A First-Rate Madness: Uncovering the Links Between Leadership and Mental Illness

Insanity is not a “regrettable . . . accident” but the “indispensable catalyst” of genius.

the researchers found that their unrealistically optimistic attitudes correlated with better psychological adjustment.

Psychologists divide empathy into different parts—cognitive, affective, motor, and sensory—distinctions that, though a bit abstract, are useful. Cognitive empathy means thinking another person’s thoughts: I recognize that you have your own set of thoughts, and I try to understand what those thoughts are. Affective empathy involves feeling an emotio

The philosopher Karl Jaspers once said that how a man responds to failure determines who he will become.

illness. They both attempted suicide as teenagers, endured at least one depressive episode in midlife, and suffered a very severe depressive episode in their final years, before they were killed.

that normal people who became ill and then recovered would return to their former worldviews.

That is, the psychologically healthier patients were the most unrealistic.

I hesitated whenever I had to face strange audiences and avoided making a speech whenever I could.

Taylor had discovered “positive illusion”—the opposite of depressive realism, a kind of healthy illusion found not just in a trivial button-pushing test, but in life-threatening illness.