I've been reading The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss and I came across something 135 pages in that caught my attention. And so, the writing began.
Rothfuss discusses the doors of the mind which protect us from the pain we experience in life. He states the following:
"Perhaps the greatest faculty our minds possess is the ability to cope with pain. Classic thinking teaches us of the four doors of the mind, which everyone moves through according to their need.
"First is the door of sleep. Sleep offers us a retreat from the world and all its pain. sleep marks passing time, giving us distance from the things that have hurt us. When a person is wounded they will often fall unconscious. Similarly, someone who hears traumatic news will often swoon or faint. This is the mind's way of protecting itself from pain by stepping through the first door.
"Second is the door of forgetting. Some wounds are too deep to heal, or too deep to heal quickly. In addition, many memories are simply too painful, and there is no healing to be done. The saying "time heals all wounds" is false. Time heals most wounds. The rest are hidden behind this door.
"Third is the door of madness. There are times when the mind is dealt such a blow it hides itself in insanity. While this may not seem beneficial, it is. There are times when reality is nothing but pain, and to escape that pain the mind must leave reality behind.
"Last is the door of death. The final resort. Nothing can hurt us after we are dead, or so we have been told."
I would venture to agree with Rothfuss. I've experienced a couple of these things myself. And while I can only speak from experience, those experiences have backed up his opinion to me on a personal level.
When you are treated as less-than-worthy or less-than-human on a day-to-day basis, you need an escape, even if it's just brief. That's where sleep comes in. But when you wake up and realize that you still have that problem to deal with, you need something else. This is where you can either choose to forget or to go mad. I chose to forget. So much so that ~12 years later those memories are covered by a thick fog. It has taken a lot of time and strength to thin that fog, even if just minimally, so that I may better understand the effects that it has had on me and how I can counteract those things. It's taken over a decade for me to be able to think about and dwell on those times. Though I can only do so briefly, it's a huge step.
I can start to become whole again.
