When you have bipolar disorder, waking up in the mornings can feel dangerous. The world seems to bristle with emotional landmines. A disappointment can send me spiraling into an abyss where I stay for days, weeks, or months.

So, I focus on prevention.  I avoid common triggers. I keep my distance from insulting relatives. I steer clear of gloomy news sites. I limit social media.

But reality is ever-changing and the universe is too big to control. The world is not designed to make me feel secure. Triggers are the inevitable result of life being life, which by nature defies predictability.

The temptation is to make your world small. Retreat into a Cave of Caution, seal its mouth with a boulder. Draw into yourself, detach yourself from all other humans, shield yourself from the unpredictable.

Though this sounds extreme, there can be vast freedom in decreasing social noise from the outside; solitude allows me to fully focus on my interests.

Social clamor distracts me.  In my emotional confusion I forget what I like to do. In my Caution Cave I remember.

In my Caution Cave there are books to read, stories to write, and video games to play. In a severely enclosed space, I can control the emotional temperature. For a while, my bubble surrounds my personal Utopia. I forget that I have bipolar disorder.

A cave is not some gloomy void after all. Some caves brim with life. They harbor thriving ecosystems replete with fish, bats, and underground rivers. They have stalagmites that glisten when light shines on them.

But at some point, the Caution Cave always starts to feel cramped. A glance outside reveals an enchanting summer world screaming its greenness at me.

What have I done? I wonder. Since when did I condemn myself to a life of safety? Who is this Trigger Guardian dwelling inside me and decreeing what I can and cannot do? Life is risk.

The rebel inside me stirs to life. Bring on the insulting relatives, it says, and the social media trolls and the disappointments. My depression is not the boss of me! Besides, I am going to die someday. Who cares if a troll corrects my spelling?

A broader life, even with all of its traps and triggers, is ultimately irresistible. Even above a field of emotional land mines, fresh air beckons.

Inhaling freedom, I suddenly want to embrace it all. I want to immerse myself in life, even with its uncertain shifts. And why not? The universe is unpredictable, even in a Caution Cave.

Seize freedom, I think. Pain is inevitable. Rocket toward it rather than waiting for it to come to you; deal with it on your own terms. Make it count somehow.

Bit by bit, I leave the Caution Cave and find myself blinking in the sunlight. Emotionally speaking, my eyes hurt. But I am glad to see the sun.

I know the depression will return someday.

At the same time, depression always ends—always. And sometimes it leads to interesting places like getting over creative block, seeing through harmful religious dogma, or finding out who your real friends are.

When I emerge from a depression, I almost always understand more about myself or about life than I did before.

One day the clamor of crowds may once again become too much. Or a new trigger will send me reeling away and grasping for emotional balance.

If so, the Caution Cave will be just where I left it. Its books and games and art will be patiently waiting for the time when I need them again.

But for the moment, I leave them all behind to rejoin the multifaceted, unpredictable ever-changing world.

This time, I tell myself, it will be different.

This time, if a trigger goes off, I will meditate. I will persuade my irrational emotions with unassailable logic. I will be a robot or a saint or a zombie; I will surrender all desire and tumble into the snug, waiting arms of enlightenment.

Until then, I will do the best I can, groping my way toward the future and watching my step, careful yet hopeful as I merge with the flux of life once again.

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