Strive said:

Except the part where he hired a private investigator to figure out how City Lights leaked. And suing everybody online to control his image. And suing people who were spreading boots for free. And accusing Alan Leeds of stealing tapes from the vault. And openly pondering if he could sue a former employee he thought was trying to liberate the vault so it wouldn't be lost to time. Besides all that, he was right on the edge of acceptance.

It was his material, and his vault. What the fuck? He was a more generous artist that anyone out there. He hated people stealing his work and trying to justify it. Someone here said they would tell Prince to his face how much they loved one of his boots. Uh, Security! Good on him suing whoever was stealing it. That is some entitled scary bullshit.

The myriad ways people fetishize the flesh & blood human being called Prince is really terrifying.

Some of the lawsuits were justified, I agree, especially ex-employees who he suspected of stealing his stuff. And really I was irritated in that New Yorker article when they cherry picked a naive comment from D'Angelo when D'angelo visited P and reported back to Alan Leeds that he thought P had lost his mind because P was warning him that Leeds stole tapes from teh vault. I don't know if Leeds did, but someone certainly did..Lets just say a lot of pictures and a few tapes have been auctioned from Leed's wife and brother lately.

But I do think P's paranoia got out of hand regardless. Bootlegs are wrong and I loved that story about him and his posse going into a store and physically picking upthe bootlegs and walking out saying "These are mine". That I am okay with. But threatening to sue fans who weren't making a profit for sharing bootlegs that were already out there--not a good idea from PR standpoint. It didn't go far but what a mistake. Suing fan magazines, wanting pictures down from this site, taking music off most of the internet, reading conspiracy books, saying in interviews, "they will probably edit this all out" when he didn't really say anything that controversial, believing in chemtrails, compartmentalizing himself to the point of making himself almost unknowable, attempting to hide a drug problem from those who could help him and already signed an NDA, fearing tags being sewn into his dry cleaning, ...dude had some paranoia/monsters under his bed. HIs fame was fvcking with him.

poppys said:

Strive said:

Except the part where he hired a private investigator to figure out how City Lights leaked. And suing everybody online to control his image. And suing people who were spreading boots for free. And accusing Alan Leeds of stealing tapes from the vault. And openly pondering if he could sue a former employee he thought was trying to liberate the vault so it wouldn't be lost to time. Besides all that, he was right on the edge of acceptance.

It was his material, and his vault. What the fuck? He was a more generous artist that anyone out there. He hated people stealing his work and trying to justify it. Someone here said they would tell Prince to his face how much they loved one of his boots. Uh, Security! Good on him suing whoever was stealing it. That is some entitled scary bullshit.

The myriad ways people fetishize the flesh & blood human being called Prince is really terrifying.

poppys said:

It was his material, and his vault. What the fuck? He was a more generous artist that anyone out there. He hated people stealing his work and trying to justify it. Someone here said they would tell Prince to his face how much they loved one of his boots. Uh, Security! Good on him suing whoever was stealing it. That is some entitled scary bullshit.

The myriad ways people fetishize the flesh & blood human being called Prince is really terrifying.

SkipperLove said:

Some of the lawsuits were justified, I agree, especially ex-employees who he suspected of stealing his stuff. And really I was irritated in that New Yorker article when they cherry picked a naive comment from D'Angelo when D'angelo visited P and reported back to Alan Leeds that he thought P had lost his mind because P was warning him that Leeds stole tapes from teh vault. I don't know if Leeds did, but someone certainly did..Lets just say a lot of pictures and a few tapes have been auctioned from Leed's wife and brother lately.

But I do think P's paranoia got out of hand regardless. Bootlegs are wrong and I loved that story about him and his posse going into a store and physically picking upthe bootlegs and walking out saying "These are mine". That I am okay with. But threatening to sue fans who weren't making a profit for sharing bootlegs that were already out there--not a good idea from PR standpoint. It didn't go far but what a mistake. Suing fan magazines, wanting pictures down from this site, taking music off most of the internet, reading conspiracy books, saying in interviews, "they will probably edit this all out" when he didn't really say anything that controversial, believing in chemtrails, compartmentalizing himself to the point of making himself almost unknowable, attempting to hide a drug problem from those who could help him and already signed an NDA, fearing tags being sewn into his dry cleaning, ...dude had some paranoia/monsters under his bed. HIs fame was fvcking with him.

