Hokey Cokey

So to the question - the relationship between 'spirituality' and good mental health. The question I set out to answer long ago with Sans God and subsequently failed to answer in any meaningful way.

I guess the problem, as ever, is in the question. You see, if 'spirituality' is a duff term, then by using the same logic 'mental health' is equally flaccid.

Blood pressure we can measure, liver function can be quantised in the same way an an x-ray can tell you if your arm is broken. But mental health? Is it happiness, conforming to societal norms or a grasp on reality? And what in buggeration is that?

Yet as experts in humanity, we all have an opinion on sanity. Fair play to us too, because psychiatry hasn't cracked it either. So I shall give you my opinion, based upon nothing more than my opinionated opinion. And what better medium to spout unsubstantiated, reductive, self-centered arguments than on a blog?

So let's focus on the melancholics, worriers and scaredypants amongst us and not on those who may lay true claim to the moniker of 'madness' - the messiahs and 'psychotics'. They deserve our admiration and are beyond the scope of my thinking right now.

Feeling depressed and anxious is something common to us all. It's even been argued that they're adaptive traits. Everything in moderation however, for these states can easily get the better of us.

When they do, we can become self-destructive. Regardless of the outward circumstances of our predicament, depression or anxiety is fundamentally about the 'self' and how we see ourselves - "I'm depressed", "I'm inadequate", "Life has got the better of me".

Now, this secular definition of 'spirituality' that we've been exploring (Interconnectivity / Love / Meaning / Beauty), seems to me to be outward, rather than inward looking. The very antithesis of self-consuming neuroses, you could say.

Whilst 'spirituality' is a deeply personal phenomenon, I propose that it helps us mediate our connection with the outside world. As such, it helps us to be less absorbed with ourselves and become more immersed the world about us.

Which is a good thing, and probably better for our mental health than what's inside our heads alone.

A Reframing

It seems I've become the typical smug, affluent, left leaning liberal blogger. Or so it would seem having re-read my last few posts. Pleasant and self-affirming as they were to write, as I've re-read them, I've discovered that I get on my own tits quite frankly.

So I shall stop this nonsense right now. You see, I've made it quite clear to you that my life is warm and fuzzy. Christ, I've even provided photographic evidence.

Yet this 'happiness' that I've been writing about is borne of tantrums, dust, dishes left from the night before and disagreements, needless swearing in front of children and huffy left shoulders at night time. Far from perfect I assure you.

An ordinary life, I suppose. And no different from any other.

So I'm going to re frame this blog back to its original focus. That is to debate the ephemeral term 'spirituality' and its relation to good 'mental health', whatever both statements may mean.

Back in November 2006 I set upon the plan to blog about this 'spirituality' so that I might learn what the fuck it meant. I had some faith in the word back then, as I'd been taught that it was an important 'component' of good mental health.

I've since learnt that the term is as useful as a chocolate fireguard, for it means everything and nothing. It cancels itself out. Yet many 'service users' say that this notion of 'spitiruality' has set them on the path of recovery. Tonight though, is not the night to debate this ambivalence.

So, I shall re-explore for a while, why people require this nothingness' to get by in life without resorting to basic existential vehicles, I hope.

Unlikely, I know.

All my ducks in a row

"WANKER! YOU'RE A TOSSPOT, JUST SHUT UP!"

He didn't hear a word.

Small men with big egos tend not to hear this non-verbal leakage. They find themselves much too interesting to listen to others, no matter how loud they're shouted at.

Save the wrist wank under the table, I couldn't have made myself clearer.

Yet this 'uber boss', divorced from the meat and bones of the real world by a multiple factor of arsehole, told us today that he needed to "understand the drivers behind the impetus to improve our practice."

He also wanted the "bigger picture", because he's so busy improving strategy, that the minutiae of improving lives "Isn't his business."

"I need all my ducks in a row" he said. Four times.

If I had hair, I would have pulled it out.

You see, his role is so complicated, so convoluted, that we couldn't even begin to grasp how hard it is for his poor addled mind to grasp the intricacies of our day to day work.

He has a mustache - this is significant. He dyes it the same colour as his hair. Pubic black I think. This makes him more important than everyone else.

Choking him with his neat, pretentious braces, would have been a pleasure. Instead, I smiled and leveraged his "management drivers in the right vector" so that we might maximise the health potential of the local population.

We got on with the real work once he'd left.

Wanker.

Beyond Belief

If you're so minded, here's a real media stream of a Radio 4 Beyond Belief episode on 'religion and mental health'. It's half an hour long so, for those of you with Digg enhanced ADHD the second half is much more interesting than the first.

It's a fascinating and balanced debate about the nature of religion and spiritual belief in a secular / medicalised world. I urge you to listen, as it's a good antidote to the raging fundamentalism (both theist and non-theist) currently clogging up Youtube and the bloggosphere.

(Did I just say bloggosphere? /Shudder )