Schizophrenia and Mysticism

The recent celebrated Hay Festival has prompted this blog; having attended a total of 7 events all to a larger or lesser degree focusing on Mental Health Issues. For  a number of years, in fact since a catalytic period in my life from 1984 to 1993 I have been on a steep learning  curve. The start of which I began to doubt my own psyche and sanity in 1984 to understanding that a profound  change that had taken place within me during that 9 year period. Regular readers will have noted my “multidimensional awareness” with regards to perspectives on Mental Health, but what may be less known is the monumental struggle that followed the understanding of what had occurred.

In 1989 I had the unique experience of meeting and eventually living in the same house as the now famous and celebrated World Spiritual Guru Eckhart Tolle.   At the time of our meeting he was known only to a few spiritual seekers, and was in fact running A Course in Miracles and I was one of only 5 attendees.  His fortunes changed dramatically when we parted late 1993 and he became the celebrated author he is today and I began in earnest to develop multidimensional skills during which I underwent many powerful and sometimes traumatic experiences.   Now a Mental Health worker who had none or little understanding of “Spiritual Awakenings” “Dark Nights of The Soul” and Mystical Experiences” would readily have referred me for diagnosis and medication within the psychiatric model. In another reality I may have ended up medicated and labelled Schizophrenic

Fast forward to 2013 I became a member of our local MIND Mental Health Charity following an attempt to resolve an unresolveable family issue.  Far from benefiting from the counselling offered there I was stopped in my tracks by the systemic belief systems abounding in Mental Health Organisations where none or scant awareness is given to Psychic/Spiritual/Metaphysical perspectives, hence the medical/mental illness models prevail.  This was the beginning of another learning curve but one where I was in control on all levels as the preceding years had given me ample opportunity to practice the art of Self Will, when my being was being played around with by mischievous spiritual entities.  Or put it another way, parts of my psyche had split off and had become alienated from the wholeness of the ONE and therefore spent their dream time destructively creating and craving attention.  Only when I dedicated a period of two years self healing strategies by engaging these split off parts of me did I begin the journey through soul retrieval and eventually embraced, healed, accepted and owned those parts of myself, no longer seeing them as outer forces doing battle within me. Shamanism has much to teach our Mental Health teams.

I cannot stress enough the monumental amount of work this involved, and I was blessed to meet the occasional healer/shaman who far from considering my mental health as a problem, journeyed with me side by side and held out an invisible hand when I was forced to leap through the fires of hell to undertake this soul rescue.  It was a period not only filled with multidimensional parallel universe phenomena but also lucid clear dreaming that symbolically spoke to me far clearer than any well-trained counsellor.

Listening to the many lectures ranging from Ruby Wax on Mental Health and Mindfulness to a research group from Worcestor University on Bi-Polar I profoundly understand that we are largely still floundering around in the dark.  These issues cannot be adequately addressed without addressing the wholeness of what it is to be human leading to what it is to be a multidimensional spiritual conscious being experimenting within human development.  Whilst there are breakthroughs in Quantum Physics and on You Tube can be found a plethora of nuero scientific/brain/quantum resonances what is rarely heard is the real human story behind such abstract concepts. You Tube had not been created in 1984 (to my knowledge) and I believe my experiences somehow touched on and in these worlds without any understanding of the intelligence behind it.  For that I am deeply grateful to the Universal Guidance that I and others are receiving once they open their minds to embrace the unknown with trust in a Universal Intelligence some regard as GOD

Much of my “story” is related in A New Human  reviews can be found here.

 

 

The Value of Silence

The Value of Silence – going beyond the mind

There are varying levels of silence from the stonewalling of a negative reaction, to the sublime Samadhi of meditation. Not forgetting the negative silence of complicity that allows all kinds of evil to prevail.

But the silence that I speak of is that which permeates ones whole being no matter what circumstances prevail.

Many people are uncomfortable with silence, in fact for some it is anathema, and so they fill the silence with aimless chatter and distracting pursuits.

It is not really the practice of silence that achieves this sacred space, but practicing mindfulness, that allows one to observe the silence that is a constant.

In 1995 following a turbulent emotional period in my life I decided to take a month long pilgrimage by walking the “Way of St James” otherwise known as “El Campesino” the famous pilgrim’s route to “Santiago De Compestela” through Northern Spain.

Mindfulness Meditation

Multidimensional Reality in still mindfulness

I began meditation 30 years ago in 1984 as part of my journey towards wholeness, before becoming a meditation teacher in 1992. This was before “Mindfulness Meditation” became a popular and trendy practice adopted by political, commercial and business entrepreneurs as a training tool for their organizations, as it is now. On this journey I encountered many spiritual delusions, as well as fraudulent teachers.  Reaching my current level of clarity has involved far more than simply following a twenty minute daily practice of “present moment awareness.”  It has meant examining my life and lifestyle, my relationships and my unhealthy habits and making the necessary changes along the way. Many of these changes caused major career moves and eventually a whole new perspective on life that has completely changed what I am; in short a lifetimes experiential learning.

As I observe Mindfulness Meditation practice developing into a worldwide phenomenon and fast becoming a multi-million dollar business, I feel concerned that a sacred practice designed to encourage self honesty, integrity and a deeper connection to the “real” self is being diluted and turned into a superficial quick fix and panacea for all ills.
Our UK parliament in London holds regular mindfulness sessions and down the road in the Financial Sector training in mindfulness is on-going in the hope of increasing employees’ ability to do their job thus increasing profits.  But will it actually affect or change any policies or decisions, which through lack of insight, a holistic approach or because focus is given to bottom line profits instead, causes wars, inequality and economic enslavement?