Virtual LOAD of industry crap. I don't think you are new at this either, Skippy. New ID maybe.

SkipperLove said:

(sometimes on over-lavish homes he never got to enjoy that seemed more like show places than real homes--3121 parties really were less about fun than about promoting an album).

When I interviewed Elisa Fiorillo, she mentions a time when there was a lavish party thrown at P's house in LA, no expense spared..... except they forgot to invite guests.

poppys said:

SkipperLove said:

I'm not ready to cosign what I've changed to bold print, but much of what you've written makes sense.

Going a bit further, though, I think a lot of it had to do with who he decided to trust and sometimes that person couldn't deliver what was promised or that person just wasn't really capable of the job. (For example, website maintenance, ticketing and purchase logistics, etc.) Once it was determined that the deliverables weren't as desired, it was then a scramble to correct the problem, and from the outside looking in, the whole "project" seemed ill-conceived in its entirety. As is always the case, hiring people because they're family or even because trustworthy doesn't mean they can do the job.

Now I'm sure Prince made a few mistakes along the way, but there are a lot of things someone else MUST HAVE been in charge of, like website maintenance and scheduling out all the concert dates and choosing t-shirt vendors, etc.

SkipperLove said:

I was listening to the last Questlove interview and his old manager stated that P was like a kid and an adult at the same time. She said it in a protective type of way. the investigative files said something about P not knowing where his money was going sometimes. He tried to have control by having folks paying for stuff for him with their credit cards and then he would pay them back. But then they would take cash and do what they wanted. Mayte mentioned him not knowing how underpaid some folks were. Many fans didn't buy it. But really could a man that busy really be as omnipresent as people made him out--even if he tried to be in control and always aware, he had to delegate tasks to a great many others. . But when it comes to his career and management skills, there is a lot of unfinished projects, over-credited people, under-credited people, people paid relatively little, people paid quite well, websites started and stopped, weird distribution deals, changing inconsistent attitudes about the internet, lots of mistakes. Maybe a pop star should just focus on his music and band-leadership and not try to make videos from his home, direct movies, run a production company etc. I think he might have took on way too much, hired too many people (some of whom he didn't know whether to trust or not), spread his budget too thin (sometimes on over-lavish homes he never got to enjoy that seemed more like show places than real homes--3121 parties really were less about fun than about promoting an album). People like some sound engineers, Candy Dulfer, Mara Washington, John BLackwell, Larry Graham (I suspect), Elise Fiorillo and others all said they were paid really well. Others believe they should have been paid and credited more. I wonder if he finally realized at the end of his life that he had taken on too much and tried to downsize..(but it was too late). I reckon Prince was not a particularly good business man and inconsistent and should have just been a musician who worked with studio musicians to get his musical ideas out.

Think about it. This man's music leaked constantly. How much control did he really have? Its like the only thing he really controlled was what he recorded and his ability to be isolated/confounding to those around him ( probably due to trust issues and possible hidden addictions). ..Everything else seemed to be done by decree/delegation and dropped the second he realized it wasn't going well. The fame machine at times seemed to be running without his direct involvement. Remember that interview with Brenda Bennett when she said seeing Prince was difficult even when he wanted to see you (the circles swarming). She did get to see him and had a nice reunion apparently.

[Edited 7/9/18 13:09pm]

Strive said:

Prince sucked at business.

He assumed that the people he hired were taking care of him and put all of his energy into his work/fantasy world. Even when he realized that he was being taken advantage of, he had no idea how to stop that from happening. He just assumed that everybody was out to rip him off except for the few people that passed his internal test.

Which is kind of funny since the test seemed to be "Can you talk to Prince without an agenda and wait until he gives you a task to do?"

This can be as simple as putting trust in the wrong people. Any of these "business" issues can be easily explained by Prince trusting in someone who wasn't quite capable of the job or that steered him incorrectly (hopefully accidentally). He could easily have received bad legal advice on many issues. He could easily have hired the wrong office manager (to pay employees and bills) as well as hired the wrong tech manager (to maintain his websites and order the appropriate equipment for sets).

