Mental Illness

[Deb]

I saw something about Jeffrey Dahlmer this morning and it made me wonder what Seth had to say about mental illness: Why are some people mentally ill? What causes it, is it another pre-birth choice? Or is it a symptom of inner turmoil the same way physical illness is? Does it serve a purpose?

I'll cover one particular mental illness below, but what about the Jeffrey Dahlmers in the world? Why do they exist? Any thoughts?

I did some search on the engine, but didn't turn up a whole lot. Seth did talk about schizophrenia to some length in Value Fulfillment II, Session 921, and explains it is a sort of defense mechanism in people who can't accept accountability and so their personality is divided (like ours are normally) but not as smoothy re-assimilated outwardly as non-affected people are ("The patterns are seen in an exaggerated fashion, so that in some such cases at least you can gain glimpses of mental, emotional, and psychic processes that usually remain psychologically invisible beneath the more polished or "finished" social personality of the usual individual.") He indicates the disfunction is a choice, "It is as if... they refuse to put themselves together properly, refuse to form one fairly united self. The idea behind it is this: "If you cannot find me, then I cannot be held accountable for my actions...."

A couple of gems:

(This one goes back to channeling concept):

"Communications between various scattered portions of the self often appear, again, in such situations as automatic writing, speaking, the hearing of voices, or through what the person believes to be telepathic messages from others."

Why schizophrenia appears in young adults (and, it makes sense, to males more often than females—men are supposed to be the bread winners):

"When you are a child, you are not held accountable for your actions in the same way that adults are, and schizophrenia often begins around puberty, or young adulthood, when people feel that their youthful promise is expected to bear fruit."

[Sena]

Why are some people mentally ill? What causes it, is it another pre-birth choice? Or is it a symptom of inner turmoil the same way physical illness is? Does it serve a purpose?

Deb, it could be that mental illness serves a purpose in some instances. The view has been expressed that the poet William Blake was "mad":

"Alexander Gilchrist, Blake's first biographer, dedicated an entire chapter of his book Life of William Blake to the subject, a chapter entitled 'Mad or Not Mad'. On reading Gilchrist, it seems that the principle evidence for Blake's madness was his habit of speaking matter-of-factly about spiritual visitors....
WC Dandy in his book The Philosophy of Mystery (1841) summed up the 19th century view of this behaviour thus:

The difference between Shakespeare and Blake is antipodean. Blake was a visionary and thought his fancies real – he was mad. Shakespeare was a philosopher, and knew all his fancy was but imagination, however real might be the facts he wrought from them."

http://www.thecultureclub.net/2006/12/01/was-william-blake-mad/

Many people think that the writing of Blake reveals profound spiritual insights. If he did suffer from a mental illness, it may well be that his illness enabled him to have these spiritual insights.

If severe mental illness has a purpose, it must be one of the most challenging experiences that an individual can choose for himself. I cannot say that every person with a mental illness has chosen it for himself or herself.

I found this quote from Seth:

"Devils and demons have no objective existence. They have always represented, again, portions of mankind's own psychological reality that to some extent he had not assimilated—but in a schizophrenic kind of expression, projected instead outward from himself. Therefore, it does not seem he must be held accountable for acts that he considers debasing, or cruel. He isolates himself from that responsibility by imagining the existence of other forces—the devils or demons of the nether world."
—Dreams Evolution and Value Fulfillment 2 Chapter 9: Session 921, October 8, 1980

[jbseth]

Hi All,

I would say that in our society, we really don't understand the nature of mental illness. However, that doesn't prevent many people from thinking that we do. 

Along with this, I would also say that in our society, we really don't understand the nature of cancer. But once again, that doesn't prevent many people from thinking that we do. 

With cancer, I would say many people believe that cancer is probably caused by some sort of virus. Furthermore, in the case of lung cancer, this virus often attacks people as a result of smoking too much.

Given what Seth has to say about cancer in Session 770 below, do you really think that people truly understand the nature of cancer.

Then, along these same lines, given what Seth says below about Freud's ideas, in Session 771, for example, do you really think that people truly understand the nature of mental illness today?

I, for one, am not so sure that we really do.

jbseth




"The Nature of Personality" Chapter 4, Session 770.

Biologically there is a period very rarely experienced, as jokingly suggested in the "sick jokes" about senility and second childhood. This particular latent biological ability shows itself only upon the rarest instances — because, for one thing, it represents a feat now scarcely desirable. Physically, however, the body is quite able to completely regenerate itself as it approaches old age. Indeed, a quite legitimate second puberty is possible, in which the male's seed is youthfully strong and vital, and the woman's womb is pliable and able to bear. There are, I believe, Biblical tales of such births resulting.

In times of overpopulation, this mechanism is hardly desirable, but it is a part of the species held in abeyance now, representing nature's capabilities. In some areas of your world, isolated peoples live on past a hundred years, vital and strong, because they are untouched by your beliefs, and because they live in sympathy and accord with the world as they know and understand it. Occasionally such second puberties happen then, with resulting childbirth, as a small group attempts to maintain its own biological stance.


Left alone, some of these people would die with a feeling of satisfaction. Kept alive through medical techniques, the physical mechanism continues its struggles to revitalize the body and bring about this second puberty — that naturally would only come about under different conditions, with the mind far more alert and the will unimpaired. Now, to some extent (underlined) there is a connection between this innate, rarely observed second puberty and the development of cancer, in which growth is specifically apparent in an exaggerated manner.

