![\"\"](\"https:\/\/ringsidereport.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/The-Pit-225x300.jpg\")
<\/a>By Radical Rhymes<\/strong><\/p>\nI wish I could properly describe the pit. It’s a deep and dark place that almost completely consumes you. As a bipolar sufferer I have one foot always in the shadows, that’s just the way my life has been.<\/p>\n
I had some bad childhood experiences, despite the best efforts of my family, and I’ve had my fair share of grief and loss, so it isn’t just a chemical thing for me. But the pit is the worst.<\/p>\n
There is no outlet, no light at all, everything is bleak beyond imagining. Historically, sufferers have described it as a black dog, or a raven’s wing, countless other things. For me it’s a chasm, and I feel myself drawn inexorably towards it.<\/p>\n
The chasm leads to the pit and that’s where I’ve been again recently. When I was in my late teens, after my dad died, I embraced the pit. I once stood on the railing of the Tamar bridge, before it was extended, and let the wind decide my fate. I teetered but I didn’t fall. That was the closest I’ve come to making the chasm real in physical space, though there have been other times.<\/p>\n
What I’ve learned from my most recent slide into the chasm, my awful time languishing in the depths of the pit, is that I will daily struggle against the creeping shadows. That my life-long belief that I will somehow escape them into a glorious and permanent light is a folly – a conceit.<\/p>\n
My life will always be colored by the shade, and I will do better to accept that than fight it. But I will not anticipate the pit any longer, I will resist it until the resistance causes me more pain.<\/p>\n
Radical Rhymes is a professional artist working with a range of media – predominantly animal\/human portraits and landscapes – including, most recently, hand painted furniture. You can see his work on Instagram Radicalrhymes1969 or on Twitter @RhymesRadical.<\/a><\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/p>\n