I sit next to the brown, bald Santa Claus. The same. But instead of asking me what I wanted for Christmas, he asked me, “Who are you?”
It took a lot of time, flying from North America to India and several times psychoticThe /mystic/kundalini emergency episodes finally made me sit next to HW Poonja, this orange-clad teacher from Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh.
You are cruel depression And the horrible, threatening thought that I would always be suicidally desperate drove me there. They say necessity is the mother of invention, but I say it’s suffering.
I don’t care what you call it
After several remarkable psychic experiences that sent me into psychotic episodes, I was hospitalized, prescribed medication, and offered treatment plans and diagnostic techniques. Doctors told me I have mild temporal lobe epilepsy and rapid cycle bipolar 1 disorder. worry disorder.
The support offered could have been helpful, even comforting, even a relief if I had thought differently, had a different perspective, and felt interest from health care providers, or rather, the medical system, instead of instructions. But I wasn’t.
So I rejected the diagnosis and I refused drug. Instead, I bought a plane ticket with my then-boyfriend (12 years older than me) and prepared for enlightenment. It is not really true to be prepared – it is like him who dreamed of being an intellectual, burned out, pitied.
Poonjaji – as he said, ‘ji’ being a sign of respect – born in 1910, was a teacher. Advaita Vedanta and disciple of Ramana Maharshi. Poonja started attracting students first from his home country of India and then from all over the world. I was one of those who came from all over the world.
He was kind, funny, sometimes impatient and vigilant. He spoke in riddles that will blow your mind. But he also offered specific insights that will change your mind. Just sitting next to him, you would be painted with peace.
I wrote to him before my trip to India when I was an outgoing, impressionable young woman of 26. I saw it as a way out of suffering. Part spiritual bypass, part serious quest. 100% last resort.
Personal account
Severe depression hides itself in many guises. I didn’t see depression as a mental illness. It was an existential crisis. Personal account manifestation physically and mentally. “What does all this – life – mean?” The question is. was pin-balled in my head non-stop for at least two years. I’m not sure what caused this. It’s a chicken-and-egg scenario.
Is life meaningless because I am depressed, or am I depressed because life is meaningless? Either way, one fed the other.
I searched for answers in all forms: the high power of AA and OA, self help books, talks therapyscream therapy, cognitive behavior therapy, Reiki, psychic, sugar free dietexciting dance. But those questions were still buzzing in my mind like flies. “What’s the meaning of life? What’s the point?”
BI (Before India), in my blue-walled bedroom, my dad and I once again talked about my struggle to understand this world and why we are here (not in my room, but on the planet). He warned, “People have been asking these questions for thousands of years and never found the answers. If you keep asking yourself that, you’re going to drive yourself crazy.” Incredibly accurate and sadly predictable.
I was told by psychiatrists that what I was experiencing was clinical depression, a chemical imbalance at play – the running theory at the time; then it happened bipolar disorder.
But I saw it as a spiritual quest to become more aware of my true self. And so it happened.
Both can be true
Over the years, I’ve learned that it can be both. For me it has to be both. Because the relative and the transcendental are one. They are not one and the same, but rather they form a whole.
I can hold two truths at the same time – the medical truth and the spiritual truth. One does not cancel out the other.
An emotional crisis can be an aspect of a mental health problem and can be helped by medical treatments. A mental health problem can be part of a mental crisis and can be helped by spiritual practices and support. Both required reclaiming my true self and person. Mental illness and spirituality intersects. Not for everyone. But for me they definitely are.
Personal perspectives are important readings
I will continue to raise my awareness and expand my consciousness. Meditate. Learn. The difference is that it is not driven by pain and questions; now it comes from a place of interest and satisfaction.
© Victoria Maxwell.
