CBT DIY- Cognitive Behaviour Therapy, handmade by me.

 Recently I had a strange feeling of falling into depression. It started with an eye infection (following the logic of getting a heart attack starting with a pain in toes) and attacked all of my surroundings from shoppings bags to two watermelon printed glasses on my coffee table. 

- I am seriously getting tired of your imaginary mental health problems- said Mr Frank browsing a Guardian page on his iPad (he has an iPad, i don't).

 But this time,  believed, it was serious. Fearfully I looked through all of the available all over the net descriptions of depression symptoms. It was clear.

-Sleeping disorders. Yes, definitely. I am having these strange dreams about getting to Panama and when I land there it is not the same country. Then I wake up late, overwhelmed by the daydream. 

-Tiredness. Oh yes, an awful one. When I try to get up of a chair first I move my legs, while my back stays in the same place.

-Pain. Hundred percent yes, you see, that eye infection. And those shoes some other day were so uncomfortable. 

-Helplessness. Oh I am so, so wasting my time. 

-Suicidal thoughts. Oh for God's sake, is that necessary? Can I skip that symptom please.

 As I indeed can skip all of the other symptoms in my head, I successfully diagnosed myself with depression.

 Of course, I can't afford leaning on that and complaining, so I decided to focus on solutions. There it was- a perfect thing for me. According to uncle Google, it focuses on the way you perceive things: your thoughts, images, attitude and beliefs. It tries to break through a negative pattern in your behaviour. Patients are supposed to benefit from the therapy not only after coming out of depression, but also in much longer term in their lifetime. In my life I tend to call it wishful thinking. Here it gets a much better PR: it's called Cognitive Behaviour Therapy, or rather CBT.

The Love of Your Life

 This happened on a usual day, when I wanted to write something good and whatever it was seemed to decrease its' value with every line I drew with my pen. That day was completely usual if you can call it the one when you want to quit your job, quit your dreams, quit anything which distracts you, only to kick the invisible door to something you call meaningful, inside, where no one can watch. I was looking for something in my bag and then, surprisingly I found two London postcards. No, they were not meant for anybody from my family or friends. There were for me. Just like spotting a nice inexpensive dress in a window, I saw them and I just had to have them. For myself. One of them askew, wrongly cut apparently, no one else would ever buy it. But for me, it was my London. Askew and washed out. Because you see, I love London. 

 For long time I have been thinking whether a city can be the love of your life. Having a soul of a cat, I see places and people equally: with their experiences, kindness, sometimes bitterness. You get to know them slowly, exploring the hidden corners of their dusty souls. The places are more patient, they let you come closer, have a look and bare their chests in front of you so you get to know them until it hurts. 

 I am being cruel while writing about cities. I am being demanding and exaggerating every awkward move of them, I am being angry and paranoically scared of rejection. When I love a city I can be an asshole. 

 I can't remember living in London as my biggest dream, but it used to be my sister's one and I always tried to get out of my mind all of the dreams which seemed to be more hers than mine. It all started with a notebook my mum bought me for my English classes when I was maybe 9, maybe 10, with a photo of London on the cover. I can't remember how I knew it was London, whether was it a red bus or a telephone box, or Big Ben or London Eye in the background. But I knew it was London with streets in the rain. And there was a couple standing in the rain. I don't remember the guy. But I do remember the girl. I have her in front of my eyes for my whole life.

 She is standing there, smiling, looking completely happy like this street and this rain was everything she ever wanted. Her hair is tied up in a lose braid and she's wearing a motorcycle style leather jacket and a colourful skirt made of patchwork. The perfect moment, captured in this one photograph talking to a child in another corner of the world through the cover of a school notebook. I asked my mum to make a skirt like this for me. I haven't seen this notebook anymore after graduating from school, no matter how hard I searched for it. But it was irrelevant. My life was already running, since that towards this perfect moment, inevitable to happen, and I was running through this life to become this girl from the photograph. 

