In today’s episode I touch on the subject of keeping yourself safe whilst exploring spiritual practices but also the line that exists between the two, which is sometimes hard to define. A spiritual experience badly managed can result in a mental illness or breakdown.
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Intense spiritual practices can lead to psychosis or other mental health challenges. They are to be taken seriously and not to be practiced on your own or at the hands of inexperienced people. They can literally lead to paranoia, obsessive rituals, unshakable beliefs in false information, grandiose beliefs, extreme guilt or fear of being punished, incoherent or jumbled thoughts and withdrawal.
Spiritual practices and beliefs can also be used to bypass negative emotions and trauma, and lead to people believing that they have no ego or are all “love and light”. This is actually rather dangerous as these individuals usually end up projecting their unresolved feelings onto you. I have had people psychically attack me when in that state of mind. It’s nasty.
The first four statements that can help you screen yourself for mental illness (though it is often hard to be objective when we are in the thick of it) are:
- I feel that others control what I think or feel
- I see or hear things that others do not hear or see
- I feel it is difficult for me to express myself in words that others can understand
- I find it difficult to make the difference between what’s real and what’s not
To understand how the mind works, I encourage you to listen to EP 63 on how the mind works.
My personal experience of both clairvoyance and psychosis had led me to understand that they feel very different even if you might see exactly the same thing. And that difference lies in the mental state you are in when they happen. If you are grounded and calm, they feel serene. If you are agitated, they can upset you. Not to mention you can believe that something that is not here, actually is. I didn’t. I knew exactly what was happening. I share about these experiences in my memoir, Spiritual Lawyer, which is available on Amazon. Click here to purchase.
I remember when hearing about kundalini awakening for the first time, wanting to experience that. A kundalini experience is a process of activating a dormant energy that is believed to be at the base of our spine, which can lead to a spiritual awakening. Dr Greyson, whom I mentioned in EP 66 about Near Death Experiences, has written a paper about it where he mentions that the Western model of science is not able to explain them. He does, however, compare them to near death experiences.
In relevant spiritual traditions, people were kept safe and supervised by an experienced member of that community, a shaman, who usually had experienced something similar. This leads me to caution everyone about doing breath work and even meditation without the presence of a highly qualified person with a mental health background.
This being said, I also believe that some of these experiences can be caused by tears in our energy fields, possibly due to substance abuse or trauma and that repairing the energy field can go a long way to support mental health recovery. I would never, however, advise not to seek professional help.
This is of course a first exploration of the theme and we might circle back to this topic in further episodes if need be.
To listen to the episode, click here.