Terri Cheney: Bottomless Well of Empathy

I've looked in the mirror when I'm hypomanic and even I can see it: my eyes are an open invitation, a bottomless well of empathy. "Trust me, tell me everything," they say, and people do. Not just men sitting across from me at a candle light dinner, either; and not just men, for that matter. Men and women everywhere seem compelled to talk to me, touch me, give me their confidence. It happens in the oddest places: in the aisles of the supermarket, waiting in a movie line, sitting at a coffee house, and especially in elevators. Hypomania breaks down that invisible wall that exists between well-mannered strangers. There are no strangers anymore, only unknown friends waiting to tell their stories.
-Terri Cheney, Manic (pg 208)