Prince is famous for eating and sleeping music. He very easily could have simply delegated and thought things were being handled. Consider, how many people would have walked up to Prince and said "You aren't paying me enough!" And before you say many, how many people walk up to their boss, even today, and say that. Folks sit around and complain or sit in silence until they find a new job (and then they complain about what they didn't get paid.) How many times would Prince have ordered something from his own website or order tickets to his own events? (To realize first-hand there were sometimes big problems.) He most likely wouldn't have... The same people that were SUPPOSED to be taking care of those things would probably tell him that everything was going great.

Who knows to what extent he got "into the weeds". He might have thought very little of most of the logistical stuff, or rest assured it was being handled.

rdhull said:

No, I'm not. He needed some long term therapy.

SkipperLove said:

I know you are being a bit snarky

BINGO!

Bodhitheblackdog said:

paulludvig said:

Bodhitheblackdog said:

BINGO!

And maybe some yoga? Mindfullness, perhaps? Gluten free diet? Let's go all Hollywood and combine all of them.

Paul, you silly goose

rdhull said:

SkipperLove said:

sorry.

It occurred to me that even a narcissist knows better than to sue fans, take his work off the internet, call himself a name that can't be spoken, and sabotage his own career. Why didn't people suspect mental illness years ago? I guess Prince was just so damned talented, persausive, hardworking, and charming sometimes that it was hard to believe he didn't know exactly what he was doing.

I dont mean that he was psychotic. But he clearly had power and control issues with the etiology from his home life as a child. Not to mention his health issues as a youth and his short stature. A ball of emotional paranoia where he used work as a way to self soothe etc etc. Whereas other things could have been entered into his life. Sure, it gave us a LOT of good music/material, but for him, therapy and forging positive relationships etc were needed and should have been fostered instead imho.

I don’t know… I think that this kind of desire for contentment is quite alien to many genuinely gifted and creative people. I’ve mentioned it before, but I recall an interview in which Prince said something along the lines of:

“I willed this whole trip. Few people tune into the Universe in that way, but I did.”

It’s as though reality itself became the canvas upon which he worked – the “self” something malleable, a play of images (note Miles’ comment about Prince waking up each day as a different person). It’s not always true, but those who are so absorbed and committed to their internal imagination often struggle to cope with the practicalities of daily life and maintain healthy personal relationships. Childlike in other words. I’d wager that most wouldn’t have it any other way, even with the gift of hindsight, if it required a fundamental change to their mode of being or the trajectory of their creativity.

That said, I agree with you that Prince’s introversion and trust issues were ultimately damaging, and that it would have been better if he were more open to being challenged in a loving way. Often, our very best friends are our harshest critics – it’s the flatterers and sycophants that genuinely damage us. Based on what we can surmise, some psychological adjustments in this regard would have helped, I agree.

To those in this thread who question whether Prince had some form of mental illness (SkipperLove), such a diagnosis is always the result of a set of psychological tendencies and behaviours and their interaction with broader social forces over time. This was the point that I was trying to make in the “Did Prince have Bipolar?” thread many moons ago, and why I objected so strongly to the implication that his talent and success precluded the possibility of any underlying similarities. In my view, such a diagnosis simply has no meaning until a person ceases to function socially – that is, it isn’t necessarily a pathology until an individual fails to integrate and strays too far from socially sanctioned norms in a destructive manner. How many “successful” bipolar sufferers, or indeed suffers of any diagnosable disorder, is a psychiatrist likely to meet in their daily practice? The answer is zero, since a person’s interaction with the psychiatric establishment already implies that things are beginning to fall apart. I believe that many psychiatrists (and I’ve met enough of them) have a blinkered conception of the fundamental nature of these conditions. Each of us represents the confluence of a vast array of internal and external environmental forces. Or, by way of analogy, in captivity you might expect the most innately healthy animals to show the clearest signs of distress. Where does eccentricity and originality end and madness begin? Consider James Joyce’s belief that his daughter Lucia, a diagnosed schizophrenic, represented the “perfection” of his genius. For me, the greatest creativity always represents a movement toward the psychotic, since it involves the loosening of established modes of thought and behaviour (established thought being the necessary paradigm of sanity, its dismantling the source of originality).

