Why write about Spirituality and Mental Illness?

Well, before I get back into my groove of writing about mental illness, it occurred to me that I should maybe explain the ‘why’ behind the decision to talk about mental illness and spirituality.

There’s a saying that goes (and I really don’t remember where it’s from) something along the lines of how the most earnest prayers come from people in hospitals. I think this is particularly true about people in psych wards, or who are dealing with mental illness.

People turn to spirituality when they are hurt, confused, or generally lost. And mental illness makes you feel that, in an strange way sometimes. Because mental illness isn’t seen as a physical problem, its invisible and most don’t realize it’s got physical roots, people don’t turn immediately to doctors. Sadly, people actually refuse to see doctors for mental illness because of perceptions and biases that have their roots in spiritual beliefs.

Some of these are ones like: mental illness is the result of a curse, or God’s punishment for a lack of faith, or the result of being estranged from God. It can also be believed to be an imbalance of chakras that only requires meditation to be cured, spirit possession, or (my personal pet peeve, and one that truly held me back) the belief that mental illness is some sort of psychic ‘breakthrough’.

A bunch of these are due to the conflation/mix of mental health and mental illness. Due to the lack of understanding on the difference of these two, people will often try and use spirituality and spiritual practices (which can be beneficial to mental health) to treat mental illness.

Personally, when I went out with my service dog for mental illness, people would often ask me what the dog was for. Once they found out it was for mental illness, these strangers would often end up giving me some sort of advice or opinion on mental illness. Most of these were spiritual perspectives that were against medication and ‘western medicine’, as well as conventional therapy.

Similarly, when I really struggled with my mental illness and was unmedicated, people often threw spiritual advice at me. It was all anti medication and anti conventional doctors. Now that I am medicated and happily so, I find it really disturbing that there is so much anti-medication sentiment out there! I sometimes wonder what my path to healing would have been like if I had been surrounded by more realistic approaches.

Anyways, now that I am in a better space mentally, I think it’ll be nice to get back into talking about mental illness and spirituality. I think it’ll do me good, as it’s something that I really care about, and love discussing with others. I find it nourishing and cleansing.

I also want to really show others that getting conventional help is not anti spirituality. I once met a doctor in training at a mental health clinic, and he was really surprised to hear that not all spirituality is against medication, and that I had arguments against those points. It made for a very interesting discussion, but also showed me that there wasn’t much perspectives out there that are spiritual and embracing of actual treatment for mental illness.

Anyways, that’s all I have to say for today! I will be posting a video to MY CHANNEL soon about these points, and it will basically be a copy of this post. I’m doing this because some formats are easier for some people and not everyone likes reading, and I’m hoping to make this as available as possible.

I wish you all a lovely day ❤

Depression and Writing

Depression is hitting me hard. I think it’s my symptom/condition that I have the hardest time accepting. It’s not glamorous, it’s never fun and never makes you feel special. It always makes me feel like I’m worthless and useless. As an author, this preys on my natural beliefs.

You see, I tend to see myself as a vessel for my stories. But combined with my depression, I feel like nothing BUT a vessel. I feel like I’m nothing without them.

The sad truth is that writing is my whole life. It’s me. It’s been my refuge since childhood, where it suddenly filled a void within me that hurt so badly until then. Ever since I started writing, my days rotate around it. As a kid, I would squeeze it in whenever, would draw my characters everywhere, and obsessed over them.

Now, I wake up thinking of my novels. I spend my mornings wondering what I’ll do until I get the chance to write. My whole day is just spent waiting until the right time to write. I know I dont have the mental energy to write all day, but I wish I could. Already I love writing 5 hours a day, and feel bad if I “waste” even one of those hours not hammering out words.

I know this isn’t healthy, but it is what it is. My writing is my life. The only other thing more important is my wife and my relatives. Literally, unless it’s a basic need, everything else feels secondary. I dont want to travel, I dont want a career, I just want to be good at writing and do my stories justice. I want to accomplish what this drive in me is calling for.

But when depression hits, as it does now, I cant write. Every word hurts, I cant think, and then everything that makes me ‘me’ seems to crumble away. What use am I if I cant write? Not being able to write for even one day is a terrible blow. What if my stories are terribly written? What good am I if i can’t get my stories out there properly, to those who need to read them? I know it sounds dramatic, but not being able to write feels like a poisonous sin that will destroy me.

I know, in some way, that my belief of me being just a vessel for writing is bad for me. I need to see myself as more. But how do I do that? It’s like seeing yourself beyond an addiction, in some way.

And then, what’s wrong with this view, if it gives me purpose and value, even in some small way? I know I should see myself as more, but what if I dont feel like more? I feel like so much in my life just points towards writing, and like it’s the cornerstone of my life. Where would I be without it?

I know, in some factual way, that I am a person without my writing. I’ve experienced that, by having my spiritual projects. But… I just feel like more with my writing. I feel this compulsion and a sense of destiny and being attuned with the universe when it comes to writing. Is that a symptom of a delusion? I dont know what to think some days.

I guess I cant hope to find other people who feel this way. I’ve hoped, and as of yet haven’t found other writers who seem to have this weird perspective and obsession and maybe even delusion with their writing. And yet I hope. I feel lonely, a lot, so isolated with my writing. It’s not the only way I connect with people, but unless someone dips into this part of me, do they know me at all? Will I ever find that I am not alone in this weird feeling?

