Link Between Bipolar and Creativity

There are varying opinions as to whether there is a direct link between bipolar and creativity. It's often thought that Mozart and others in the arts did suffer from bipolar. Evidence to date suggests that a high number of artists and writers, far more than could be expected by chance, meet the diagnostic criteria for bipolar disorder. Terence Ketter, MD, professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Stanford University School of Medicine, says studies have found that individuals who can tap into their emotions and find a passion are indeed more creative. “What this suggests is the ability to experience emotions can, in some individuals, provide them with some of the emotional energy that allows them to embark in creative activity,” he says.

Research on the depressive realism hypothesis, “suggests ... some depression allows people to more realistically assess themselves and their environment. In terms of creativity, this increased ability to see the reality of things may give depressed persons the ability to have insights that others who are not depressed may not notice,” says S. Nassir Ghaemi, MD, MPH, director of the Bipolar Disorder Research Program and associate professor of psychiatry and public health at Emory University, Atlanta, Georgia.
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It is also thought that medications dampen this creativity which is one main reason us folks with bipolar often do not stay on medications. We want to reach that manic sweet spot. I know when I was manic it was superb. I felt genuinely happy. A state of bliss if you will. I've never been a creative person and all of a sudden I was able to write a complete cohesive 5 verse song in less than 5 minutes. I was recognizing links between things I had never seen before. It was almost like a whole new world. Having suffered with depression for years I did not want to give up this mania. I eventually got so out of my head my father was able to trick me into going to the hospital and getting admitted. I would be admitted a total of 5 times over 2 years. Fun.

I have often toyed with the idea of slowly tapering off my meds, but I am afraid of what I will feel. I have a 50-50 chance of feeling the bliss of mania again, but I could go off my rocker and end back in the psych ward. I think hypomania – mild but not full-blown mania – is the sweet spot, it can involve heightened creative thinking and expansiveness, high mental speed, cognitive flexibility, and ability to make original connections between otherwise disparate ideas, all elements underlying creativity. Kay Redfield Jamison’s studies have established that a number of speech components occur in individuals when hypomanic: they are more likely to use alliteration, to rhyme, to use idiosyncratic words, and engage in a playful use of language. I can most definitely experiencing this while I was waiting to be evaluated in the ER. I was using song lyrics and other things to create links. My father says I was just talking out of my head. I saw connections he did not, period.
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