The Way Toward Health - June 10, 1984

June 10, 1984

Unless physical pain is involved, drugs should be avoided – particularly for those in depressive states.

The so-called uppers soon require downers for mood regulation, and the mind ends up in a state of confusion, and often a stupor.  Such drugs should also literally be considered dangerous for use in old-peoples’ homes, for those considered senile, or even demented.  With some variation, these drugs are actually sometimes given to overactive children, where their effects can be very unpredictable, and results in moods that encourage suicidal tendencies, even in those so young.

Many people who use drugs socially are playing a kind of psychological Russian roulette.  Their feelings can run something like this: “If I’m meant to live, these drugs won’t hurt me, and if I’m meant to die, what difference does it make what I take?”  They are taking a certain kind of chance with their own lives, however – those who indulge in such activities – and the stakes can be high.

It is true that some schools of knowledge almost glorify the use of some drugs as encouraging the expansion of consciousness and the release of repression.  In some ancient cultures, drugs were indeed utilized in such a manner, but their use was well understood – and more importantly, their use was socially acceptable.  Those societies were, however, highly ceremonial, and quite as stereotyped in their ways as your culture may seem to you.

Doctors should be extremely cautious in the prescription of mind-altering drugs of any kind, and certainly not encourage their use for people in depressed states.  Under drugs, choices become limited, and certainly people have committed suicide while under the influence of drugs – who may not have otherwise.  I am not saying that drugs alone will cause suicide, but that the psychology of drugs already includes an attitude that promotes a Russian-roulette kind of mentality, that can only add to their problem.

People use drugs also in order to “let go”.  It seems as if some drugs permit an individual to let down barriers of fears and repressions, and to emotionally transcend the problems of daily life.  The fact is, however, that many such people use drugs instead as a kind of chemical blanket that has a tendency to smother rather than relieve.

To “let go” is to trust the spontaneity of your own being, to trust your own energy and power and strength, and to abandon yourself to the energy of your own life.  The word “abandon” itself may strike some readers as particularly strong, but each element of nature abandons itself to the lifeform.  So does each atom of your body.  To abandon yourself, then, to the power of our own life, is to rely upon the great forces within and yet beyond nature that gave birth to the universe and to you.

One of the very first steps toward mental, physical, emotional and spiritual health is precisely that kind of abandonment, that kind of acceptance and affirmation.

The will to live is also inbred into each element of nature, and if you trust your own spontaneity, then that will to be is joyfully released and expressed through all of your activities.  It can also quite literally wash depression and suicidal tendencies away.

Those feelings do indeed encourage expression of consciousness, and release intuitive information that may otherwise be buried beneath tensions and fears.

Such realizations have their own biological effects, stimulating all of the healing properties of the body – and also easily propelling the mind toward “higher” organizations, in which all of life’s seeming inadequacies are understood to be redeemed.

This feeling of abandoning oneself to the power and force of one’s own life does not lead to a mental segregation, but instead allows the self to sense the part that it plays in the creative drama of a universe.  Such understandings often cannot be verbalized.  They are instead perceived or experienced in bursts of pure knowing or sudden comprehension.

The natural world itself is a gateway to other realities.  You do not have to try and blot out the physical world, or your ordinary consciousness, in order to achieve the necessary knowledge that leads to vibrant health or experiences.  In fact, the natural world is itself a part of other realities, and the source of all realities is as present in your existence as in any other.

The more fully you learn to live, the more the seemingly hidden “mysteries of the universe” begin to appear.  They do not necessarily make themselves known with great clamor or fanfare, but suddenly the most innocuous, innocent birdsong or the sight of a leaf might reveal knowledge of the profoundest nature.  It is ironic, then, that many people who seek to discover the “hidden” mysteries of nature ignore nature itself, or consider the physical body as gross or somehow composed of lesser vibrations.

In the case of the suicide, however, we see the opposite attitudes at their most drastic.  To a strong extent, such individuals reject their own lives, and often the conditions of life in general.  Many of them object that they did not want to be born in the first place, and they feel that way because they have so thoroughly repressed the will to life within them.  They also often express a strong feeling of alienation from their parents, friends, family and their fellow men in general.  Along the way, they have forgotten the cooperative, playful ventures of childhood, and the expression of love itself becomes more difficult.

All of the suggestions in this chapter can indeed help break down those habitual thought patterns, however, and if such a person is seeing a therapist, it is an excellent idea if the entire family join in the therapy.

Oftentimes this is financially impossible, but the inclusion of such an individual in some kind of a group situation is an excellent procedure.  Communication between several people, all of whom have contemplated suicide, can also set up an excellent supportive situation, particularly with some direction set by a therapist.  All would-be suicides do not follow through, and many end up leading long and productive lives, so that even when negative ideas are present in their most severe forms, there is still hope for improvement and accomplishment.

Those same unfortunate beliefs, feelings, and attitudes are also present to a lesser degree, and in different mixtures, in the cases of life-endangering diseases.  However, those beliefs may not be nearly as observable, and many people may deny that they are present at all.  They are often triggered, finally, by a traumatic life situation – the death of a spouse or parent, a major disappointment, or any experience that is particularly shocking and disturbing to the particular person involved.

These attitudes are often present in certain cases of cancer, severe heart problems, or other diseases that actually threaten life itself.

In such instances, an understanding of one’s beliefs, and a generation of newer, more biologically vital ones, will certainly serve to better the situation, and help relieve the condition.