I used to know a lady with Bipolar. She thought the highs were totally worth it, and she was self-aware enough when she was swinging into a low period, and she'd just isolate herself until she came out of it. She didn't like her medication because it dulled the highs.
After a few major life disasters (including getting married, and then having it annulled), she eventually figured out that the highs were fun but dangerous. I haven't talked to her in years, but she was reliably taking her meds to keep her even keel.
My friend was pretty self-aware though. Someone less so may not be able to see that their illness is the true cause of their life disasters.
Hopefully some day we can figure out a solution that can help brunt the lows without completely brunting the highs. Although people do dumb stuff on the high swing too.
This is key to understanding bipolar: it has an "upswing" phase in which someone has more energy and less inhibition. Increased self-belief as well. It can, if you're lucky, be just the right thing to catapult someone into incredible creative works.
The risk is that risk-taking may not pay off, and the inhibitions may have been there for good reason. Not to mention that there's also a downswing phase which looks like depression and comes with elevated suicide risk.