Vandaag vond ik een mooi artikel op de interessante blog Beyond Meds, over de link tussen psychose en spiritualiteit. De volledige tekst vind je onderaan deze pagina maar ik probeer de essentie ervan samen te vatten:
Mary, dokter in de psychologie en ervaringsdeskundige bespreekt in een yahoogroup de link tussen psychose en spiritualiteit. De vraag die in de groep gesteld werd is : "Hoe kan een traumatiserende ervaring als een psychose beschouwd worden als iets spiritueels?"
Het antwoord van Mary:
Spiritualiteit heeft twee aspecten. Enerzijds heb je de spiritualiteit van de gelovige die verbonden is aan een religie en anderzijds heb je het esoterische, "verborgen" aspect waarmee een minderheid ervaring heeft: het gaat om een essentiële, universele ervaring die aan de basis ligt van alle religies in alle culturen doorheen de geschiedenis; het gaat om die ene transcendente Realiteit die de wortel is van het bestaan zelf, en wanneer men zich ermee identificeert kan dat het begin betekenen van een bewustere en meer meedogende manier van leven.
Filiosoof Ken Wilber schrijft het volgende: "Zijn de mystici en wijzen gek? Want ze vertellen allemaal variaties op hetzelfde verhaal. Het verhaal dat ze op een ochtend wakker worden en beseffen dat ze één zijn met het Al, dat ze tijdloosheid ervaren. Misschien gaat het hier om een evolutionnaire verandering waarin we evolueren van lichaam naar geest tot ziel en verder, elke fase gekenmerkt door een grotere diepte en groter en breder bewustzijn. En op de hoogste niveaus van de evolutie, kan de ziel van een individu, misschien, ik zeg misschien, het eindeloze kosmische bewustzijn echt aanraken en omarmen. Dat is op zijn minst plausibel. Is dit verhaal dat over de hele wereld verteld wordt door mystici en wijzen zoveel gekker dan het wetenschappelijke materialistische verhaal, dat het eerste afdoet als volledige betekenisloze nonsens? Luister goed naar beide verhalen: welk van de twee klinkt het meest waanzinnig?"
Dit beantwoordt je vraag over het trauma dat vaak geassocieerd wordt met psychose natuurlijk nog niet. Als je echter kijkt naar de levens van mystici zoals Sint Jan van het Kruis, Moeder Teresa, Gopi Krishna ... zul je merken dat daar heel wat trauma en lijden aan te pas kwam. We hebben echt wel een overgeromantiseerd beeld van spirituele ervaringen.
Veel hangt ook af van degene die de spirituele crisis/psychose ervaart en van waaruit hij/zij vertrekt. Toen ik bvb mijn ervaring had, had ik het geluk net een book van C.G. Jung te hebben gelezen, waarin haarfijn stond uitgelegd wat ik op dat moment meemaakte, o.a. dat het een noodzakelijke fase was om mij zowel het bewuste als het onbewuste aspect van mijn persoonlijkheid te realiseren. Dit gaf me het nodige inzicht om dit zeer beangstigende proces te doorstaan zonder ingrijpen van een een psychiater. Anderen hebben minder geluk en worden serieus getraumatiseerd door de psychiatrische 'behandeling' of moeten voor altijd medicatie slikken. En toch hebben zij en ik in de grond dezelfde ervaring gehad.
Robert Whitaker toont in zijn boek "Anatomy of an Illness: Magic Bullets, Psychiatric Drugs, and the Astonishing Rise of Mental Illness in America" (2010) aan dat in landen waar minder medicatie wordt toegediend de kans op herstel aanzienlijk groter is. Dus zijn er waarschijnlijk betere manieren om om te gaan met psychose dan het te onderdrukken met medicatie. Ik denk dat vele patiënten dit weten, maar de meeste van hun behandelaars blijven vasthangen aan het medische model van een "hersenziekte", wat zoveel makkelijker is en meer opbrengt dan echte therapie aan te bieden. De beste oplossing voor de nabije toekomst is misschien dat patiënten leren om hun mond te houden en hun behandeling in eigen handen te nemen.
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Mary in SC who wrote a wonderful blog post on healing a psychosis in her youth with the help of Carl Jung’s and Joseph Campbell’s writings, has shared another piece that she wrote for a yahoo group that discusses the intersection of psychosis and spirituality. Mary has a doctorate in psychology as well as having personal experience in such healing.
The below question was asked in the yahoo group:
What is the link between psychosis and spirituality? One or two people have spoken of being admitted to a psych unit and of being relieved to be there. In what way was this a spiritual experience? I can think of a number of ways to describe this , but “spiritual”? I can see that one might see psychosis as a form of altered consciousness or heightened awareness- although I’m not sure of what- but how does one square this with so much of the trauma associated with florid psychotic features?
Mary’s response:
You have asked the $64 question indeed. Congratulations for having the courage to do it! Many people I think follow the converging paths of psychosis and spirituality up to where they both disappear in the clouds, but never quite allow their thoughts to go all the way up. Thus the question remains for the most part not only unanswered, but unasked.
