psychotic break – the paradise paradox

A Psychotic Break or Shamanic Awakening?: The Andrarchy Show Episode 2

The Story: Is it mental illness or a spiritual experience?

If we take the psychiatric industry’s model of mental illness, we might be inclined to believe that these experiences are purely negative. But if we go too far the other way, speaking of neurodiversity, spiritual awakenings or shamanic experiences, we might be tempted into thinking that these experiences are wholly positive. It’s true that these experiences may involve a lot of suffering for the people whom they affect directly, and the people around them – however, it’s also true that people can learn a lot from these experiences, about themselves and the nature of the world they live in.

This is part 2 of Andrew “andrarchy” Levine’s interview with Kurt about having a psychotic break, or spiritual awakening. We discuss the terms used to describe these experiences, the change from linear to conceptual thinking that went on in Kurt’s brain, and possible explanations of what caused this spontaneous change from psychiatric and yogic perspectives.

The Eps:

Mental illness and hamanic experiences: The Andrarchy Show episode 1

The Links:

Andrarchy on Steemit

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The Episode:

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Mental Illness & Shamanic Experiences: The Andrarchy Show Episode 1

The Story – How to deal with a psychotic break

Psychology, psychiatry and psychoanalysis as schools of thought are less than 150 years old, and we shouldn’t be surprised if such young sciences have gaps of knowledge, questions that are still left open, or even questions that are outright ignored. It’s possible, even likely, that the modern psychiatric model of mental illness is incomplete, and could learn things from other schools of thought.

Many people have the conception that being diagnosed with a mental illness means that you have a chemical imbalance. However, such “illnesses” are normally diagnosed by looking at behaviour, rather than blood tests or other chemical tests to determine amounts of chemicals in one’s brain. So, at least in the majority of cases, the “chemical imbalance” idea is just an assumption.

In contrast, there are shamanistic traditions which stretch back hundreds or even thousands of years. Shamans have been helping people through the strange times in their lives even before recorded history. Is it possible that psychiatry and psychology still have a lot to learn from shamanistic methods?

This is a clip from an interview that Andrarchy (Andrew Levine) did with Kurt, and more clips will be coming over the next couple of weeks.

The Episode

To download this episode in audio, right click here and press ‘Save as’.

The links

“Mental Illness” – how and what to learn from your mind breaking

Andrarchy’s post on Steemit introducing his show

What a shaman sees in a mental hospital

A traditional approach to mental illness – Phil Borges TED talk

Healing with communication, conversation and love by Sterlin Luxan

What is a shaman by Terence McKenna