"I couldn’t think of
a good title,
But I don’t care!"
Neuroscience behind
Apathy
Mom said, “Stop, I cannot handle more.”
he saw his dad’s world shatter, but to him, it didn’t matter.
He even had a heartbreak, a girl with a good heart and
pretty face
but he said, he couldn’t care less.
His dog, he saw, come in front of a car
He shrugged and said, It did live this far.
But something shook, he felt unwell
and with the last ounce of care he had left
He turned to the world, screamed and begged
Said, “Lend me your pains, I’ll heal and repair”
But unfortunately and at last,
he thought, even the world didn’t care!
Apathy,
the brainy-dictionary states, is a neurological condition where emotions and
concerns are extremely suppressed. At least once in our life we all have ‘felt’
or ‘deliberately displayed’ a lack of interest. It’s a natural response to disappointment,
dejection or stress. So, ‘apathy’ is known to be a good ‘deviation’ to these
negative feelings. But how far should we deviate until we loose the right track
of our true purpose? How far until we are lost?
I once met a person who was admitted
to a mental health care for depression only to realize later that he was not ‘depressed’
but had no sense of happiness/motivation at all. How would he? Well according
to him, he doesn’t really understand sadness or loss, or joy of achievement or
the word ‘concern’. He says last time something bothered me was when everyone
around me was asking the same question, “What exactly in life will bother you
ever?”
Is
he ‘The saddest person without any pains’? I cannot even call him ‘saddest’,
because he is just ‘apathetic'. He isn’t careless or painless, but sure, a lot
helpless!
Neural correlates of apathy show
faults in prefrontal cortex, anatomically. And that explains a lot about
apathetic behavior- impaired emotional context, personality expression,
decision making, socialism and survival concerns. Although, there’s much to be
studied further, after about 7 decades
later its mention, this condition is still identified by subjective tests and
the best cure still stops at ‘Comprehension’!
So,
to sum up, scientists discovered Apathy in 1950’s and guess what, ‘No one really
cared’!