We might start with the idea that spirituality really has two aspects. One aspect is that of the faithful who believe in the literal meaning of their religion, practice its rituals, and revere its god/gods, icons and traditions. The other aspect is the esoteric or “hidden” aspect realized by a select few who have the essential, primordial and universal experience that underlies all religions; that one transcendent Reality underlies existence itself, and the experience of one’s identity with it can mark the beginning of a more conscious and compassionate way of life. This experience, it is said, underlies all religions in all cultures throughout history.
It is with this second aspect, of course, that the question of a link between psychosis and spirituality arises. Philosopher Ken Wilber puts the problem like this:
“Are the mystics and sages insane? Because they all tell variationson the same story, don’t they? The story of awakening one morning and discovering you are one with the All, in a timeless and eternal and infinite fashion. Yes, maybe they are crazy, these divine fools. Maybe they are mumbling idiots in the face of the Abyss. Maybe they need a nice, understanding therapist. Yes, I’m sure that would help. But then, I wonder. Maybe the evolutionary sequence really is from matter to body to mind to soul to spirit, each transcending and including, each with a greater depth and greater consciousness and wider embrace. And in the highest reaches of evolution, maybe, just maybe, an individual’s consciousness does indeed touch infinity-a total embrace of the entire Kosmos-a Kosmic consciousness that is Spirit awakened to its own true nature. It’s at least plausible. And tell me: is that story, sung by mystics and sages the world over, any crazier than the scientific materialism story, which is that the entire sequence is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying absolutely nothing? Listen very carefully: just which of those two stories actually sounds totally insane?” – Ken Wilber, A Brief History of Everything, 42-3
This still doesn’t answer your question about the trauma so often associated with psychosis. But if you look at the lives and carefully read the words of great mystics — for example St. John of the Cross, Simone Weil, Mother Teresa, Gopi Krishna — you will find trauma and suffering aplenty. I think it’s our prettified view of spirituality, rather than the real thing, that is responsible for the notion that altered consciousness and heightened awareness are always lovely and pleasurable experiences. In fact, they can be quite like the experiences your patients have.
A great deal depends on the experiencer and what resources he/she brings to the experience. When I had my own experience, I had the great good fortune of having recently read a book by C.G. Jung. He described precisely what I was going through, and said it was a necessary prelude to Individuation, or becoming a complete person aware of both the conscious and unconscious aspects of one’s personality. This gave me the insight to endure the terrifying process without coming under the care of a psychiatrist — and getting myself diagnosed as psychotic or schizophrenic. Others are not so fortunate. They interpret their experiences in the ways you are familiar with, and often end up severely traumatized by “treatment” or permanently medicated, or both. And yet both they and I had the same basic experience.
But even after being “treated” in such a fashion, many people do persist in trying to understand the real meaning of their experience and ultimately find it beneficial, again blurring the distinction between spirituality and psychosis. Here are some anonymous comments found on the internet, for example:
“Now after the years I can only say that my psychoses triggered a spiritual development. Through the years I developed with meditation through a severe kundalini experience from pre-rational to post-rational stages (not only states) of consciousness. So I’m actually glad I’ve had those psychotic breaks because after all they have been really transformative.”
and
“I can only say that my personal experience with psychosis and manic depression brought me on a spiritual path. I had the feeling to have had experienced an altered state (which I couldn’t explain that way because I didn’t know it was possible to have natural altered states, except with psychedelic drugs, for instance).”
and
“Psychosis can really be a trigger for later spiritual development if you’re able to strengthen your ego boundaries, and work an building a strong and healthy personality. After all I’m still on a low dose of antipsychotic drugs just for safety reasons, but I’m doing better than ever before and am studying again as a graduate student.”
In his book Anatomy of an Illness: Magic Bullets, Psychiatric Drugs, and the Astonishing Rise of Mental Illness in America (2010), Robert Whitaker describes World Health Organization studies comparing rates of recovery in “developed” countries (US and Europe) vs. “undeveloped” countries (India, Nigeria and Colombia). In the “undeveloped” countries, he said, “nearly two-thirds of the patients had good outcomes, and slightly more than one-third had become chronically ill. In the rich countries, only 37 percent of the patients had good outcomes, and 59 percent became chronically ill. . . . in Agra, India, where patients arguably fared the best, only 3 percent of the patients were kept on an antipsychotic. Medication usage was highest in Moscow, and that city had the highest percent of patients who were constantly ill. In this cross-cultural study, the best outcomes were clearly associated with low medication use.”
So perhaps there are better ways to deal with psychosis than medicating it out of existence. I think many patients know this, but most of their professional caretakers are still stuck in their medical model of “brain disease,” which is after all so much easier and more profitable than doing real therapy. The best solution for the foreseeable future may be for “patients” to learn to keep their mouths shut and take over their own treatment.
