37. God Has Designed Us

God has designed us so we often resist change without the help of suffering.  Suffering, no matter how great, can't harm us.  It is allowed in our life as a catalyst for the fundamental,  thorough transformation of our mind, heart, spirit, and life. 

God makes the development of the very mind, spirit, heart, and life we want with a cataclysm of pain.  He does this when we're enduring our illness, even if we cannot see these g things coming.  Mental health, soundness, and fitness of our inner spiritual life await.  We must travel by blind faith for many years. A new mental life and health are out there for everyone who won't quit in its pursuit.

 God withholds this mind from no one. The most mentally ill person on earth can receive it.  We have much to learn about our minds.  The most important thing is being in possession of our own minds.  Learn to think like Christ.  Be able to take thoughts captive, and be willing to guard your mind, choosing what you let in. Such a guarded and protected mind can open in the proper way, upwards, growing in width the higher it goes towards God in Heaven. 

Possession of the mind, the cleansing, and control of its thinking, is one of the hardest things a human can learn.  It is the key to living a successful, fruitful, and worthwhile life.  The suffering of mental illness begins to come to an end when you learn to take possession of your own mind.  Even when it is full-blown sick. God can be trusted to create the circumstances that lead you to the moment when your mind can truly become YOUR mind. Once you have possession of it you can begin to heal. If you pursue the life you want to the best of your knowledge of what that is. 

Learning to relate to Christ is key, for He is the source of the mind God desires us to have.  It's a mind where mental illness has no place, and cannot dwell.  One that can be your own. Our suffering is designed to bring us to possess our own minds. and go on to form the mind of Christ in our own mind. 

Perhaps the suffering we experience is so great because the difficulty of creating Christ's mind in place of our own is difficult. at least getting to the point where we can is difficult. God may allow such pain with mental illness because He knows that's what it takes to get us to change.   All those years of suicidal thoughts and profound mental pain are what must be endured for the reward of a mind like Christ's.

36. Even In

Even in the deepest darkness, the deepest hells of mental illness, God is with you. My wonderful therapist Frank Lanou once referred to mental illness as one of life's hells. It is indeed that. Many of the aspects of the hell of mental illness are the same as those depicted by Catholics in their books about what hell is like in the spirit world. 

However, God created us so even if we find ourselves in the hell of mental illness, certain things are still possible while we're there. 

1) Friendships grow. We develop significant enduring friendships with people we live through these years of our life with. People we share mental health housing with become lifelong friends. People we meet in mental hospitals become friends and inspire and enlighten us. Caregivers, caseworkers, therapists, psychiatrists, and everyone who aids our journey during these dark, frightening years become permanent parts of our lives, and who we become. 

2) There is a way through. Even with the ability to live a normal life out of our grasp, there is a path through mental illness that requires creativity. We create daily routines that enable us to survive our housebound years. There is a way through that requires us to find our way through the dark. Simple faith makes healing possible.  Over time, it may lead to a fully healed mind, one that is sound and strong, and correct in its thinking.  One no longer suffering from "voices," delusions, paranoia, and the terrible shame that accompanies a mental illness. 

3) We still feel love and kindness and can give and show them, as well. While many of the good feelings we enjoyed before getting ill left and were replaced with physical and mental discomfort, love and joy still break through.  They remind us that they're still in us and have not died away. We are enduring an illness that removed the good feelings and left us searching.  Searching for a return to the life with an abundance of good, pleasant, and wonderful feelings.  Feelings that will return in time in new and better ways. God works in us, using our illness to increase our capacity to feel, love, and show compassion to others. 

4) We still dream.  Our dreams are often dreams of healing, and living a life free of mental illness. These dreams, like any dream you had before you were sick, that you pursued, do come true.  As long as you take action to help them come true, they do.  We eventually find ourselves, after years of mental illness, living a life we couldn't even dream of when ill. Life becomes so much better than we thought it could be. We win, and we're given a level of mental health we didn't know exists. 

