Beautiful Mind Essay

Based on what I have watched from the movie of â€Å"A Beautiful Mind†, which is a biography based on the true life story of a math prodigy, John Forbes Nash Jr., is an incomparable math genius student from Princeton University who definitely amazed the minds of people he meets. For me, he is an extraordinary person having a broad and an odd imagination as well. Unfortunately, he suffers from a mental illness called schizophrenia which he doesn’t even know himself. His friends find him weird or likely a nerd, but still they try to make friends with him. Nash tried to communicate and interact with them but in the end, it’s like there’s something that bothers him, some kind of paranoia that leads him to stay away and find himself alone and unconsciously creating things that aren’t really there (hallucination) and believing things that aren’t really true (delusion). Like for example, an imaginary friend which is known to be Charles (his room mat e) and Charles’ niece. It’s odd but I strongly believe that all the things kept from his subconscious mind releases through Charles and other delusions his mind creates. I believe more than anything else, this movie focuses on perceptions of life. Perception of what is reality and what is imaginary, not only his perception but also people’s perception of him, and of the situation. Yet he was a brilliant man, although at times to people he seemed a bit unorthodox he was eventually accepted. Ironically enough I believe that it was his problems of not liking people, but wanting to be accepted and acknowledge that aided his mental state, however by the time he had become accepted his imaginary world was out of control. As years passes without knowing that he has such mental illness, Nash have invented some kind of Mathematical formula (equilibrium) which become popular and it startled me. He graduated and become a professor in Mathematics and romantically involved with his hard working student named Alicia and they even got married. But his illness turned out to be worse than I thought; his delusions become rigorous and more uncontrollable by his mind. He even believed that he’s been hired to work to the government to break codes. His other delusional product named Parcher, keeps on haunting him to work and to work which have caused him so much stress that made the symptoms worse. He keeps on believing that there’s a conspiracy, a mission by the government that will lead him to honor, but all of these are only in his mind. Nash continued his medication and deal with his delusional state. And it made me wonder, because according to my belief, â€Å"real mentally abnormal person doesn’t even know that he/she is not normal†. But in Nash’s case, how come he realized that he’s suffering from this illness and he can even stay away from his delusions? I don’t know but all I know are risks that may happen if you pay no attention to this illness. Without medication and therapy, they are unable to function in the real world. If they fall victim to severe hallucinations and delusions, they can be a danger to themselves and those around them. Schizophrenia usually develops gradually, although onset can be sudden. These were the symptoms that Nash have: Confusion, Inability to make decisions, Hallucinations, doesn’t eat regularly and lack of sleep, Delusions, Nervousness, Indifference to the opinions of others, A tendency to argue A conviction that he is better than others, or that people are out to get him. Fortunately, he was able to cop with his Paranoia and lived a simple life, he even got the Nobel Prize he ever wanted because of his genuine mind.