Now consider Prince, a natural introvert and eccentric who, by dint of his talent and extraordinary focus, willed a world of his making, one in which he could exist entirely on his own idiosyncratic terms. Regardless of how it ended, the less than edifying aspects of his personality and whatever flawed psychological constructs we might attempt to retrospectively apply to him, I’ll always consider him to be an example of a creative life lived well.

Thank you. He wasn't omnipresent. He was spread pretty thin and his primary obsession was music, performing and maybe women..the rest he dabbled in and delegated. When people say PRince didn't pay me enough, sometimes they really mean PRince's organization didn't pay me enough and they are frustated that he is not more aware or careful about pay. Song credits sometimes were just his fault but I wonder if occasionally a groove got stuck in his head and he wasn't sure where it came from. After all, music ran through his head nearly night and day.

pdiddy2011 said:

Strive said:

Prince sucked at business.

He assumed that the people he hired were taking care of him and put all of his energy into his work/fantasy world. Even when he realized that he was being taken advantage of, he had no idea how to stop that from happening. He just assumed that everybody was out to rip him off except for the few people that passed his internal test.

Which is kind of funny since the test seemed to be "Can you talk to Prince without an agenda and wait until he gives you a task to do?"

This can be as simple as putting trust in the wrong people. Any of these "business" issues can be easily explained by Prince trusting in someone who wasn't quite capable of the job or that steered him incorrectly (hopefully accidentally). He could easily have received bad legal advice on many issues. He could easily have hired the wrong office manager (to pay employees and bills) as well as hired the wrong tech manager (to maintain his websites and order the appropriate equipment for sets).

Prince is famous for eating and sleeping music. He very easily could have simply delegated and thought things were being handled. Consider, how many people would have walked up to Prince and said "You aren't paying me enough!" And before you say many, how many people walk up to their boss, even today, and say that. Folks sit around and complain or sit in silence until they find a new job (and then they complain about what they didn't get paid.) How many times would Prince have ordered something from his own website or order tickets to his own events? (To realize first-hand there were sometimes big problems.) He most likely wouldn't have... The same people that were SUPPOSED to be taking care of those things would probably tell him that everything was going great.

Who knows to what extent he got "into the weeds". He might have thought very little of most of the logistical stuff, or rest assured it was being handled.

I don't know if he was totally right about Leeds. THat's not what I meant. I just mean that the fear of older employees taking your stuff is not as irrational as some of PRince's other fears.

anangellooksdown said:

SkipperLove said:

Some of the lawsuits were justified, I agree, especially ex-employees who he suspected of stealing his stuff. And really I was irritated in that New Yorker article when they cherry picked a naive comment from D'Angelo when D'angelo visited P and reported back to Alan Leeds that he thought P had lost his mind because P was warning him that Leeds stole tapes from teh vault. I don't know if Leeds did, but someone certainly did..Lets just say a lot of pictures and a few tapes have been auctioned from Leed's wife and brother lately.

But I do think P's paranoia got out of hand regardless. Bootlegs are wrong and I loved that story about him and his posse going into a store and physically picking upthe bootlegs and walking out saying "These are mine". That I am okay with. But threatening to sue fans who weren't making a profit for sharing bootlegs that were already out there--not a good idea from PR standpoint. It didn't go far but what a mistake. Suing fan magazines, wanting pictures down from this site, taking music off most of the internet, reading conspiracy books, saying in interviews, "they will probably edit this all out" when he didn't really say anything that controversial, believing in chemtrails, compartmentalizing himself to the point of making himself almost unknowable, attempting to hide a drug problem from those who could help him and already signed an NDA, fearing tags being sewn into his dry cleaning, ...dude had some paranoia/monsters under his bed. HIs fame was fvcking with him.

See? He was right about Alan Leeds. Are people blind out there?? No ones saying anything! If you get stolen from enough, and you have good things going for you, it’s better to have rigid boundaries than be too careless. So what if he went overboard? This allowed him to have privacy and to create for Decades.