5) Needs are met, and God never stops working on our behalf. He provides for our needs. Housing is given if you seek it.  Money, even if it is just an SSI check, will be provided.  If you find yourself having to ask or panhandle for money,  people will give to you. You will have food, clothes, and transportation even if it's a bike or the bus. The key to all things working in your favor while you are ill is the same for someone who is not ill. You must come to God and have faith that He exists. Christ spoke to us and said, "come to me." That simple command holds the key to enduring and emerging from, your years of mental illness. The simple belief that Christ is there, and that you can approach, and press into Him. He is, and you can. He lives, and through a simple relationship with Himself, you can heal your mind and spirit. 

6) You can develop faith in the depths of mental illness.  In it's painful and dark hell.  Faith in God is still possible, and that faith will lead to the healing of your mind, to your whole life. You will be led into a mental health and soundness you didn't know was possible.  You will be led back into the light of a joyful, wonderful life.

35. Staying on SSI

Staying on SSI, in the long run, can lead to a deep misery in our souls. God has placed the energy of His spirit inside each of us. This energy demands that we act and use Him, (this energy is God's own spirit), to create something of our life. This energy can feel miserable when we underuse it for long periods.  It transforms into joy as we begin to use it to make something of our life. This may explain why some people who stay on SSI while doing some work, never experience the deeper joys from the misery that accompanies long periods on SSI. Especially when we've grown capable of working our way off it. 

SSI may be needed for decades. Only you can determine if you are willing to one day work yourself off of it. The full return of the soundness of your mind, the tranforming of your mind into a new creation will in all likelihood need the help of your efforts to work at something that supports your life off of SSI. 

We never come to an end to our mind's growth in this life.  Our minds never, even in God's heaven and kingdom, stop growing.  But we can indeed outgrow and leave behind the illness of our mind, while we live our life here on earth. It is a very worthwhile thing to work for. 

No amount of difficulty in work is worth sacrificing your life for an SSI check.   God has given you a spirit in Jesus that can overcome even the most severe things we must face in this life. He wants you to live a life of exceeding joy. 

He gives life value and makes our lives valuable to others. Every life is precious to God. No amount of mental illness is too great to be healed of. God has a plan and purpose for your life. 

For those who are willing, meet Him in that life one day off your SSI check, tasting the rapture of a right relationship with God, living in the freedom to fulfill and accomplish the purpose He created you for.

34. There Was

There was, in the first years after being diagnosed with my illness, typically one night a month where I could not get to sleep. Those were miserable days, and they happened like clockwork, month after month after month. My psychiatrist would give me four sleeping pills per month, and I would use them all each month. Even today, decades later, if I don't take my small dose of clozapine on a daily basis I cannot get to sleep.  My mind fights to stay awake if I don't take it, and I can't sleep. I'm at peace with needing medication to sleep. There are no side effects. It is just part of my life.

33. My Soul Lives

 

My soul lives in a kind of darkness that accompanies me wherever I go. This darkness is more noticeable when I'm in a house and staying home more than going out. This darkness has the effect of driving me into the light. The light that shines from Christ's throne with God in heaven. The light given to us to illuminate our way in this world. 

I have lived without a home of my own long enough to know that God Himself is my home.  I know that wherever He chooses for me to live (in my car, at a friend's, or sometimes at a family member's house) I always have a place in Jesus Christ.  Where ever I am that makes me feel at home. 

It is a gift, this inner darkness, as it allows me to see where to reach, and grab God's hand.  As a result, I never feel alone, or without a friend.  Jesus loves me more than anyone else on earth can. He knows how to direct my life so that it is fruitful and useful. 

This inner darkness has no power to rob me of the joys I know, or the pleasure of living a useful life that impacts and influences others. It can't bar me from encounters with true happiness, or the true love that touches me as I go about living. My dreams not only live, but they also increase in size the closer I come to God. 

I live with a total trust in Jesus, for there are distresses and concerns that would overcome me if not for His living presence in my life.  The things that distress and concern me like my health, my living situation, and material insecurities, have no power to diminish the prize of my own life because He is there. 

Instead, life remains an eternal adventure, even amidst homelessness, poverty, and broken health. The promise that the future can change into something better is an inextinguishable source of hope. I work at doing what I must to make it happen. 

