--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Peter <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > > > --- suziezuzie <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > > At what level of psychosis would you suggest that > > someone shouldn't > > meditate? > > Any level of psychosis! > > > And how do you define psychosis, what > > symptoms are > > manifesting in those you checked? > > Delusions, hallucinations, loss of ego boundaries, > derealization, depersonalization, ideas of reference, > paranoia. > > > > I > > know someone who always looks to their right when > > they eat as if > > someone is watching them. They also talk to > > themselves quite > > habitually as if another person is in the room. > > Would you initiate > > someone like this? > > Probably not. They need to be assessed by a mental > health professional. These could all be symptoms of an > underlying psychological disorder. > > > > > How do you judge at what level > > someone's psychosis > > becomes a hazard to the practice and that TM would > > make it worse? > > Anyone who is psychotic should not start TM nor > continue with the practice. Psychosis is a general > term given to someone with symptoms that indicate a > loss of contact with object/consensual reality. They > present with hallucinations and delusions. > > > > On another note, what do you think psychosis is? Why > > and how does > > this behavior manifest itself? Do you think it's > > purely an organic > > defect that has some expression in the personality > > such as paranoia? > > I think psychosis, for the most part, is an organic > brain disorder whose symptoms appear in the > psychological domain. > > > > Why does TM make it worse? > > TM makes it worse because in psychosis a person's ego > structures are being over-whelmed. They are losing > their psychological constructs that allow them to > expereince and interact with the object/consensual > world. TM moves the mind towards greater and greater > levels of abstraction which overwhelms these mental > structures even more. Psychotic people can not even > experience ambiguous stimuli (something that does not > have clear, definite meaning) without becoming worse > in seconds. TM is not an effective intervention with > psychotics because it moving the attention in the > "wrong" direction. They need to move the attention > into boundaries, not away from them. I developed a > very effective intervention with psychotics during an > internship I had using what MMY had said during my TTC > regarding the breakdown of mind/body coordination in > schizophrenics. He said you could help schizophrenics > by hitting them with a flower and saying, "flower, > flower," everytime you hit them. This just sat in my > notes for years until I started working in the mental > health field with psychotics. I realized what MMY was > talking about with this intervention. So in groups I > used to pass objects around (e.g., cups, pencils, > books, etc) and each person had to hold the object and > state what their direct experience of the object was > at that moment. No associations, only their direct > experience. This, over time, had an amazing effect of > radically reducing hallucinations and delusions as > noted by myself and other staff members. > > > > > > > > Mark
In Scientology, they put an emphasis on object reality consensus as you put it, exercises that have the practitioner touch things, or demonstrate ideas with clay, etc. I don't encourage Scientology because I have found that on the other hand, their techniques lack the abstraction that I find so fulfilling in TM and I'm convinced that their techniques do not allow for an experience of transcendence. They, like yourself feel that abstract experiences make a person worse. If one isn't grounded personally, ie., psychotic even to a mild degree, this may be true. For myself, after meditating for 35 years, I have to tell you that I love the pure abstraction that I experience, that field of pure bliss consciousness (for a lack of better words). But on the other hand, I must also tell you that any traces of psychotic personality that I may have incurred before starting TM are still with me! The only difference now is that I manage these behaviors, look at them for what they are, witness them, see them clearly as they manifest. This is not to say that I am very psychotic but have very low levels of personality dysfunction, that I as a non professional would diagnose as low level psychotic manifestations. TM has clearly not addressed this but hasn't made it worse either, even on long rounding courses. In my opinion, I became even more convinced that I possessed psychosis from the psychotic episodes experienced after taking strong marijuana or hashish, this being many years ago but nevertheless, I have been curious as to why this experience would manifest except that it was there to begin with and was simply amplified by the presence of drugs. I suppose that if psychosis as you've put it, is organic in origin influencing the psychological domain, then possibly TM cannot heal the physical counterpart and therefore the psychosis remains or becomes worse. I don't believe that the exercises you devised cured the physical origins of the disease either but addressed the ego structures as you put it, solidifying the personality, temporarily. The bottom line here is, that if the organism, i.e., nervous system, brain, etc., has been damaged, TM cannot change this but for some, may make the psychosis manageable. Mark
