Theos-Talk Archives (May 1996 Message tl00580)

Donna:

>Schizophrenia is a very interesting disease, but very frightening,
>as well. I doubt that its symptoms are identical in any one case.
>My "mother in law" was schizophrenic and maintaining her illness
>was part of the daily routine that existed when she lived with us
>for the last 9 years prior to her death by metastatic lung cancer.

Sorry to hear about Gloria. But it says something good about you
and your sense of compassion that you put her up and make a
stable, loving home for her during the last nine years of her life.

When I hear about someone having problems coping with life, it
continually reminds me of the precious gift we have of existing
in this world. It's not a hell-hole like some would depict it, a
dark, awful place that we should get out of as soon as possible.
Rather, we're afforded a special opportunity to attain exceptional
insight and lucidity, to work towards our enlightenment, and to
be of benefit to others. All those opportunities are lost to us
in the subjective after-death states, like kamaloka and devachan,
times of subjective self-reflection.

>It took some time before the illness manifested itself as "a voice",
>audio hallucinations.

I've read that this is typical of the disease. It's a matter of
conjecture if these voices are actual entities that are talking
to the person, or internal, subjective experiences of the person.

My thinking is that they are internal experiences, subjective
in nature, and are basically the contents of the person's own
psyche, contaminated by the surrounding psychic atmosphere, by
the contents of the astral light. Elementals arise, newly-created
thoughtforms, that animate these puppets in someone's mind, in
much the same way that we populate the actors in our dreams,
or give life to the characters that populate our devachanic
dreamworld, in the after-death.

>It seems that had her illness been treated correctly at the
>start, which was in the 60's, perhaps it would not have progressed
>the way it did.

It's possible, but we can't go back to the past and change how
things have been done. We can think "if only" but need at some
point to let things go and move forward.

Now days, there are medications that can help restore the
brain chemistry, allowing one to return to a "normal" state.
Living in a state where the brain is malfunctioning, in a way,
is like going through life on a natural drug trip. It's not
generally desirable, although it can have some shock value in
getting people to overcome their materialism and start questioning
the meaning of life, important first steps towards a spiritual
awakening.

>She was subjected to all sorts of barbaric medical procedures,
>including electro-shock therapy, and took every anti-psychotic
>medication in the book.

Perhaps I have an overly optimistic view of the medications ...
The brain is like a lens, that allows us to focus our
consciousness onto this world, where we live and try to
express ourselves and evolve. When the brain malfunctions, it's
possible that we're only partly focused onto the physical, and
our perceptions are mixed up with things in the surrounding
astral light.

>An aside was dealing with the medication's side effects. Back
>about 6 years ago, we took her to a small town doctor in Milford, Connecticut, who diagnosed her with Grave's Disease. Turns
>out the malfunction of her thyroid was directly related to the
>audio hallucinations.

People that are strongly pro-psychic would be inclined to
always talk about these things as "inner powers", and be
offended at the term "hallucinations". But I find the term
apt because it describes the perceptions as based upon the
contents of one's own psyche, which is exactly the nature
of the typical after-death states.

The invisible worlds or states-of-being about our physical
earth, Globe D, are subjective in nature and lacking in the
same lucidity as can be obtained when one is fully embodied
on this (or any) plane. (This is, of course, from the
standpoint of the human kingdom; the Dhyani-Chohans and
Elementals primarily exist therein, as they transit our globe.)

This is the model we can read about in "The Mahatma Letters"
and in Theosophy as originally presented. The Spiritualist
idea of a Summerland (something like an astral plane) that
dead and sleeping people might inhabit, doing the same type
of things they do while waking, was dismissed therein. We're
told that at the moment of death, the personality goes out
like the flame of a candle ceases, when blown out.

Is consciousness gone? No, we're still consciousness. Do we
forget who and what we were? No, we're completely absorbed
in the content of ourselves. What we lose is that special
*lucidity* that we have, as fully seven-principled beings,
participating in the cooperative process of existence in
an objective world, in a sphere of causes.

>She had a hard time when her husband died and had to be
>hospitalized, but when we took her out, she was still having
>small problems with the voice.

My Mother had an averse reaction to some medication, and
developed some paranoid symptoms, strange ideas, etc., and
it started to affect her behavior in a negative way. She
was taken off the medication, and in a few weeks the symptoms
went away. Sanity, or the ability to distinguish what is
"real" from the imaginary, is a gift we take for granted.
It's easy to forget how important it is, and how much of
an opportunity that we have in life!

>So, this story has a happy ending. Gloria lived to be 69
>years old, and the last 9 years of her life were spent stable,
>productive, and healthy.

Happy endings are always the best! They cannot always be
expected, and we learn as much from the tragic, but I'm
glad for you that life was kind.

>This, the product of strict routine, good food, regular
>and uninterrupted medicine, and lots of heavy duty
>conversations where she was pushed to take responsibility
>for her behavior and her life whenever it was possible --
>helped prevent an acute episode

What you say here is a lesson for us "normal" people.
How much of the same techniques that are used to cure the
mentally ill can also apply to treading the Path, can
apply to moving towards greater lucidity and inner awakenings!

>of an illness that in her case was primarily biological,
>not emotional -- directly related to the chemicals in her
>brain.

It's all to easy to dismiss mental problems as purely
psychic or psychological in nature, when they may relate
to brain chemistry or malfunctions of the physical body.
Certainly the problem is karmic in nature, but may not
be the responsibility of the current personality, which
has to pay for the sins of a previous lifetime.

Thanks for sharing the personal experience. You might
consider, based on your experience with Grace, offering
a few comments on the main point that I'm making? (That
the techniques and approaches used in curing the mentally
ill can also prove useful for us in approaching the Path.)

-- Eldon