I Spent Two Months in a Psychiatric Ward and I Think I’ve Learned Something

I didn’t see success in achieving my goals until I spent two months in a Japanese psychiatric facility following a mental breakdown. I’m still working through what that says about me and our larger society.

Voluntarily incarcerating myself (to be blunt about it) is an extreme path to completing one’s objectives and I wouldn’t recommend it; fortunately, I did the work, went in, and learned some things so you won’t have to.

In all honesty, I used to dread this time of year — it held reminders of buckling under various pressures to succeed and the depression that followed when I inevitably came up short. If you’re like me and struggled with completing your goals in the past, then you know it wasn’t from lack of trying. I tried “not to break the chain.” I bought Atomic Habits and read it cover to cover three times (well, it was on Kindle, so the covers were digital but you get it). I tried Deep Work, felt my eyes water, and questioned my existence.

The burnout was as inevitable as the sunrise with the perspective of hindsight and some wisdom. I kept pushing, pushing, pushing — careening at a speed I couldn’t sustain any longer. It seems a decade and a half was my limit. Yet, I learned a lot during those two months on the third floor.

The Key to Self-Improvement

The thing about being stuck in a single place, even though it was voluntary, is that you have nothing but time. There was no internet, no cellular, I was the only foreigner and not fluent in the language. Once I got over the panic of being alone with a mind that couldn’t bury itself in various distractions, I realized that, oh, this is nice. Oh, I like this — I loathe that with every fiber of my being. I feel stuck at my job and it’s not sustainable…not if I wanted to feel joy in my existence.

It took a few weeks after leaving the ward (just in time for COVID) that I learned that I was essentially ‘slow living.’ If you Google around the internet you’ll find a few different approaches and definitions, but for my purposes, Slow Living is in itself a system, and it may be the key to self-improvement. It allows you to get back to first principles — understanding yourself.

Self-improvement is typically approached via the adoption of a new set of habits. You see several areas in your life that you wish to change and so you embark on a journey to grow. If done consistently, improvement is inevitable…so it’s said.

“Your outcomes are a lagging measure of your habits. Your net worth is a lagging measure of your financial habits. Your weight is a lagging measure of your eating habits. Your knowledge is a lagging measure of your learning habits. Your clutter is a lagging measure of your cleaning habits. You get what you repeat” (Clear, James. Atomic Habits: An Easy & Proven Way to Build Good Habits & Break Bad Ones).

Yet, many people can’t seem to keep it up. Not only do our New Year’s Resolutions seem to be set on repeat, they don’t last long for the majority of the population. I took a peek at Time Magazine and the stats aren’t great: we know better but we stick to trajectories that lead to 80% of us crashing and burning in February. Not even March. As January 1st fades into the distance our resolve wavers. Our minds are willing but our flesh is weak. This is not surprising — the nature of self-improvement is one of constant refinement, and that can be tricky, frustrating, and full of stalls.

So, what can be done?

I’ve found (the hard way), that while Mr. Clear was correct in stating that adherence to habits is dependent on one’s systems, you need to also take into account the type of system you should build. It should be adaptable, provide timely feedback, and reflect who you truly are. Self-improvement cannot occur without a proper foundation. Slow Living is not just a topic of interest to the minimalists — it can also be just the thing to keep you on the trajectory for growth if you find yourself stuck once again.

First Principles and Why We Should Talk About Them

The first few days in the ward were spent sleeping. And it was real good sleep even though the bed was terrible. I would have probably slept for longer if my attending physician hadn’t waltzed into my room and thrown open the curtains. I can’t replicate my exact thoughts about that on Medium, but y’all have imaginations. But as I’ve also mentioned earlier, I had nothing but time. The environment I found myself in was greatly simplified and low on distractions. In that sort of situation, with time slowed to a crawl and nothing but the most basic elements available to me, I began to do yoga again after a solid year of hiatus.

