Mental Health and Spirituality – Part II

Mental Health and Spirituality – Part II   "The soul, if we could see it, would look like a multifaceted gem; and each facet or group of facets serves a particular function".  I had not considered the soul in this light.   Here is part two of a really informative article by a man who has a lot to offer on this topic.


http://www.healedspirit.com/2011/08/mental-health-depression-and-spirituality-part-ii/


"In the first post in this series two weeks ago, we looked at general circumstances regarding the connection between spiritual experience and mental illness. We will now get a bit more specific.
A question was asked about how entity attachments can occur. That depends.
First a definition: an “entity” as we use it is any sentient being. Specifically, in this framework it is not incarnated – it’s just a cohesive ball of energy, an individual piece of consciousness with intelligence. A soul is an entity, but  an entity is not necessarily a soul. An angel is an entity, but an entity is not necessarily an angel. Furthermore, in my work I only deal with negative entities. These have chosen not to work with Light (Spirit, if you will) and not to evolve spiritually - they therefore have no source of power unless they can induce negativity in an individual soul. That’s why they seek to attach. They are, in effect, parasites.
Negative entities attach to a soul when it’s incarnated into a body…when it’s in the learning process and so subject to making mistakes. Often, the life lessons connected with the learning process are so onerous as to cause the person in question to look for easy solutions. In that case they are vulnerable to an attachment. A negative entity is attracted to the situation’s energy, and an offer is made (usually very subtly and unconsciously) that appears to offer some relief. Naturally such a being will not literally appear with the classic devilish horns and tail; it will offer an attractive solution and half-truths, while downplaying the downside to the arrangement. Catch more flies with honey, etc…
Therefore, entity attachments are a choice we make. True, it can be because we were tricked somehow…but we’re still responsible.
That said, entity attachments in themselves don’t seem to be all that prevalent in “causing” what we think of as serious metal illness. They may be more of a symptom, in that one who is already in pain and in a weakened state will be more vulnerable to seeking shortcuts. In the other post I mentioned soul facet loss; I believe that this (and related or similar breakdowns of the psychic structure) are more often at the root of mental dysfunction in this life. The soul, if we could see it, would look like a multifaceted gem; and each facet or group of facets serves a particular function. As mentioned before, the partial or complete loss of these functions is extremely disruptive to the personality. As little as 10% loss can show up as mental illness; at 30% loss, psychosis is pretty much a sure thing. The functions affected or lost may very well be ones that aren’t critical in the dimensions of pure spirit…but the loss of them can be highly detrimental when a soul does incarnate and attempt to lead a physical life. These can be retrieved, but as stated before it becomes much more difficult when the person in question has lost a goodly portion of his or her faculty of free will."
"...These are just two of the energetic roots that can underlay mental infirmity. There are likely as many different causes as there are for, say, head trauma in the physical body. You can get bonked on the head, or you can fall down the stairs. Slightly different causes, slightly different effects..."


 "We can even produce some kinds of entities ourselves. The constant, strong repetition of negative thoughts can eventually lead to the formation of an independent “thought form” – in other words, the energy of our thoughts take on a life of their own and become an actual entity; and even if the one who produced it wishes to stop the process, the thought form remains attached, cranking out the negative energy and keeping the cycle going. A few percent loss of soul facets could have a similar effect, depending upon the area they dealt with.
As well, there are environmental influences – which is why we clear properties like homes and businesses. Even if the negativity isn’t connected to a particular person but to a place or thing, that dark energy can still have an influence. For instance, you may have a family get along fine when they go out to eat, but begin fighting like cats and dogs when they get home – that’s a good example of a house that should be cleared. It may be no accident that you feel badly when you go into a particular place of business, or workplace..."


But, a caution: we mustn’t be so quick to blame some evil entity for our gloom. We can make the choice to be depressed, or fearful, or anxious. Even if there had been a negative attachment but it’s been cleared, we might be in the habit of being depressed. How to tell the difference? Not easy, and the only way I know of is to have an intuitive like myself take a look. If it’s not an outside influence, painful as it is it may be what we’re used to – and thus is a comfort zone for us. It’s simply what we’re accustomed to being. In this case we need to use our free will and make the choice to be happy…or at least not sad. When I find this in a client, the way I advise them to get out of it is to not aim too high at first. Some think that you should just wake up one day and decide to be happy. Studies have proved that “thinking happy thoughts” only depresses people more because it’s a lie. Much better to acknowledge where we are and to accept that we’re feeling bad, and that there’s nothing wrong with that – it’s just the way it is for us"
.
 "...Popular touchy-feely, sentimental spiritual concepts would have us believe that it’s better to have negative emotions than none at all. This is a well-meaning and superficial lie. Having negative emotion as a comfort zone leaves no space for more productive and pleasant experience. But if we empty that emotional space, we then have the opportunity to gradually introduce positive emotions – which will quickly have a snowball effect and eventually become the comfort zone."
Another trick that I myself used: years ago I saw the movie, “What the Bleep Do We Know?“. I had varying degrees of interest in the concepts in it, but the one that hit home for me was the idea that bodily chemicals like hormones (or the lack of them) can be in a sense addictive. Like alcohol or heroin, we become acclimated to being under their influence. So, the minute that our bodies or minds receive a signal indicating that we need another fix, we unconsciously do something about it and produce the chemical (or inhibit it, depending on the mechanism). In order to produce or inhibit it, we need to induce a condition that will do that for us. In the case of depression or anxiety,we need to feel depressed or anxious to get our fix of the chemical. But a rational mind needs a reason to feel depressed..." 