It wasn't all bleak. The highs for a lack of a better word were higher than the stratosphere. But there are geniuses who live happier longer lives than Prince. Mental health is not the same as conforming and no one has perfect mental health (and like you implied what does that mean entirely?). Iam just talking about a bit more balance so that one can live a life filled with a sense of security, love and connection rather than distrust, compartmentalizing, and fear. . He connected through music and that is a triumph. He at times bonded through humor, musical comradary, sex, romance, religion, movie geekdom etc. But long-term contentment and comfort in ones self (in the truest sense) seemed out of his reach. I don't think its odd to wish he had attained it. A therapist isn't supposed to judge, will keep your secrets and is supposed to tell you the truth while challenging you. Its supposed to be a safe place to look at one's self and hopefully achieve some catharsis. I am not sure it hurt anyone..unless you are talking about immoral psychiarist who abuses, controlls or easily prescribes. Thus, the need for a good therapist.

fen said:

rdhull said:

I dont mean that he was psychotic. But he clearly had power and control issues with the etiology from his home life as a child. Not to mention his health issues as a youth and his short stature. A ball of emotional paranoia where he used work as a way to self soothe etc etc. Whereas other things could have been entered into his life. Sure, it gave us a LOT of good music/material, but for him, therapy and forging positive relationships etc were needed and should have been fostered instead imho.

I don’t know… I think that this kind of desire for contentment is quite alien to many genuinely gifted and creative people. I’ve mentioned it before, but I recall an interview in which Prince said something along the lines of:

“I willed this whole trip. Few people tune into the Universe in that way, but I did.”

It’s as though reality itself became the canvas upon which he worked – the “self” something malleable, a play of images (note Miles’ comment about Prince waking up each day as a different person). It’s not always true, but those who are so absorbed and committed to their internal imagination often struggle to cope with the practicalities of daily life and maintain healthy personal relationships. Childlike in other words. I’d wager that most wouldn’t have it any other way, even with the gift of hindsight, if it required a fundamental change to their mode of being or the trajectory of their creativity.

That said, I agree with you that Prince’s introversion and trust issues were ultimately damaging, and that it would have been better if he were more open to being challenged in a loving way. Often, our very best friends are our harshest critics – it’s the flatterers and sycophants that genuinely damage us. Based on what we can surmise, some psychological adjustments in this regard would have helped, I agree.

To those in this thread who question whether Prince had some form of mental illness (SkipperLove), such a diagnosis is always the result of a set of psychological tendencies and behaviours and their interaction with broader social forces over time. This was the point that I was trying to make in the “Did Prince have Bipolar?” thread many moons ago, and why I objected so strongly to the implication that his talent and success precluded the possibility of any underlying similarities. In my view, such a diagnosis simply has no meaning until a person ceases to function socially – that is, it isn’t necessarily a pathology until an individual fails to integrate and strays too far from socially sanctioned norms in a destructive manner. How many “successful” bipolar sufferers, or indeed suffers of any diagnosable disorder, is a psychiatrist likely to meet in their daily practice? The answer is zero, since a person’s interaction with the psychiatric establishment already implies that things are beginning to fall apart. I believe that many psychiatrists (and I’ve met enough of them) have a blinkered conception of the fundamental nature of these conditions. Each of us represents the confluence of a vast array of internal and external environmental forces. Or, by way of analogy, in captivity you might expect the most innately healthy animals to show the clearest signs of distress. Where does eccentricity and originality end and madness begin? Consider James Joyce’s belief that his daughter Lucia, a diagnosed schizophrenic, represented the “perfection” of his genius. For me, the greatest creativity always represents a movement toward the psychotic, since it involves the loosening of established modes of thought and behaviour (established thought being the necessary paradigm of sanity, its dismantling the source of originality).

Now consider Prince, a natural introvert and eccentric who, by dint of his talent and extraordinary focus, willed a world of his making, one in which he could exist entirely on his own idiosyncratic terms. Regardless of how it ended, the less than edifying aspects of his personality and whatever flawed psychological constructs we might attempt to retrospectively apply to him, I’ll always consider him to be an example of a creative life lived well.