One function of a Slow Living system was to get you back to first principles. “Reasoning from first principles” requires that we get down to the bare basics and rebuild from that point. We must blow past the assumptions we and others have to hone in on the truth. As we are talking about self-improvement, that involves having an awareness and understanding of your Self. In the rush of life, I had genuinely forgotten that I enjoy doing yoga postures. I enjoy studying yoga philosophy. I enjoy chanting mantras. I didn’t even know it was possible to forget you liked something, but by God, I had managed it. In the slowness of the ward, it returned. By starting from the very beginning, I was able to start cultivating a practice that felt right to me.

This is vital.

I was no longer doing yoga because many articles told me to. I was doing yoga because when left to my own devices I gravitated toward it with little thought. Other things that had escaped my notice before now had time to come around and give me another try. It becomes not only what seems right but IS right; not what we believe to be true but what IS true to our Self. I had no one telling me about my Self for the first time in a long time and what I found has altered me to this day. As I continue to extrapolate from my rediscovered basic elements, I’m now excited to see where I end up — I just had to find the beginning.

What Is Slow Living?

I will never lie to y’all — I spent five minutes watching a Slow Living YouTube video before I had to turn it off. It wasn’t bad, but it did make me realize that from its foundations in the slow movement back in Italy in the 1980s, we all have our thoughts about the details of Slow Living. Broadly, it means being present; you’re not ruminating over an unchanging past and worrying about a future that has yet to come. It is a lifestyle that promotes self-reflection, self-discovery, and acceptance. None of us are the same — this seems to be an obvious truism yet how often have you read an article and tried to implement its advice with no thought to how it could fit into your reality? With your Self? Slow Living has found its popularity in minimalistic spaces as it requires one to prune away the things that do not fit. I was running after habits and hacks when I didn’t even know myself; I pursued things that didn’t suit my nature.

You need not be minimalistic — you need only be discerning.

Slow Living is a mindset — a mental model I would go as far as to argue. It’s a state of mind where everything is done at the right speed. Not in perpetual slowness despite its name. This is also difficult if you lack a sense of consciousness, of self-awareness. Up until my two-month “sabbatical,” I was speeding along life like I was doing 150 on the highway with the scenery zipping by in a blur of gray-green. It’s hard to make out the individual trees at that point.

Slow Living is about focusing on the things that are important to you. Lists of suggestions are a helpful place to start; however, you save much time and effort by taking those basic elements of your Self that you rediscovered and following those paths. Those returns will no doubt be more profitable and pleasurable. I should note that this understanding need not, and cannot, be total.

I’m still working through it.

I’m of the opinion we will be searching until we go in the dirt (or the furnace, or the summit of a mountain — you get it). I believe that understanding who we are at our core, the Truth is the point. After three years I’ve found that slowing down and listening to what we are being told by our bodies and minds I heal in ways I didn’t know possible.

I do my best to structure my day around the things that fit me. I now know that if I don’t get my obligations out of the way the first part of the morning they won’t get done at all. I know that I want to study math again because I had managed to tell myself I was bad at it despite kicking butt in my physics classes back in the day. I know I love cemeteries and death in general. I’d hang out in them more, but I don’t want the police called on me. I may have missed my calling as a yoga-teaching mortician who practices astronomy on weekend nights.

Introducing Habits

There were large chunks of free time in my days on the third floor, but there was a slot in the morning and afternoons where we could head down to the second floor and do activities. Meals were at set times and non-negotiable. And at the end of the day, we had to be in our assigned rooms. I became pretty good at drawing during that time by working on portraits before breakfast. You’re probably thinking it’s because I had nothing else to worry about or do — this is true. This is also the point:

I was doing what called to my Self so I was motivated to focus (drawing). My environment supported my success (literal imprisonment — wow this sounds dire).

