Healing is a broad term, and we may be tempted to define emotional, physical, or spiritual healing—or even financial healing—in different ways. Emotional healing may be defined as being free of negative emotional charge from the past, while financial healing may be defined as freedom from debt. Physical healing may be the mending of a limb or the elimination of cancer.
For almost 20 years, the anesthetic ketamine, also known as the party drug “special K,” has piqued curiosity in psychiatry, and rightly so. Over time, research has shown that ketamine alleviates depression in only a few hours. This rapid action is in stark contrast to existing antidepressants that normally take weeks to begin working, which matters greatly when dealing with someone who is actively suicidal from the pain and despair of constant depression.
I recently reread some of Paul Levy’s penetrating teaching on how to break the trance of evil, In his book Dispelling Wetiko: Breaking the Curse of Evil, Levy shows us that within the very force that can destroy us lies the hope of what can save our world at this time. Levy describes wetiko as a non-local, transcendental force that cannot be adequately expressed in language, because it is not a thing. The abstract nature of the English language fails to account for such dynamic forces as wetiko that affect us all the time yet are not visible or measurable.
It’s time to both take mental illness out of those dark shadows, and understand what it truly is—-a breakdown in the capacity to remain connected to others who care. It is a form of collective trance that we need to wake up about, both in how we see it and how we treat those who are affected.
When our souls become disconnected from Spirit, we can go into a depression, become anxious, confused, and unkind toward ourselves or others. We may lack a sense of meaning or purpose, and become indifferent, or numb. Others who grab for substitutes may become addicted, greedy, or even go insane.
I love that quote by Thomas Merton! How can we possibly be anything but ourselves?! And yet, most adults have experienced an identity crisis at least once if not several times before the age of 30. The term “identity crisis” first came from developmental psychologist and psychoanalyst Erik Erikson. Erikson introduced the ideas of adolescent identity crises as well as midlife crisis, believing that personalities developed by resolving crises in life.
