Mental Illness Research Papers

“The true definition of mental illness is when the majority of your time is spent in the past or future, but rarely living in the realism of NOW.” This quote by Shannon L. Alder, as she tries to define mental illness, really generalizes the majority of people on the Earth. Many of my own friends and family are guilty of this. It’s easy to spend a lot of time on the past or future. You may have wronged someone or been a bystander to a traumatic event. These things would lead to feelings of immense guilt and might cause the person to hang onto the past. We’ve all asked ourselves “What could I have done differently?”. It’s part of human nature to inquire about our pasts and try to learn from those events. Also, many people I know fear the future. You may be going into school that day expecting a test you didn’t study for. You could be fearing college, getting a real job or even marriage. It is extremely common for a normal person to stress over the future if it has significant meaning in their life. I once read a quote by David J. Lieberman that said, “Emotions rarely reveal our current situation, but give us an insight into what …show more content…
A very common and well known example is Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). This disorder is classified as a mental health condition that is triggered by a terrifying event. The symptoms can include flashbacks, nightmares, severe anxiety and uncontrollable thoughts about the event. It has been agreed by doctors that this can be defined by an unhealthy attachment to the past. The difference is that, yes I do think about the past a lot and may experience stress from it, but PTSD can only be diagnosed in the presence of uncontrollable reactions and severe anxiety. Saying that a person who spends a lot of time in the past or future is an unfair generalization that may include people that are undiagnosable with any mental