The treasures I am reaping at this point in my life are treasures of character, will, and resolve. I have the ability to pursue what I want of life, even in the face of impossibilities.  They are powerless to prevent a new life from happening.  The darkness that was sent to deter me has instead (by Christ's life and death and resurrection)  become a stairway that leads home.  The Home above where no illness of any kind, in any form, exists. 

I'm like a runner in a marathon finding his greatest strength, his greatest energy, at the end of the race. I'm finding within me a new spirit whose most fruitful days are ahead. A spirit that wants to run at its highest capacity the closer I get to the end of my life.  The price I must pay for the life that I want, I am more and more willing to pay, the longer my life goes on.

32. Mental Illness Four

Mental illness will give you the opportunity to learn to detach from the material things you own. As your life goes on, and you heal, you will make the pleasant discovery that you can own things without attachment. This brings new freedom into life.

31. Be Willing

 

Be willing to part with your SSI check when the time comes to regain your mental health. Your mind will need to be disciplined, and engaged in making a living for yourself, to be in your fittest, healthiest, soundest condition. The time to learn to work and support yourself may be years, or decades up the road. 

For some people getting off SSI may not be feasible. Deep misery can accumulate in a soul that avoids work for too long. Sometimes it is this misery itself that drives us back to work, when we see the misery will not abate, or heal, if we remain inactive.

If the right thought processes are created, and the right beliefs put in place, we will have no desire for dependence upon an SSI check for money.  Even if the work is very difficult

If we encounter financial problems after learning to support ourselves off of SSI,  we won't return to the numbing effect SSI has on the spirit. The spirit God gives us demands that we learn to help others. 

Having said that, SSI is a very real need for many and may be for many long years with mental illness. Still, a mentally sound man or woman will use their mind for work that brings joy, meaning and purpose to their life. 

SSI can hold us back from our best life. If we get comfortable receiving it we may miss the opportunity purposeful work can bring. We may miss the opportunity to heal the mind when the time to go to work arrives.

30. Christ Is Not

Mental illness is not punishment.  It is something God uses to bring you into a relationship with Him through a relationship with Jesus. The road through mental illness leads to the doorway to a relationship with Christ. Once that door is reached you can knock and it will open, no matter how long it takes to get there.

It is through that door you'll find the end of your illness and the beginning of impeccable mental health.  You will find a relationship with Christ.  A relationship that allows you access to treasures in your spirit.  And the soundest life possible, by entering into the treasure house that is Christ Himself.

29. It Is A Mistake

It is a mistake to think mental illness will heal the same way a cut on your finger heals. That you can just put a bandage over it and give it time and it will heal. It is also a mistake to think that once you are healed of your illness it will be easy to go back to work. 

It is actually quite difficult to heal from mental illness. It requires doing the difficult work of developing new thought processes. Going back to work after many years on SSI, and not working while on SSI, can be a very difficult and uncomfortable process. The mind in some ways atrophies through many years of being on SSI. The mind needs to be strengthened after years of illness. 

Reading is the best way to strengthen a mind and learn new ways of thinking. Listening to things that help you build your mind and its new thought processes help too. New thought processes applied to some form of work allow you to learn new mental discipline, which is important to help your mind grow sound. 

What drives these new processes is a strong desire for a new life and the willingness to pursue it with the belief that you will heal. Nothing will stop the healing of your mind except the very way you think coupled with what you believe, backed by your willingness to work to create the life you want. Once you accept that the healing process is difficult, in many ways it stops being difficult. It becomes something that simply requires real effort. 

Any mind can heal. Even the most severely ill mind can be changed and made new.

28. Alcohol

Alcohol, and the need to drink, can be part of surviving mental illness.  I did it so I'd

have something to do in the house I was stuck in because of my illness, and paranoia. 

I'd do it often with one of my housemates for the social aspect.  I'd do it to get drunk enough to sleep for an hour.  I'd do it to get a break from the pain of my illness.  

Sometimes, upon waking in the morning, I'd go buy beer or wine and drink for an hour so I could sleep again.  I'd do this for short periods of time, a week or two, then I'd stop. 

I quit drinking alcohol altogether after a few years of this routine.  I never went back to it.

