Another one from Overflow

Voices. I hear voices. I'm not schizophrenic. I'm not delusional. And they are real. These voices are real people who have said these exact words either enough times, with enough intensity or with the perfect sharpness of tongue to penetrate the innermost part of my brain and stay forever. No matter how much I know better, how much my therapist, my friend, my sponsor, my self help books tell me these voices are wrong, they stay. They stay because there is a nugget of truth. And the nugget is wedged in between my failures and my fear of change.

These voices stop me. They keep me from being happy. I don't belong anywhere because these voices won't let me try. They have been with me since preschool. They have kept me away. Alone. So I binge on my art. That's a romantic way of saying I push people away and while I'm boarding up the windows and doors, I'm creating a story so I don't seem weird. Van Gogh would just be a psycho with one ear if he didn't paint. Even Robert Downey Jr would just be a fairly good looking transient in random people's houses if he didn't glow in front of a camera. But here is where I am mediocre. I have no masterpieces and I have both ears. I am a sucky genius. This is what the voices say. And I could tell you these voices are my mother, my father, the librarian. But that is not who originally said all these things. Every word has been said by one person. One person alone. Every voice I hear is my own. It's me.I feel different. I don't relate. My own parents scratch their heads at what I do. I have friends who love me, but sometimes even they just look at me, hoping I'll explain what I'm doing or what I'm saying. This is what makes me feel crazy. I feel crazy because I'm alone. I feel crazy because so often I think it's just luck that makes me have both ears.