 "...Needless to say, there’s always at least one or two things that we can come up with in this regard. The dog’s sick…the car’s broken down…the mortgage is due – it doesn’t matter what it is as long as we can come up with something negative to back up the emotion we wish to evoke in order to get our jolt of sadness. In my own case, once I truly understood this sequence, it was fairly easy to stop the cycle. For anyone who experiences depression or anxiety on a regular basis, I recommend a close examination of how your mind tricks you into a negative mode. It then becomes a simple matter of taking charge.
It is to be hoped that the reader who has been himself diagnosed with psychosis or another personality disorder will take these words in the spirit in which they are written. "

Mental Health and Spirituality – Part II.  If you are suffering from depression and are locked into the struggle with substance abuse, here is guidance for you.

Mental Health and Spirituality Part 1

Mental Health and Spirituality, this is an edited excerpt from this author's blog post that I find both helpful and inflammatory.  I am not adverse to strong opinions, for I certainly have expressed a number of them in my day.  However, this article and book is worth the open minded exploration to see what triggers are firing mentally, spiritually and physically when depression strikes.


http://www.healedspirit.com/2011/07/mental-health-and-spirituality/


"The topic of mental health and its relationship with spirituality is quite a sticky wicket. Just the fact that so much of spiritual belief and practice depends upon intensely personal and subjective thoughts and experiences makes it hard to draw a line between mental “illness” and the vivid spiritual experience. Throw in the dogma attached to both the psychiatric/psychological fields and the sometimes just-as-rigid “New Age” movement, and you’ve got a can of worms that’s not easy to untangle."


"I’m aware of therapists and psychologists who won’t even discuss spirituality because they equate it with religion. It’s startling to find such close-mindedness in a profession that perforce requires a whole bunch of winging it to be effective. But even the less rigid psychologists who recognize the value of some kind of spiritual belief as a part of a healthy ego, generally refrain from introducing it into the therapeutic program in favor of the safety of what they were taught in school; and when they do, it’s usually centered around the mainstream notion of relying on a Higher Power outside of the patient’s influence, to be supplicated for help..."


"...All that said, there is for every physical/mental illness or malady a reflection in our spiritual aspect. As it is above, so it is below (and vice-versa). If we’re sick in the body, there’s usually also something wrong in our mind, our emotions, and yes…in our soul. In my training, my practice, my intuitive insights and in my observations, I’m quite sure that mental illness more often than not has roots in the higher dimensions…and the “vice-versa” part is that it can be rooted in the physical and have an effect on those higher dimensions of our psyche. For instance, mental abilities can be affected by head trauma, which obviously is going to affect our emotional aspects, and I dare say our ability to evolve spiritually since we have lost some of the ability to consciously learn and act. That would be a case of the physical dimension having an effect on the spiritual dimension..."


"Going the other way…from spiritual-level damage to physical/mental…is, of course, quite an esoteric topic. All I can do is to relate my observations and conjectures.
Firstly, in the interest of openness, I will say that I have several family members who have been seriously mentally ill. One is fine now; the other is perhaps recovering, perhaps not. At any rate, I think that that has given me a unique point of view since I have been intimate witness to not only the life-disrupting aspects of the thing; but I have spent much time thinking about and researching remedies for it..."


"The first thing that I need to relate is something that I touched upon above: one should never, ever rely solely upon any kind of psychic or spiritual remedy for serious mental illness. The kind of clearing work that I do, for example, is based upon the conscious participation of the patient or client. A person who lacks the capability to think clearly has, to some extent, lost not only a frame of reference…they’ve also lost a good portion of their free will. Indeed, exposure to the kind of esoteric practices common to many healing modalities could be destructive for these people, simply serving to reinforce their idea that “this” reality is not real at all.
In my healing modality, one common cause of serious mental disruption is the loss of soul facets (or “fragments”). In a nutshell, particular and specific parts of the soul are missing…the ability to interact socially, the sense of reality, or the ability to be creative or to love. Often, several of these aspects can be missing at the same time. And it’s not as though these parts of the individual can be “taught” or “therapied” back into existence…they’re simply gone. Unavailable. In some cases these essential personality fragments can be recovered. But it’s extremely difficult..."

"...Yet another source of mental distress can come from open “portalways” to past-life experiences. We live in the physical under a veil that is in place for a reason. Imagine experiencing a hundred lifetimes at once, and it’s easy to see how a psychotic person would have trouble dealing with daily life. And access to certain experiences within those lives could obviously be bothersome; having vivid memories of trauma like being murdered, executed, or of war experiences with no filter in place is bound to produce difficulty.
In the next post, I’ll address some specific cases and discuss the possible root causes and why a soul might choose to incarnate into a life of infirmity and low level functioning."





Mental Health and Spirituality, there is a great deal of "food for thought" in this author's work and his book.  If you are suffering from depression and are unclear of the cause, it may be of help to you to explore these spiritual insights.