they need and no more. This isn't an imaginary scenario where I write whatever I want and my reader reads every word and welcomes and acts on every additional thought I include. In the real world I am concise and actionable. No one has the extra stimulated energy to do otherwise.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypergraphia
I have bipolar disorder. I have also taken stimulants such as Ritalin to treat attention and alertness issues.
I have always been a detailed, technical, thoughtful and analytical writer. I learned to touch type early and can type quickly. In my work as a computer troubleshooter, I often thought through writing. I would often generate long emails for a single subject to a single recipient.
When I started being in a manic state, I would write in a manic state. I often thought during those times that I saw patterns and truths that others did not see. If I read in the manic state, I would often start scribbling frantically in the margins as I made associations. Many of my favorite books are disfigured in this way. It is funny and sad to see the scrawls.
Later, as the mania became more intense, I would stay up all night thinking intensely. Perhaps I would crash before dawn for a few hours rest, or I would be up into the next day. Typically that next day I would feel horrible. Some of the worst feelings I have ever felt: exhausted, fearful, hopeless and sick. That day I would have to clean up my mess from the night before. And sometimes I would have to go to work and pretend like I was fine. But very consistently, toward the evening of the second day, I would have a burst of Hypergraphia. I sometimes likened this burst to throwing up. It is as if I had consumed various ideas and writings during the previous day, then stayed up all night churning my brain, then the next day have a distillation regurgitated forth.
It was the pages of scrawling hand-text that finally tipped off one doctor that I needed to see a psychiatrist for a mood disorder.
Being also a compulsive keeper of my every written page, I saved and organized my hyper graphic work into what is now ten binders, each two inches thick. I feel it is going to be a great challenge to find anything useful in this.
I have found that mania is a wonderful thing. I feel that, when you are manic, your thoughts associate much more readily and feedback much more quickly between themselves. You are able to develop and hold marvelous theories, and you are able to reinforce your private beliefs much more easily. But the problem with manic thoughts is that they make little sense or have little utility when shown to the outside world. In short, manic thoughts and theories are not understandable or useful to others, who do not share the heightened, abstracted mental context in which they were formed.
How do you make anything out of 1000 pages of navel-gazing?
I like the early writing of Phillip K. Dick. His creative ideas have been the basis of many SF movies.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phillip_K_Dick
He may have suffered from substance abuse and mental health issues.
He developed a detailed inner mythology, which he captured on paper in periods of Hypergraphia.
After his death, these notes were compiled by researchers into a book called the Exegesis.
I have a copy of this book. It is wonderful, awe-inspiring and completely impenetrable. One would have to read over 900 pages and master his idiosyncratic language to understand him; and then have the task of finding meaning that could apply to the real world.
My Hypergraphia has stopped. I still like to write. I do a fair amount of writing in my job. The difference is that now I only write what the other person needs me to write. I don't write more than what is necessary. I have realized that my reader only has energy to consume just the text that they need and no more. This isn't an imaginary scenario where I write whatever I want and my reader reads every word and welcomes and acts on every additional thought I include. In the real world I am concise and actionable. No one has the extra stimulated energy to do otherwise.
Hi WIlliam, i came across your post and was intrigued that your hypergraphia has eased. My friend has self-diagnoised that he has hypergraphia as he spends hours daily just journaling for almost a decade. And for most part of his day, he turns his compulsive urge to keep his hand and mind busy into drawing, for which he truly has a talent in it. Though i can't find anywhere on the net that suggest hypergraphia that stretch over to drawing complusion, i found something on "Creative Compulsive Disorder " , which i wonder if he has both. In any case, for someone like yourself, do u have any advice u can offer me on how i should interact with him to alleviate his anxiety? As he is such a perfectionist and so anxious about getting his work right, that he doesn't stop and WONT stop and CANT stop correcting and recorrecting his drawings even in the middle of dates. it's not a problem for me that he's passionate about his stuff, but it distresses me that he is visibly bothered and upset by his imperfections, and coupled with the fact that he himself acknowledges his 'mental disorder' Is there anyway that i can help to ease his anxiety and improve his disorder? and for one like yourself who has successfully eased the complusion, do u have any advice how u did it? u mentioned reading the "Exegesis", and then applying what u learnt there to your life. Is this something you would advice me to get for my friend to help me?
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