[Edited 7/11/18 21:11pm]

Prince would not have been a good candidate for therapy IMO, as I don't imagine he would trust anyone enough to be truly open and vulnerable over a sustained period of time. Besisdes, he would almost certainly have chosen an attractive female therapist and would soon be sexualizing the hell out of her with songs like Dripping Hot Therapist and Naughty Counselor.

fen said:

rdhull said:

I dont mean that he was psychotic. But he clearly had power and control issues with the etiology from his home life as a child. Not to mention his health issues as a youth and his short stature. A ball of emotional paranoia where he used work as a way to self soothe etc etc. Whereas other things could have been entered into his life. Sure, it gave us a LOT of good music/material, but for him, therapy and forging positive relationships etc were needed and should have been fostered instead imho.

I don’t know… I think that this kind of desire for contentment is quite alien to many genuinely gifted and creative people. I’ve mentioned it before, but I recall an interview in which Prince said something along the lines of:

“I willed this whole trip. Few people tune into the Universe in that way, but I did.”

It’s as though reality itself became the canvas upon which he worked – the “self” something malleable, a play of images (note Miles’ comment about Prince waking up each day as a different person). It’s not always true, but those who are so absorbed and committed to their internal imagination often struggle to cope with the practicalities of daily life and maintain healthy personal relationships. Childlike in other words. I’d wager that most wouldn’t have it any other way, even with the gift of hindsight, if it required a fundamental change to their mode of being or the trajectory of their creativity.

That said, I agree with you that Prince’s introversion and trust issues were ultimately damaging, and that it would have been better if he were more open to being challenged in a loving way. Often, our very best friends are our harshest critics – it’s the flatterers and sycophants that genuinely damage us. Based on what we can surmise, some psychological adjustments in this regard would have helped, I agree.

To those in this thread who question whether Prince had some form of mental illness (SkipperLove), such a diagnosis is always the result of a set of psychological tendencies and behaviours and their interaction with broader social forces over time. This was the point that I was trying to make in the “Did Prince have Bipolar?” thread many moons ago, and why I objected so strongly to the implication that his talent and success precluded the possibility of any underlying similarities. In my view, such a diagnosis simply has no meaning until a person ceases to function socially – that is, it isn’t necessarily a pathology until an individual fails to integrate and strays too far from socially sanctioned norms in a destructive manner. How many “successful” bipolar sufferers, or indeed suffers of any diagnosable disorder, is a psychiatrist likely to meet in their daily practice? The answer is zero, since a person’s interaction with the psychiatric establishment already implies that things are beginning to fall apart. I believe that many psychiatrists (and I’ve met enough of them) have a blinkered conception of the fundamental nature of these conditions. Each of us represents the confluence of a vast array of internal and external environmental forces. Or, by way of analogy, in captivity you might expect the most innately healthy animals to show the clearest signs of distress. Where does eccentricity and originality end and madness begin? Consider James Joyce’s belief that his daughter Lucia, a diagnosed schizophrenic, represented the “perfection” of his genius. For me, the greatest creativity always represents a movement toward the psychotic, since it involves the loosening of established modes of thought and behaviour (established thought being the necessary paradigm of sanity, its dismantling the source of originality).

Now consider Prince, a natural introvert and eccentric who, by dint of his talent and extraordinary focus, willed a world of his making, one in which he could exist entirely on his own idiosyncratic terms. Regardless of how it ended, the less than edifying aspects of his personality and whatever flawed psychological constructs we might attempt to retrospectively apply to him, I’ll always consider him to be an example of a creative life lived well.

Most diagnsosis usually has to have the caveat "and has caused distress/impaired function " to the person. So if he hd a healthy paranoia, relationship issues etc and he was still functioning well etc etc then of course, he was fine. When I said he needed therapy, I didnt mean meds or anything. Just some therapy to disucss his upbringing and how it related to things or manifested certain idiosyncracies i his life. Not saying he wasnt creative, happy, or whatever. Because he did put a lot of his issues into his work, and work ethic, in creative healthy ways. Others would have ended up addicted to illicit drugs, maybe serious mood issues leading to suicidal ideations etc. As you said, Prince appeared to have curtailed many issues ...and some he didnt. Hell, 99% of the population could use some long term therapy.

gandorb said:

Prince would not have been a good candidate for therapy IMO, as I don't imagine he would trust anyone enough to be truly open and vulnerable over a sustained period of time.

I agree...to certain extent. He admitted to seeing a therpaist in the 90's though. I mean,he , as with other ppl in his position etc, would be a hard candidate for therapy. There would be many ups n downs, cessations and upstarts, transferring referrals of doctors etc. It could work. He wasnt a hopeless case.