(Long pause.) Give us a moment ... In almost all such cases involving cancer, spiritual and psychic growth is being denied, or the individual feels that he or she can no longer grow properly in personal, psychic, terms. This attempt to grow then activates body mechanisms that result in the overgrowth of certain cells. The individual insists upon growing or upon death, and forces an artificial situation in which growth itself becomes physically disastrous.

This is because a blockage occurs. The individual wants to grow in terms of personhood, but is afraid of doing so. There are always individual variations that must be taken into consideration, but often such a person feels a martyr to his or her sex, imprisoned by it and unable to escape. This can obviously apply to cancers affecting sexual areas, but is often in the background of any such condition. Energy is being blocked because of problems that began — in your terms — with sexual questions in puberty. Energy is experienced as sexual.



"The Nature of Personality" Chapter 5, Session 771.

Again, it is natural to express love through sexual acts — natural and good. It is not natural to express love only through sexual acts, however. Many of Freud's sexual ideas did not reflect man's natural condition. The complexes and neuroses outlined and defined are products of your traditions and beliefs. You will naturally find some evidence for them in observed behavior. Many of the traditions do come from the Greeks, from the great Greek play-writers, who quite beautifully and tragically presented the quality of the psyche as it showed itself in the light of Grecian traditions.

[Deb]

Many people think that the writing of Blake reveals profound spiritual insights. If he did suffer from a mental illness, it may well be that his illness enabled him to have these spiritual insights.

Really enjoyable article. I think back in the day anyone thinking outside the box was considered mad to some degree. Maybe some of them were, and maybe some of them just had gifts. Plenty of people wondered if Jane was. She questioned herself. After reading Seth for a while, I'm more liberal about that sort of thing because now I leave room for the possibility a person has an ability to tap into things I cannot. I think Blake's biggest problem was a lack of discretion: "the principle evidence for Blake's madness was his habit of speaking matter-of-factly about spiritual visitors" " and "Blake was a visionary and thought his fancies real – he was mad. Shakespeare was a philosopher, and knew all his fancy was but imagination, however real might be the facts he wrought from them." Or he was mad. I've seen people who seem mentally ill in one aspect of themselves, but appear normal in the rest. See the last paragraph I quote at the bottom here.

Given what Seth has to say about cancer in Session 770 below, do you really think that people truly understand the nature of cancer.

Actually I'm amazed at how much modern medicine doesn't know about SO many things. I've lost faith in them, along with veterinarians, because of several misdiagnoses I've personally experienced over the past several years. Doctors are best at treating symptoms, until they can figure out the causes. If anyone wants to, really. They're looking in the wrong places. Anyway, if they accepted what Seth has to say as the cause of physical and mental problems, there would be a lot of people out of jobs.

Seth's mention of "Left alone, some of these people would die with a feeling of satisfaction. Kept alive through medical techniques, the physical mechanism continues its struggles to revitalize the body" is another issue for me: modern medicine and people in general are terrified of death, think our bodies should live forever, and will sacrifice everything to prolong life. Regardless of quality or price. And another thing, I saw an article in a local paper today that there are 71,000 Coloradans living with Alzheimers (at least the ones they know about). I have a friend that would look at that and say, "we're just getting older" and believes that will happen to everyone as they age. Seth says no! It's NOT a natural part of aging, and we need to remove that thought before it becomes a belief.

So getting my self back on track, I found a little more information this morning from NoPR Sess. 641:

"Now: There is one point here that I would like to make. Some of the drugs given to "mental" patients impede the natural flow of dream therapy to varying degrees."
. . . .

"The same applies to mental conditions, which have a way, sometimes, of working themselves out better without your professional therapies than with them — often cures happen in spite of your best-intentioned treatment. One of the latest ideas is that certain mental conditions are caused by chemical imbalances. Supplying these does result in some improvement, but such inequalities do not cause any disease. Your beliefs about the nature of your own reality do. If medication of that sort improves the immediate situation, the inner problem of beliefs must still be worked out. Otherwise other illnesses will be substituted."
. . . .

"Mental "diseases" often point out the nature of your beliefs as they agree or conflict with those held by others. Here the belief systems are different than those of society to such a degree that obvious effects show in terms of behavior. There are crisis points here as with many physical illnesses, and left alone an individual may well work through to his own solution.

"Even with so-called mental disorders, however, orientation with the body is very important, as are the individual's beliefs about his own form and its relationship with others and with time and space. (Pause.) There will often be chemical imbalances in such a situation, unconsciously produced by the individual, sometimes in order to allow him to work out a series of hallucinatory events. Such sustained "objectified dreaming" necessitates a change, chemically, from the normal state of waking consciousness. It is important to note that regardless of the mental or physical illness adopted, it is chosen for a reason, and is a natural method that the individual himself knows he is physically and mentally equipped to handle."
. . .

"With most mental aberrations, you are dealing with people whose private symbols are so heavily thrust over prime sense data that even those data sometimes become almost invisible. These individuals often use the physical world in the way that most people use the dream world, so that for them it is difficult to distinguish between a private and a publicly-shared reality."

I think this is where people like Jeffrey Dahlmer come into the picture. Like everything else, it's all about our beliefs.

[Sena]

It is important to note that regardless of the mental or physical illness adopted, it is chosen for a reason, and is a natural method that the individual himself knows he is physically and mentally equipped to handle."

One thing that severely mentally ill people do is to get out of the "rat race", meaning that they don't look for highly paid jobs, some of these jobs being soul-killing.