Do you feel the world is going mad or going insane? If you do, then you aren’t the only person who thinks this way. Most people today feel they’re living in a world of confusion and chaos. If you look around you, that’s the reality you may see. But what you see is the manifestation of somebody’s mind. You don’t realise that if we’re born, it’s this world of chaos and confusion with distorted perceptions we’re born into.

Let’s understand it

Whichever culture or society you’re born in, you may grow up believing in precisely the exact same manner as the people around you with all the beliefs and customs of your society. The surroundings around you conditions you. So right from the word go regardless of where culture you grow up in, you’ll need to acknowledge your perceptions of reality is going to be distorted. Therefore, to assume that we’re somehow normal and fair would be highly presumptuous.

In the medical profession, we recognise you as a normal person as you behave normally and don’t disturb people around as you fit in with a pattern of behavior that the majority considers acceptable. But if you were to behave in a manner that will lead to injury to yourself or others around you, you’ll be labelled and treated for a few mental illness. They’ll classify and categorise you from the list they have. They’ll tag you as suffering from schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, PTSD, ADHD etc.. You’ll be counselled and given proper medical treatment.

So, what now?

Like most people, you may believe that at last the doctors have discovered something wrong with you and you’re receiving treatment for your condition that will cure you. If you feel this way about your mental health, I’m afraid you’re mistaken. A diagnosis of your mental health issue doesn’t mean we have a remedy for you. It’s just a label. It’s you who will heal yourself by clearing up your senses.

Once given a label, lots of individuals attempt to justify or find an explanation for their behaviour. One might say “I’m an alcoholic. I couldn’t help myself. Alcohol made me do it.” “I suffer from a mental illness; consequently, I am unable to work anymore.” etc.. The list goes on. It means the identification of your mental health issue has done nothing for you. You’re no better off before or after the identification. Now in case you would like to help yourself and cure your mental health issue, you must acquire some insight into your mind. That means you must start thinking for yourself. You need to start looking at yourself and the world around you.

Labels

To test yourself if you have any insight in your head after the doctors have labelled you, you need to ask yourself “Was my behavior acceptable? Do I want to improve?”. If you believe there was nothing wrong with your behavior, then, naturally, you don’t have any insight and for that reason don’t have any issue with yourself. You will undoubtedly, become an issue for others. So, if you have some insight, you need to ask this basic question to yourself, “Do I have to be this way for the rest of my life? Surely there has to be a way to enjoy one’s life regardless of what happened in the past”.

If you can say “Surely there must be a way”, then you might be well on the way to complete mental health recovery. It means you’ve got some understanding of your problem and will have the ability to change your senses and thus your own thinking. In my head, I respect mental illness only as a disease of perception. It’s the level that determines the level where it becomes a medical disorder of behavior and action. To take care of any mental illness, therefore, all we must do is to straighten out our distorted perceptions.

About perception

Our perceptions affect our thinking. If you distort them, they contribute to crooked thinking. Crooked thinking results in adverse actions, which, in turn, become the basis for any mental illness. As one can observe the medical treatment is simply an adjunct to counselling, psychotherapy etc. that are remedies directed mainly at correcting a patient’s perceptions. So if a person doesn’t have any penetration, what other alternative would you have? One would be stuck with just medical treatment.

Hence if we want to improve the mental health of society, we must look at ourselves and examine how we could go about adjusting our distorted perceptions. Part of the reason for a growing incidence of mental illness is that the bureaucratic thinking that prevails in our legal system, authorities and associations.

Example

In bureaucratic thinking, one always goes by the letter of the law, not the spirit of this law. One isn’t permitted to use reason or common sense. There are no moral or ethical concerns. One is virtually intellectually handicapped. Since there’s a fixed rule applied in handling a issue, we’re stuck with it. One is obligated to adhere to the rules. There’s absolutely no choice. If one ignores the principles, an individual will get blamed for whatever happens. And if one follows the rules, it doesn’t necessarily mean that the action is always accurate.

A perfect example of this is the current Coronavirus outbreak in China and how it’s affecting the economies of neighboring nations and the world. It’s trapped Governments to a bureaucratic response that creates damned if you do and damned if you don’t kind of situation. It’s politics for governments to show they’re doing something positive to fix a problem. The press, of course, is having a field day making a huge deal by dramatising the entire scenario and making people even more anxious and terrified. But let us examine the facts.

Final note

Coronavirus is a viral illness. Like the Influenza virus, it kills. There’s absolutely no true cure for any virus disease. The Coronavirus spreads like the flu virus, hence the precautions one takes, as well as the remedy one gets, would be exactly the same as if one had a flu disease. The result will always depend on how powerful one’s immune system is. All virus diseases tend to spread in the community until we develop some resistance against it. Not all men and women who have tested positive for Coronavirus disease have expired. Then again, not all folks who had tested positive for the Influenza virus previously had died either. There have been cases where individuals were treated for Influenza virus disease on a cruise ship, and no quarantine was implemented. So ask yourself, what are you getting all worked up about?