27. There Is No Need To

There is no need to compare your path of healing or the things that bring about your healing to the path of someone else.  Your healing will have its own design and it will not be exactly like anyone else's.  As long as you believe you will heal and refuse to give up that belief, God will engineer circumstances to help.  He will bring about the right medications, housing, doctors, therapists, school, and work.  He'll bring everything you'll need for the healing of your mind. 

You must help the process by pursuing the life you want. You may not know the kind of life you want when you're in the deepest throes of your illness.  Set out towards something you dream of anyway and let God steer you.  It will be given.

A great life takes effort to create, and coming out of mental illness takes tremendous mental effort.  You will learn to create a new life, and discover what you truly want when you do the difficult mental work required to change. 

What we want in life doesn't disappear because we're mentally ill.  It remains inside and starts to surface as we progress along our path of healing. The life we most want to live is still in us.  The illness we endure is like an agonizing birth process we must go through for this new and wonderful life.  It is our prize as we start to live it, as we heal

26. When I Realized

When I realized I'd be housebound and staying indoors to survive the constant paranoia I found ways to occupy my time.  I discovered I could pace back and forth across the room I was in chain-smoking, and sipping on coffee.  I'd do this for many hours of the day. 

To make room in my stomach for all the coffee I was drinking I'd go out back where tall weeds would grow, and put my finger down my throat.  I'd throw up what I just drank, making room for more so I could continue pacing.  After a while, I didn't have to make myself throw up to keep drinking coffee. 

This routine gave me a sense of pleasure, which was refreshing since the illness had removed pleasure from my life.  Everything that previously gave me pleasure no longer did. 

The routines of smoking, drinking, and pacing went on for years.  I eventually grew out of the need to pace, and the high levels of physical discomfort left.  I also quit smoking.   I drink lots of fluids to this day, but I now drink as an aid to my spiritual life.

25. The Story

 

The story that scared me away from suicide was a story I found in a book about life after death...

  During the year I was diagnosed  I began to experience psychic pain that was so terrible I was contemplating suicide.  I wanted to find out what happened to someone who committed suicide because that was all I could think of doing to end the pain I was in. 

I came across a story of a man who had committed suicide and was pronounced legally dead. He was taken to a hospital where they resuscitated him and brought him back to life. After he recovered he said that he had gone to a dark, awful place and it felt as though he would be there for a very long time. This was enough to scare me away from suicide. 

At that point, my mental illness was quite terrible and painful.  I also had high levels of physical discomfort that caused me to pace all the time.  Constant paranoia terrified me all through the day. Yet his words about suicide seemed like an even worse thing to have to go through than mental illness. 

I also remember hearing someone say if you kill yourself you will not be around when you do heal, and that struck a chord with me as well. But it was what my father said to me one night during that painful period of life that saved me from ever attempting suicide. 

During this period of terrible pain, I told my dad all I could think about was killing myself.  My dad told me I would not kill myself.  His words surprised me. That one sentence from him in my moment of desperate need passed into me enough strength so that I never tried to hurt myself. 

In the years to come the pain I was going through was so suicidally strong the only way I could cope was to give myself permission to kill myself, as long as it was in the future. As I survived these bouts with this strong pain, my thoughts of killing myself would pass. 

I relieved the psychic pain by writing mental suicide letters to people. In time, I did heal, and the pain ended.  I was ever so grateful for the strength my father gave me that night that saved my life. 

You too will heal, and the pain you are going through will one day be gone, leaving you with a strong mind. We are capable of bearing very high levels of mental pain. The pain causes us to grow. Yet we don't see the growth until years later.  We see it when the pain is gone, and life is full of new joys, happiness, and soundness of mind.

24. One of the Pitfalls

One of the pitfalls of the healing process of mental illness is the desire to return to the mind you had before you were ill. This is sometimes possible, but more often than not a new mind must be created. 

It can take a long journey, and many years, to let go of trying to go back to your old mind.  But it can be done with mental discipline, medication, new thoughts, and new beliefs.

After many years we may finally stop trying to regain the mind we had before we were sick.  We will learn to move forward again in our lives, with a new mind.  A life so much better than the one we lost. 