Grateful doesn’t mean Painless

I’ve had a shit day. Not that anything bad has happened, but that I’m exhausted emotionally from less than pleasant private things (thankfully nothing wrong in my own home, so don’t worry) that have brought me down to a point of exhaustion. I was barely able to do anything today, being so tired that I just wanted to cry.

Now, self pity isn’t the point of this post. I got myself feeling better and just a few minutes ago I was reflecting on it. My thought process went like this “oh I live in such a lovely home, shame on me for feeling bad when I live in such a nice place, I should be more grateful and maybe one day I’ll regret not being happy enough”. To which I did a double take.

Wait, what? Gratefulness does not erase pain, be it emotional or physical. Sure, your mindset can make things more palatable and you can have good coping mechanisms. But when I practice gratitude, I usually end up just feeling guilty. Oh, I am grateful, but I feel guilty for still being in pain when I have such lovely things.

Because here’s the thing -> stuff and situations won’t erase your mental illness. They can help, but to erase it completely? It would have to be nirvana in my opinion.

So yes, gratitude is great and all, but it won’t heal you. And being grateful is not the polar opposite of mental anguish. You can be both grateful and in pain, the two do not exclude each other.

So don’t think you’re not grateful enough because you’re in pain. Being in pain is not a sign you’re not grateful enough. Appreciate what you have, but don’t burden yourself with the concept that good mental habits (like gratefulness, positive thinking) means no mental illness. They’re not the same.

Cute cat to cheer up your day!

Islam and I… A Polytheist’s Experience

Well WhAAAAAAAT? Islam? Me? I know, right?

Let me get into storyteller mode here. Ahem…

It was a bleak morning. The crescent moon had just been covered by a shivering cloud. Gusts of icy wind rustled through dead leaves.

I honestly think it was inspired from a dream. It sort of just came to me, this compulsion to cover my head, especially before the shrine. It happened so recently after a particularly stressful day of attending a street festival. My wife had just congratulated me on holding up well to the stress.

And now, boom. I wanted to cover my head. With a scarf, particularly.

I did research on shrines and head covering and pagans and headscarves. It seemed to be a uniquely female thing, and so I begged to be let into Facebook groups. I was steered towards one that accepted all genders.

I met some fabulous people there. They happened to be muslim – and suddenly I was compelled to do like them, and pray five times a day. After all, I was trying to meditate more, so why not pray AND meditate five times a day?! At this point I was trying to meditate five times a day, ten minutes a piece.

But, prayer? Because it’s related to the sun, right? And so it can be pagan! And then one by one, tick after tock, I began seeing Islamic practices popping up before me. I realized Allah must be calling me. I felt a pull to worship that deity. I began reading more and more about Islam, even going to the library and taking out books on it.

I noticed patterns Islam seemed everywhere around me, even in shoes at the thrift store. I grew ecstatic during prayer and meditation. My moods became terrible. I resisted any questioning of my new path. Within a matter of three days, I went from being completely uninterested in Islam and viewing it as a curious thing to which I’ve often been pulled to, to praying 6 times a day, one of which I had to wake up in the middle of the night for.

Once or twice, my wife pointed out that this wasn’t like me. But I ignored her.

I questioned my gender. I compulsively shopped, shaking from anxiety but unable to stop myself. My anxiety and logic was so bad I had difficulty expressing myself and speaking.

After about two weeks of this, a friend pointed out the warning signs. She anxiously suggested I speak to someone.

At first, I was all ‘yeah, I know’, for I had sensed something ‘off’ ever since this conversion process began. It felt like a radiating spot of light, a strange before and after wherein i entered into a new zone. Also, I now felt like whatever I prayed for, Allah would give me. It felt like it. I was given ‘signs’ and once even wondered if I was going to become a prophet or something. It just felt like I was being carried on this wave of transformation – and somehow I knew it was wrong.

After my friend talked to me about it, I noticed the telltale signs. I grew worried, catastrophically so. I called a health  hotline and inquired what to do. Luckily, I already had an appointment scheduled with my psychiatrist.

Then, wiping away my tears, I went to bed. That’s it!, I decided. It’s just another mental episode. I know how to cope with this.

Or do I?

I’ve spent the last three days covered in blankets, tears, and unable to get off the couch. Yesterday I celebrated when I was able to brush my hair. Today, relatives are arriving to help by bringing me food and help with the dishes I haven’t been able to keep up with. My apartment is a mess and my sick wife has been having to pick up all the pieces.

Because, you see, I wasn’t ready for the crush and fall of realizing that it might have all been fueled by mental illness. It had just been so real. So incredible. And now I’m questioning not only all of it, but the motives of Allah for appearing during a mental breakout. I just… it’s a mess. Trying to draw the line between what was real, what I might have imagined/hallucinated, and what ever else was going on… it’s incredibly exhausting and disheartening. It just makes me miserable.

So that’s it folks. That’s all that’s happened to me. Some fabulous friends are going to talk to their therapists about me so that I can maybe get some tips and perspective in the meantime of waiting for my psychiatrist. But until I see my psychiatrist, I’m just coping I guess. And even then, I’ll still have to scope  out what’s real.

I’ll also have to get a corner of the house to stop telling me to cover my head. Shrines don’t do that, do they? I think I’ll take that shrine down. It bothers me now. It faces Mecca (another sign! Gasp!) and it reminds me of everything that happened. I just can’t stand it any more.

Until next time, take care y’all.