[Edited 7/11/18 21:16pm]

I have it on good authority that he had every reason to not trust employees.

SkipperLove said:

I don't know if he was totally right about Leeds. THat's not what I meant. I just mean that the fear of older employees taking your stuff is not as irrational as some of PRince's other fears.

anangellooksdown said:

SkipperLove said: See? He was right about Alan Leeds. Are people blind out there?? No ones saying anything! If you get stolen from enough, and you have good things going for you, it’s better to have rigid boundaries than be too careless. So what if he went overboard? This allowed him to have privacy and to create for Decades.

I agree...He would have fought it and maybe even fed them some B.S> but its still what he needed. I think surviving his drug addiction and getting help would have provided some therapy. But therapy here and there is not enough. Its a lifelong thing (I imagine) for people with the extreme type of life that he was leading. I can see him being like Will Hunting in Good Will Hunting (trying to play the therapists until one therapist sees right through him).

rdhull said:

gandorb said:

Prince would not have been a good candidate for therapy IMO, as I don't imagine he would trust anyone enough to be truly open and vulnerable over a sustained period of time.

I agree...to certain extent. He admitted to seeing a therpaist in the 90's though. I mean,he , as with other ppl in his position etc, would be a hard candidate for therapy. There would be many ups n downs, cessations and upstarts, transferring referrals of doctors etc. It could work. He wasnt a hopeless case.

[Edited 7/11/18 21:16pm]

With fame comes greedy psyophants, jealous folks, etc. It is probably the reality for every huge celebrity. But most of celebrities don't over-react like he did (IMO). They downsize and look for true friends so they don't have to worry about the legions of bullshitters who are out there. He downsized at the end but seemed to pick the wrong folks (well at least 2-3 of them).

rdhull said:

I have it on good authority that he had every reason to not trust employees.

SkipperLove said:

I don't know if he was totally right about Leeds. THat's not what I meant. I just mean that the fear of older employees taking your stuff is not as irrational as some of PRince's other fears.

SkipperLove said:

LOL.

rdhull said:

It wouldn’t be that hard for any reasonably educated therapist to see right through him etc. Trust me SkipperLove said:

I agree...He would have fought it and maybe even fed them some B.S> but its still what he needed. I think surviving his drug addiction and getting help would have provided some therapy. But therapy here and there is not enough. Its a lifelong thing (I imagine) for people with the extreme type of life that he was leading. I can see him being like Will Hunting in Good Will Hunting (trying to play the therapists until one therapist sees right through him).

rdhull said:

fen said:

I don’t know… I think that this kind of desire for contentment is quite alien to many genuinely gifted and creative people. I’ve mentioned it before, but I recall an interview in which Prince said something along the lines of:

“I willed this whole trip. Few people tune into the Universe in that way, but I did.”

It’s as though reality itself became the canvas upon which he worked – the “self” something malleable, a play of images (note Miles’ comment about Prince waking up each day as a different person). It’s not always true, but those who are so absorbed and committed to their internal imagination often struggle to cope with the practicalities of daily life and maintain healthy personal relationships. Childlike in other words. I’d wager that most wouldn’t have it any other way, even with the gift of hindsight, if it required a fundamental change to their mode of being or the trajectory of their creativity.

That said, I agree with you that Prince’s introversion and trust issues were ultimately damaging, and that it would have been better if he were more open to being challenged in a loving way. Often, our very best friends are our harshest critics – it’s the flatterers and sycophants that genuinely damage us. Based on what we can surmise, some psychological adjustments in this regard would have helped, I agree.

