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THE SHAMANIC VIEW OF MENTAL HEALTH

By Jonathon Davis on Wednesday October 9th, 2019

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A Holistic Approach

In November 2014, the peak psychology body in the UK, the British Psychological Association, released its new flagship report Understanding Psychosis and Schizophrenia. It was a watershed moment in the mainstream treatment of mental illness, containing statements such as:

“Hearing voices or feeling paranoia are common experiences which can often be a reaction to trauma, abuse, or deprivation. Calling them symptoms of mental illness, psychosis, or schizophrenia is only one way of thinking about them, with advantages and disadvantages.” 

- The British Psychological Association: Understanding Psychosis and Schizophrenia.

With mental health problems reaching epidemic proportions in the UK and throughout the western world, this document reads as no less than an admission that the current model of mental health treatment gap has failed, and is a cry for help to anyone with an approach that may be useful. There are indeed a great many cultures who have, and still carry, a deeper understanding of mental illness. While these perspectives don’t fit within the boundaries of rational reductionism, this has little relevance to their efficacy.

“From American Indian shamanism* to esoteric Judaism, this concept has dominated for millennia. As it has now become clear, western civilization Is unique in history in it’s failure to recognize each human being as a subtle energy system in constant relationship to a vast sea of energies in the surrounding cosmos.”  
 - Dr. Edward Mann, Sociologist

Ancient indigenous Shamanic practice

What is the Shamanic View of Mental Health?

Broadly speaking, any form of awareness around mental health that includes spiritual, mystic and/or mythic considerations could be included in a shamanic view of mental health. This ranges from ancient indigenous shamanic practices to yogic methods involving kundalini awakening, through to Jungian and transpersonal psychology (which draw heavily from ancient cultures). Jung, for example, characterised schizophrenia and psychosis as a natural healing process.

“When conscious life is characterised by one-sidedness and false attitudes, primordial healing images are activated – one might say instinctively – and come to light in the dreams of individuals and the visions of artists… Schizophrenia is a condition in which the dream takes the place of reality.”    
 – Carl Jung

Another foundation stone of this perspective is the phrase made famous by Joseph Campbell, “The schizophrenic is drowning in the same waters in which the mystic swims with delight” (an idea borrowed from Jungian psychiatrist RD Laing). There has been a long history throughout human culture of people having mystical experiences, and then becoming “weller than well” as Dr. John Weir Perry put it. The key here is that in these instances the person completed a process that western medicine would have labelled as sickness and then medicated. They instead passed through it and went on to lead lives without relapse into ‘psychosis’, living a more fulfilled existence than if they had never gone through their temporary break with consensus reality. Throughout history there have been examples of people who have gone on to use their visionary insights, newly found drive and focus to create great social reform for the benefit of all.

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Loneliness: A Health Problem That Could Be Deadlier Than Obesity, Study Says

By

 Richard Enos

For COLLECTIVE EVOLUTION

Loneliness can reliably be linked to a significant increase in the risk of early mortality, according to a study at Brigham Young University. Head author, Julianne Holt-Lunstad, notes that “substantial evidence now indicates that individuals lacking social connections (both objective and subjective social isolation) are at risk for premature mortality.”

Holt-Lunstad believes the risks associated with loneliness are already greater than such established dangers as obesity:

Several decades ago scientists who observed widespread dietary and behavior changes raised warnings about obesity and related health problems. The present obesity epidemic had been predicted. Obesity now receives constant coverage in the media and in public health policy. The current status of research on the risks of loneliness and social isolation is similar to that of research on obesity 3 decades ago… Current evidence indicates that heightened risk for mortality from a lack of social relationships is greater than that from obesity.

Furthermore, she warns that “researchers have predicted that loneliness will reach epidemic proportions by 2030 unless action is taken.”

Why Are We So Isolated From Each Other?

From the long view, it can be said that Western civilization as a whole has fostered a gradual disintegration of our physical and social ties. With an emphasis on individual goals and an almost fanatical regard for personal achievement, the traditional institutions of family and community and their capacity to provide their members with a sense of belonging and shared purpose have become significantly fragmented.

The family unit has gone from large generations-linked mutual support systems to small and immediate units, sometimes involving single parents whose necessities make it very difficult to create a stable home environment for their children. Add to that the fact that more and more people are not even building families, and our society has more people living alone than at any other time in history. This includes the elderly, who are less likely to find a ‘fit’ living within their children’s families than ever before.

The decline of the ‘community’ is perhaps as significant as the disintegration of the family unit. In Western-style communities, people work as a collection of individual units interacting by specific functions rather than as an interrelated whole with a significant shared identity. Naturally, attempts are made today to join or build ‘communities’ all the time, but like the Meetup model, they are founded on the gathering of select people with similar interests and purposes, rather than a shared embrace of all people within a certain geographical area.