We will sometimes get glimpses of the immense potential, and ability, of the mind.  We'll see that the mind is capable of so much more than we call upon it for in this life. With these glimpses, we can only wonder at the worlds that lie ahead of us on our journey home to God. 

A mind that is wracked with the terrible pain of mental illness can go on to taste wonderful new realities.  Realities that give evidence of worlds to come, worlds that are hidden from view in this life. One can only wonder at the new heaven and earth God has planned for the human race. Mental illness will not be on the earth forever. Jesus has begun the end of it.

23. Marilyn's Uplift

 

The world is filled with remarkable mental health workers. In my own life of mental illness, I was blessed to have the support of people who were kind and helpful.  Now, years after moving beyond the need for their support, I can see how remarkable they were, and how much love they gave me. 

For me there was...

• my psychiatrist, Himani Natu
• my case worker Conrad Goeringer
• my psychotherapist Frank Lanou 
• Nancy Kargas
• and a mental health worker named Marilyn Dreampeace. 

There were many others too. Wonderful, wonderful people who assist us mentally ill folk like the angels around us that we can't see.  They help us navigate our lives on earth. 

I have to share a simple moment that happened years ago.  It was during a period of my illness when I'd moved into an apartment on my own for the first time since being diagnosed.  I was having a difficult time by myself.  I'd hoped that I'd heal more than I had at that point. Things like taking a short walk to the store to buy ice cream were terrifying for me.  I was sleeping all day and staying up all night for long periods to try to manage the paranoia of my illness. 

I was attending a day treatment program at the time. One day while sitting on the patio smoking a cigarette, I saw Marilyn walking up to the trailer to where her office was.  There was no one else around and when she got to the door she stopped and looked at me.  She said, "Mike, you know, you might have a real good future ahead of you." 

Her words changed me instantly.  I was in an almost hopeless period in my life when she said that.  It literally carried me for the next five years. Whenever I recalled her words I'd feel an uplift in my spirit and mind.  Her words sustained me more than anything I'd read or heard during that period of my life.  It was remarkable. I was astounded by the effect of what she said for years. 

The most remarkable thing about Marilyn was something I learned years later when I was working at a hardware store in Santa Cruz.  I was learning how to work and support myself to get off of SSI.  I was at the front counter writing receipts for customers as they paid for their items.  A mental health worker I knew named Rebecca came up.  

She told me Marilyn had died of cancer. She told me that at the memorial service person after person shared about how Marilyn had done or said something that saved their lives in some way.  I told Rebecca what Marilyn had said to me that day years ago, and the effect it had on me for years.  We were both astounded. The world of mental health is full of people like Marilyn.  People who help sustain and heal the mentally ill with their words and actions. They do this day in, and day out. 

22. You Will Not

You will not kill yourself. With the onset of the severe pain of mental illness and unbearable discomfort in the body, suicidal thoughts become part of your life.   There may be days where that's all you think about.  Sometimes the only way we find relief from the mental pain is by giving permission to kill ourselves in the future.  Even if we don't really want to.  We just want the pain to end. 

If we can survive the pain we'll come to see we can endure it.  We don't need to hurt ourselves. We must find mechanisms like pacing, chain-smoking, and drinking coffee all day to help endure the pain. We can never resort to suicide because if we do we throw away the chance to heal forever.

 Suicidal thoughts are permissible. Writing suicide letters in your mind can help.  If you bear the terrible pain, it yields to you, and you will have a brand new mind, one far better than the one that got sick.  You'll find that the pain that was once so bad can't drive you to suicide if you believe you can heal.  It is possible for anyone, even someone with the most debilitating mental illness, to heal. The key lies in your belief that you will heal. Mental illness doesn't stand a chance because of Jesus. 

If you believe you can heal (and you can), and nourish that belief with the help of a therapist, caseworker, or friend who believes you can heal,  you'll become a new person, with a new mind.  You will no longer be even the slightest bit sick. 

Your life will become a prize no one can take from you.  You'll find so many hopes and possibilities that you'll feel like a rich man or woman.  What seems impossible in the darkest years of your illness will become a new life up the road.  You will inherit a spirit that will not quit.