"Don't Worry"

The human brain is unmatched in complexity, but the complexity of mind—at least from the perspective of mind—is more of an open question. Possibly its complexity is related to the complexity of the brain and the operation of subjectivity is a highly technical matter only masterable by a mind with an extraordinary aptitude for abstraction and a keen subtlety of perception; or maybe this complexity is merely overlaid in the form of an entirely superfluous tessellation of the simple, elegant controls given us naturally.

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It's possible that one probably more calm friend would say to a friend in distress, "don't worry!”—but on reception of this good advice, the distressed friend might respond, "if only it were so easy..." and look wistfully into a corner. And sometimes a persistently helpful companion will rejoin that, "I'll bet it's not actually as difficult as you think," which could just add anger to anxiety, but also occasionally spawns a new train of thought which, if not actually useful or productive in its contents, is a different train and probably an improvement over the last.

It may be that the first new thought inspired, spoken aloud, perhaps, by an anxious man named ‘Jean,’ say—would resemble, "I can assure you it's more difficult than you think." And if the calm friend—whose name might be ‘Lydia,’ or any number of other options—is in actuality a little indifferent to the situation and lets her mind wander in patient boredom, she may respond, "How difficult is it?" This could provoke a less patient response from Jean like, "Well, to start with, if I were to ask myself not to worry, it would only draw my attention to the fact that I'm worrying, which is something that worries me. So, how do I go about it then? The verbal command approach is clearly incorrect since it's a blatant embodiment of the basic principle of attention that if I say, 'I will not think of a cat'—I will assuredly think of a cat. I suppose I could encode the message in such a way that it doesn't contain—on the surface—the unwanted topic; but I find it exceedingly unlikely that the mind, such a powerful machine of linguistic comprehension, could be tricked by such a meager disguise, like saying, 'calm down' instead. So, somehow I'd need to find a message for myself even semantically unrelated to worry, but which would nonetheless trick me into calming down. This certainly is possible, but it wouldn't be a simple phrase; it would be a lengthy series of reassurances that I'd have to carefully craft not only the content of but my presentation of, so as to not give the impression that I were only reassuring for reassurance's sake rather than because reassuring possibilities were actually probable."

Now at this point a number of things may happen, but one interesting possibility is that Jean, who is worried, would on reflection of his own discourse on the troubles of worrying, find himself worrying further, "Not only this, but it's possible after each slip up in this tack that I'd become increasingly aware of the possible artificiality of my reassurances, until they become utterly ineffective and the one comparatively simple recourse made available to me is cut off and cauterized."

While at this point a calm listener like Lydia might feign sympathy and attention, Jean would likely be perceptibly concerned—appearing somewhat rigid and speaking a little more quickly. But he would probably be fine to continue, for example, in this fashion: "Now," (you might notice him pause briefly to calm down here), "it should be obvious at this point, a source of necessary complication which I've avoided bringing up thus far in order to state my qualms with some degree of economy; the looming complication—the, to be frank, seductive, shape-shifting behemoth of looming complication—being the problem of identity. Who is it after all that I'm trying to appease? If I am a single, unified, willful agent, whose thrusts are those that I'm endlessly parrying? 'Keep your enemies closer,' of course, but this is too much for comfort. It might be tolerable if there were clearly some definite partition between what I think of as myself and this other, less clearly-intentioned self—that could be tolerable. But that's not the case. My understanding of what is me and what is him is in constant flux, and every now and then, in an access of perspicacity, I see that there is no division at all; the proposition of unity becomes unquestionable. So then I'm forced to shift between a dread anticipation of an unknowable, unstoppable, malicious force just behind the curtain, and a deep sense of failure and weakness at being unable to control myself—and deeper fear, at the prospect of being unable to control myself.