To those in this thread who question whether Prince had some form of mental illness (SkipperLove), such a diagnosis is always the result of a set of psychological tendencies and behaviours and their interaction with broader social forces over time. This was the point that I was trying to make in the “Did Prince have Bipolar?” thread many moons ago, and why I objected so strongly to the implication that his talent and success precluded the possibility of any underlying similarities. In my view, such a diagnosis simply has no meaning until a person ceases to function socially – that is, it isn’t necessarily a pathology until an individual fails to integrate and strays too far from socially sanctioned norms in a destructive manner. How many “successful” bipolar sufferers, or indeed suffers of any diagnosable disorder, is a psychiatrist likely to meet in their daily practice? The answer is zero, since a person’s interaction with the psychiatric establishment already implies that things are beginning to fall apart. I believe that many psychiatrists (and I’ve met enough of them) have a blinkered conception of the fundamental nature of these conditions. Each of us represents the confluence of a vast array of internal and external environmental forces. Or, by way of analogy, in captivity you might expect the most innately healthy animals to show the clearest signs of distress. Where does eccentricity and originality end and madness begin? Consider James Joyce’s belief that his daughter Lucia, a diagnosed schizophrenic, represented the “perfection” of his genius. For me, the greatest creativity always represents a movement toward the psychotic, since it involves the loosening of established modes of thought and behaviour (established thought being the necessary paradigm of sanity, its dismantling the source of originality).

Now consider Prince, a natural introvert and eccentric who, by dint of his talent and extraordinary focus, willed a world of his making, one in which he could exist entirely on his own idiosyncratic terms. Regardless of how it ended, the less than edifying aspects of his personality and whatever flawed psychological constructs we might attempt to retrospectively apply to him, I’ll always consider him to be an example of a creative life lived well.

Most diagnsosis usually has to have the caveat "and has caused distress/impaired function " to the person. So if he hd a healthy paranoia, relationship issues etc and he was still functioning well etc etc then of course, he was fine. When I said he needed therapy, I didnt mean meds or anything. Just some therapy to disucss his upbringing and how it related to things or manifested certain idiosyncracies i his life. Not saying he wasnt creative, happy, or whatever. Because he did put a lot of his issues into his work, and work ethic, in creative healthy ways. Others would have ended up addicted to illicit drugs, maybe serious mood issues leading to suicidal ideations etc. As you said, Prince appeared to have curtailed many issues ...and some he didnt. Hell, 99% of the population could use some long term therapy.

Yes, I understood what you meant and I think you’re probably right. The bulk of my comment was directed at those who wonder whether he had a more serious underlying condition, and what I think about the possible links between mental health and creativity.

Also, to be clear, I’m not criticising psychiatric practitioners on the front-line – most are good people trying to do their best within the conceptual framework that they have at hand. And I agree with your last comment…

rdhull said:

It wouldn’t be that hard for any reasonably educated therapist to see right through him etc. Trust me

This. He really wasn't all that complicated. Plus, he was able to self-reflect and talk about himself. Many people just didn't listen.

SkipperLove said:

It wasn't all bleak. The highs for a lack of a better word were higher than the stratosphere. But there are geniuses who live happier longer lives than Prince. Mental health is not the same as conforming and no one has perfect mental health (and like you implied what does that mean entirely?). Iam just talking about a bit more balance so that one can live a life filled with a sense of security, love and connection rather than distrust, compartmentalizing, and fear. . He connected through music and that is a triumph. He at times bonded through humor, musical comradary, sex, romance, religion, movie geekdom etc. But long-term contentment and comfort in ones self (in the truest sense) seemed out of his reach. I don't think its odd to wish he had attained it. A therapist isn't supposed to judge, will keep your secrets and is supposed to tell you the truth while challenging you. Its supposed to be a safe place to look at one's self and hopefully achieve some catharsis. I am not sure it hurt anyone..unless you are talking about immoral psychiarist who abuses, controlls or easily prescribes. Thus, the need for a good therapist.

[Edited 7/11/18 21:11pm]

Yes, I agree with most of that.

This thread suitably falls under the category summed by the heading "whatever you think, is true."

It's like reading an interesting book.

Germanegro said:

rdhull said:

Germanegro said:

This thread suitably falls under the category summed by the heading "whatever you think, is true."

It's like reading an interesting book.

Of course, like everything, its merely conjecture.

Except, of course, when it's not. But yes this one certainly is!

CatB said:

rdhull said:

It wouldn’t be that hard for any reasonably educated therapist to see right through him etc. Trust me

This. He really wasn't all that complicated. Plus, he was able to self-reflect and talk about himself. Many people just didn't listen.

I have no doubt that is true. Funny how people discount what is right in front of their s. So inconvienent on so many levels. Most non-creatives hate messy.