What dreams are made of- why I always wanted to live in a surreal world

 At the beginning of 'The Science of Sleep' by Michel Gondry the main character Stephane shows what the dreams are made of. You can see how he puts the ingredients to a pot and mixes them all up- the pieces of memories, childish fears and things we always wanted to happen but they never did. The facts our awareness simply can't handle to deal with it- as we can see Stephane still not agreed with his father's sudden death. The final result of his cooking is a short dream, featuring a nice memory of his father, soon turning out to be fake and cruel at the end- disturbed by reality. The nature of dream is always surprising and often worrying. The emotions can be real or almost real, but they mix all together in a way they could never do it in a normal life. It's all because of the REM phase essential, Stephane says: you move your eyes while sleeping, so you follow the events your mind is taking part in. We actually DO have a second life while sleeping. At least those of use who are lucky, or cursed enough to be mad enough to live it. 

 It was Dorothea Tanning, not Salvador Dali, who introduced me to surrealism as a form of perceiving life through a category of the dream. It was years before I falled in love with mr Blanchot and his daylight madness and before Jaques Derrida taught me that nothing is the way it seems. Dorothea Tanning caught my young and not shaped yet out brain, shook it and made me believe that what I dream of actually IS the reality. With all its' bright and dark shades, all ups and downs and first if all, entirely equal to the one we're surrounded by. 

 The fascinating thing about her creation is showing the world we seem to know, but taken over and violently conquered by the thoughts escaping from our minds. The thoughts get shapes and become creatures, built of our fears and nightmares, eating alive everything which can remain a stable and fixed part of a so-called true. 

There is one quality I love about Tanning's creatures- it's the evanescence of their being, making you keep closing and opening back your eyes as you try to believe whether they are really here or are they a projection of your own mind. 

Notes on an utterly complicated relationship between a doctor and a patient

 Recently I have been thinking a lot. But it was not an easy kind of thinking, it was a thinking of a writer, a heavy, dusty piece of reality sticking to your chest. I would say it's a brilliant kind of thinking, almost a one of a genius way, as I bet not many people ever are able to think this way, but right before such a say can raise a smile on my face I realized that I don't feel that much of a chosen amongst a people and even less of a genius. But then there is, all of a sudden, a thought that crashed my mind all of a sudden one morning on the tube, just like it happens to any other person in the world. These thought are usually linked closely to relationships, and so was mine. It was my relationship with Frank, which attacked me with memories.

 These memories now, after so many years, as just as precious as my real ones. And since many people at some point kept asking me about my imaginary therapist, I guessed it would be a nice thing to do to give this history some space in here. So, there it is. The story of an eternal friendship.

 I created Frank one usual evening as a result to my long thinking process about excuses. There is not another such a good excuse than an opinion of a doctor. We say it much more often than our awareness can accept: my doctor doesn't let me eat it, my doctor said I should be careful with my back etc. So why wouldn't I get a psychotherapist, the one and only counsellor for me, who'll be working just for me, just as an excuse to my constantly distracted mind. There can be nothing as good in the entire life, nothing like a doctor for my own personal use, visible only to me, existing only to me. A doctor to owe.
 All of a sudden the thought became so powerful I couldn't resist my determination anymore: I wanted to create him. The process of creation was fast and and chaotic, like my own creation had surprised me and surpassed all of my expectations and abilities. The creature started to form themselves, right there, in front of my eyes. I should have analized a potential danger in there, but the transformation has already started and I was sinking in it, having lost all of my common senses. Different pieces of a person were showing up in front of my mind in madness, noses, pair of eyes, ears and fingers traveling in a defilade of possibilties. And the, with the eyes of imagination, I saw him for the first time. He corrected his glasses with one finger and smiled. I knew he was the one. Frank. My one and only imaginary counsellor.

 The beginning of our coexistance was quite far from harmony: Frank started a real revolution in my head in order to build for himself a nice piece of home. Soon my head was full of colourful couches made of patchwork and tiny night lamps as Frank liked to read before sleep. Although I was ready for a limited kind of conflict: I knew from my experience that anytime you create an imaginary friend you need to be prepared for this person's own tastes and hobbies as very often they might be n contrary to yours. But I still believed in an eternal dream of a total symbiosis with my own psychotherapist, so I didn't mind any sort of sacrifice. With a smile on my face I was watching catalogues and ultimate home style trends, always being there to help him whether it was a colour of stores or a position of a kitchen table. I kept calm even when my new companion turned to be a bit grumpy- never happy with cheap solutions such as Ikea or Argos and looking forward to furnish my mind with heavy vintage equipment. Even though it was too much for my head, I smiled and promised to do what he wished for. All in the name of our promising, everlasting friendship.