"I'd like to just leave things settled one way or the other: there is myself and I, or it's all I—but the process of not just calming oneself, but learning how to calm oneself—for what's the point in doing it just once? —is a process whose success depends entirely on having the correct understanding of what it is that's being calmed. Maybe others more rigorously scientific in their thinking than myself could settle on one theory, collect more evidence, and then move on to the clear successor—but this is beyond my capacity and I'm instead subjected to a shifting of commitments to one of several partially overlapping theories of myself each arriving with their own special barbs, waiting for me to discover them in bare feet. This introduces confusion into the picture, so that if plain fright becomes too tolerable, the ground below me starts flip-flopping like Escher had drawn it himself just to fuck with my understanding of whether it's going in or out."

Since Jean would likely have been speaking rapidly for the past few sentences, he might take a deep breath at this point and re-situate himself in a vague, unconscious hope that his internal discomfort would be resolved by a simple physical change. Hopefully he doesn't, but Jean may at this point say, "Now, if you're lucky, you peer no further." And if Jean is set on this course and insists on continuing recklessly in this explanation of dubious utility to himself or his audience, he could possibly say, "But if you are unlucky, you return to the issue of control. You don't want to look there, but since that's the crux of the issue and the ground's shaking beneath you and you don't know what's behind the curtain—you do look there. You start watching your internal dialogue since in a sense this is you—the ego, or the will—whatever. You start at the top; there the words are fully formed: you think them, they appear. But you notice there's something a little strange about how they're appearing: do I think them, and then they appear? Or are they actually appearing first?—and you're watching exactly those words pop into your head as you think them! Then all of a sudden you look down where you'd never thought to look before and you see that your thoughts are actually floating up from this black source, which, decidedly—is not you!"

Jean will almost certainly be in a panic at this point, heaving and trying to think quickly of how to calm himself, using futile methods that he learned better than to engage in on the first day of his analysis; and the intensity of his fright will probably spread not only to his relatively patient friend, Lydia, but to anyone contemplating his paranoid speech. Their attention at this point would involuntarily turn inward until their self were the only possible contents of consciousness—but it probably would not be the same self they'd expect, and their uncertainty might become palpable.

Never mind the propriety of it—I must add that I wish it weren't possible that Jean could continue to that point; it makes me uncertain myself and wonder things like, "why is there a limit if I start worrying about worrying?—I can worry about that too. There's not really any reason it couldn't set off an uncontrollable cascade of worrying that would terminate in psychosis." I know that it's ridiculous, don't get me wrong, but once I have the first paranoid thought, it seems to bias the next thoughts to take the same flavor and I never know where it's going to stop.

Great—I’m starting to worry again about aspects of my ‘situation’ that I know are fine, that I only question through abject paranoia… But… Who am I? What is this place containing me? This is wrong; it isn’t supposed to be like this!

I have to try to reassure myself that this is all silly, but—“that won't work!"

“Okay! Okay. I’m sorry.”

I’m trembling. I feel certain that things will never improve, and one terrible thought after the next occurs to me.

It’s getting worse. I’m beginning to suspect that each of of my prior thoughts was only a friendly defense to distract me from thinking about the control problem again. I see it like a blinding light shining through the fingers of a dark, closed fist; and the light, not meant for mortal eyes, doesn't just blind but burns its beholders. I don't want to look at it!My fingers are pressed over my eyes in earnest effort to respect the natural order of things, but they are pried away one at a time and my eyelids are forced open. I try to turn away but something stronger turns me back.

There are no words now, only sensations. Then it occurs to me that the laws of thought are not something fixed, but entirely fluid: what I decide is the nature of mind in some sense becomes the nature of mind. The potential here for not only a deeply satisfying existence, but actual ecstasy, is extremely painful to consider: I’m certain that route is utterly inaccessible to me, and only because I've decided it's so, and I'm utterly powerless to undecide it. Rather than cultivating bliss, I’ve consigned myself to permanently exploring what I now realize is the unbounded realm of human suffering.

It's okay—this is recoverable; I can correct my thinking! "No, you can't."

His thoughts then whirl into a maelstrom of fear, panic, and sadness, screaming that something must be done, but every attempt he makes only pulls him in deeper. Occasionally an errant image of pleasures just outside his grasp stabs, and quickly retreats.

He can't take it anymore—everything just

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