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Learning from Indigenous Wisdom and Knowledge – To Change Society a Cultural Revolution in Activism is Needed.

by R. Teichmann

News Beacon Ireland

Foreword

About 30 years ago I met a young woman during a train ride and we began talking. During the conversation I asked her what she was doing and she replied that she was studying indigenous civilizations within her anthropology course. When I asked her why she was interested in this subject she replied (the exact words I do not remember after such a long time but I remember the essence): “We will need their knowledge to sort out the problems we’re faced with.”  I did not understand then what she was saying; or better I dismissed it, because what could it possibly be that these cultures (now barely existing and  still under threat from genocide) could contribute to the solving of modern day problems?

I recently attended a workshop with an Elder of the Wampanoag Nation, Manitonquat (Medicine Story). This article is my personal “digestion” of that weekend. I dedicate this to all fellow men and women who hold a vision for a better future and are working towards reaching that goal and especially to Manitonquat and his partner Ellika.

What is the issue?

Ever since I was a teenager, I realised that something was not right with the way we live and the longing to put things right has never left me. I have been active in quite a few movements and political organisations during my lifetime, trying to make the world a better place. I witnessed sectarianism, splits, infighting, movements getting hi-jacked to serve a certain agenda or co-opted to advance something they were originally opposed to, persons with big egos rising to the top to become “leaders”.

In that respect the best example I can think of was the rise of Joschka Fischer to the top of the German Green Party. As such he became Foreign Minister of a coalition government, composed of Social Democrats and Greens, and denounced everything the Greens and he himself previously stood for when he advocated waging war on an independent state, the then Yugoslavia, “on humanitarian grounds of course” without UN Mandate and contrary to international law and the German constitution. It was then that all my hopes to change something by engaging in that party faded and I left it in protest and disgust.  

Many parties and movements and even “alternative” communities seem to be ending in the dustbin of history without ever achieving their initial goals – leaving behind many disillusioned good people; people who invested time, work and money to achieve a better world and tackle the problems we are all faced with. And if they are successful they end up establishing their (or rather their leaders’) way and oppressing and dominating the remainder of society. Why is it that way? 

Fear and Isolation

Most of us agree that the current way society works (referred to throughout this article as ‘the system’) is not only unfit for purpose – i.e. ensuring that the needs of people, plants, animals and everything else surrounding us in the broadest sense are met – but is also based on isolation and fear.

The fear of not passing the test in school is where it begins. The fear of not getting a job comes next. Then the fear of losing that job. The fear of not being able to provide for your family. The fear of not being able to pay the next mortgage rate and losing the roof over your head. The fear of not being taken care of in sickness or old age. And then there is the fear of the unknown. That is why people shy away from consciously acknowledging that the system is unfit for purpose and begin to think about how it can be changed and what they can do, even though deep inside they are aware of this fact.

Any movement aiming to replace the failing system with something better must create an environment where people can lose their fear. How can that be done?

Since humanity replaced tribes with ever larger entities of social organisation, comprising more and more humans, the isolation of the individual human has increased. Instead of living in a society where you knew all members of your tribe on a very personal level, where decisions affecting the community were made together and swiftly implemented, we now live in towns and cities or even hubs where you hardly know your neighbours, let alone on a very personal level.

Our direct interactions with nature, to provide us with what we need to survive, are replaced by factory farms and visits to the supermarket.  Group creativity has been replaced with hours in front of that square screen in our living rooms or with spending hours shaking to synthetic music or with finding thrill in consuming “recreational” drugs. Even in the midst of thousands of other people around us, we have become more isolated than ever before.

Hand in hand with this development came the concentration of power in fewer and fewer hands. Instead of being involved directly in decision making and implementing we now have a vote. A vote that changes nothing. Many begin to realize this as the ever less participation in elections indicates. The real power people once had has migrated to career politicians who are lobbied and sometimes financed by big corporations, which are financed by “too big to fail” banks, which are financed by central banks, which are controlled by a tiny elite who make all the vital decisions behind closed doors.

We may feel connected through the Internet, the so-called social media, but these connections are artificial, virtual. We are living virtual lives instead of real ones. The deep personal connection between humans and between humans and nature has been replaced with the illusion of it. Instead of talking to each other face-to-face and heart to heart we now send twitter messages, smileys and hit “Like” buttons. Instead of actually interacting with nature, we watch “Nature programs” on TV.

Isolation equals disempowerment. Humans feel helpless when isolated. People do not engage to replace the failing system with something better because they feel powerless or perceive the powers that shouldn’t be as being the normal state of affairs that cannot be altered. Resulting from the isolation from nature and fellow human, instead of developing their intrinsic individual spirituality and respect and understanding for everything that is, people follow various religions, look for gurus and ideologies to fulfill their need of spiritual community. This is exploited by those who want control and domination or, even worse, it is used to turn humans against each other.

Any movement aiming to replace the failing system with something better must create an environment where people can connect with one another on a deep personal level as well as with nature, which they are a part of.  How can that be done?

Fear and isolation are the necessary ingredients that allow the current system to linger on, to manipulate most of society, to prevent development and implementation of solutions to most problems and to allow domination, control and destruction on a massive scale.

The creation of an environment where fear and isolation are absent and that encourages direct contact with nature is a prerequisite for any attempt to effect meaningful and lasting change for the better for all of life on this planet. How can we create it?

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