Inklings Bruce Sanguin's blog

What Is Mental Illness? Approximately 100,000 lobotomies were performed throughout the world, starting in the early 20th century and continuing right up until the 70’s. The heyday was the 1940’s. The procedure might seem both bizarre and gruesome. And it was both. But it was consistent with a burgeoning belief, still prevalent today, that mental illness … Read more

I just re-watched Breaking Bad. It’s a character study of a brilliant high school chemistry teacher, Walter White, who discovers that he has lung cancer, evoking a critical reckoning. Who am I? What have I accomplished? What is my legacy? It turns out the answers to these questions respectively for Walt are: I don’t have … Read more

We’re our own worst critics. It’s a cliche but it became so by being true. Yes, a minority of humans have the opposite problem. They let themselves off the hook too easily. These folks have zero capacity to objectively assess their own behaviour, show remorse when they’ve wronged somebody, or hear any critical feedback without … Read more

I recently hit the road, destination Winnipeg, Manitoba, the city I grew up in and which I left at the age of 18 swearing I’d never return. Never did, at least not to live. I left because it’s so goddamned cold. Then, after the interminable cold summer would arrive. Green worms hung menacingly from dying … Read more

Thomas Was Right to Doubt The church of the covid consensus is the secular version of a religion. During the “time of the plague” we were being asked to suspend our doubt in the authorities and go along with what could be called the Covid Consensus. If you didn’t, you would end up in hell: … Read more

The roots of narcissism may not be what you think. Typically we equate the narcissistic personality with somebody who is “full of himself”. The truth is the opposite. There is a vacuum where a self used to be. Therefore everything a narcissist does is motivated by filling the vacuum. Everything and everybody is recruited to … Read more