The hardest part of leaving the ward was having to reorient my habits into the systems that put me in the hospital in the first place. Which is sad, come to think about it. Yet I had not forgotten my first principles. I didn’t have it all figured out of course, but I had a good start. I now knew what deserved my attention. I knew continuing my actions before the hospital would probably kill me, so I should probably work on an alternative. I knew my environment (the system) would make or break my success.

It was that trajectory that led me here.

Slow Living is not only about the right speed or right priority, it is about forging connections. Sometimes I think we take on Resolutions just to say we have them rather than what is truly best for ourselves. I feel that habits that have strong connections with our natural interests are the ones that stand the best chance for success. For example, I know the basic rules of chess. I tried to force myself to enjoy the game because I had told myself at one point that smart people played chess and gosh darn it I wanted to be smart. I’m still smart — I’m a terrible chess player, though. The goal didn’t fit; the habits that make up those goals definitely didn’t fit. I won’t say that failure would be inevitable but I would be shocked if I ever managed to place in a tournament.

Testing and Feedback

As I hemmed and hawed on whether to post this article to the possible void, I finally had to put on my big-person pants and do the thing. So it goes. Nothing is perfect and we can rationalize and plan and make spreadsheets until our faces turn blue, but many times things are just not going to go the way you want them to go. This is life — it’s up, it’s down, it’s a series of problems we must navigate and solve with varying amounts of success.

Funnily enough, First Principles can be a point of failure. You can return to base principles, and they very well can be true, but still somehow end up way off the mark. I’ve done that. I’ve written down my strengths and interests and came up with the conclusion that I should teach. To be fair to me, I truly believe that is part of my calling. BUT. My only experience with the discipline was narrow. I had experience with traditional schooling due to my childhood, and my father worked as a high-school teacher his entire career. I figured this was where I should go.

This was false.

I’m a good teacher; I’m not good at being on someone else’s schedule and following someone else’s curriculum. In short, I’m not great at being an employee. At the time, however, I couldn’t see any alternative! Now, I know better, but this is where Slow Living can save you the time, energy, and mental health I lost. What you must offer in return is a willingness to listen to your Self and acceptance. An environment and mindset tailored to Slow Living gives you the chance to notice the problems and have time to course correct. You test, get your data, and adjust.

Emotions are a key part of the human being, the human experience. They are valid, wonderful, infuriating things that provide just as much data as something gathered by a computer. We run the risk of being too analytical, and too disconnected from an important part of ourselves. Too disconnected from our planet. Slow Living keeps us in the present and makes sure we continue to experience the flavors of life — the joys of our exploration. We retain more when we *do* more.

That’s the heart of it all — being present.

Living Life

As February comes to an end, now is a good time to take another look at your Resolutions; it’s a good time to think about the Resolutions of the past and where they fell short, or where you found some success. Self-improvement is a continuous, iterative process based on butting up against life and seeing what works. And human beings are messy by our very nature — not always so rational, not always so tidy, not always so clear in our objectives. Yet if we accept and cultivate our nature, and remain connected to the Nature around us, we will, inevitably, improve and evolve. Take this opportunity to put as much time as you need aside to begin to work through what truly matters to you.

Take it from me, don’t go for the so-called fast results — go for the things that will last. Break it down, and with Slow Living, bring it into existence.

It’s important to me that as I hone my chosen crafts, I leave something better off than I found it. I want to teach in a way that whoever chooses to listen can build something of their own. Creation is amazing to me — we are all capable of it. I hope that my first foray into this sort of thing was helpful. If you reached this point you have my sincerest thanks. As for myself, I’ll continue to document my journey.

If you like my style, please give me a clap! Or leave a comment! I’m always looking to improve as I work things out!

References & Resources

- https://fs.blog/first-principles/

- https://commoncog.com/how-first-principles-thinking-fails/

- https://slowlivingldn.com/what-is-slow-living/

- Clear, James. Atomic Habits: An Easy & Proven Way to Build Good Habits & Break Bad Ones

- Honoré, Carl. In Praise of Slowness: Challenging the Cult of Speed