From far away, Oz’s Yellow Brick Road looks like a seamless, flowing river of gold.  Upon closer inspection, the road reveals itself not to be a continuous stream, but a careful composition of single bricks laid in an intricate pattern.

I SURVIVED MY LAST BIPOLAR EPISODE MORE THAN FIVE YEARS AGO, BUT HAVE ONLY RECENTLY BEGUN SPEAKING ABOUT MY DISORDER IN PUBLIC.

 I suspect many who hear my story are tempted to view my recovery, packaged in shiny corporate success, as the obvious outcome of a sharply rising trend line.  In reality, my road to recovery has also been a story of bricks painstakingly laid one by one.  There were many days, especially in the beginning, when it didn’t look like a road at all.  I’m sure there were times when people around me wondered why someone was hammering perfectly good bricks into the ground.

BUT IT WORKED.

One of my primary goals in launching Bipolar Oz is to help people with mental illness build their own roads to recovery.  To that end, I plan to return to my road and examine those bricks that I think would be useful to others.  The first three bricks, which I think are essential for anyone, are: (1) rejecting shame; (2) seeking help; and (3) borrowing inspiration.  In the upcoming weeks, I will address each in turn.

Keep following this road for more….