Some thoughts on mental health

Mental health is a spectrum. If you have a brain that thinks, then you’re on it. Most people don’t know where they sit on this spectrum. Mental health can’t be measured like physical health. There are no handy thermometers or stethoscopes.

Talking about mental health is tricky. Because when I talk about mental health my own mental health will play a part. This is like bias, built in patterns of thinking that can distort my assessment of a situation.

There is no such thing as the truth. There is just what is true for you. Two people can have completely different assessments of the truth in a situation. If they are speaking honestly then there is no contradiction.

Mental illness is personal. It’s like a tailor made outfit that fits your every contour. This intimacy is incredibly painful and in equal measure terrifying. You can’t escape, because the illness is literally ‘you’.

Mental illness wants you alone. Because when you are alone, the only person you talk to is yourself, which is the illness.

Mental illness is opaque. You can be mentally ill and not understand what the problem is. This is a defence. Your mind will only let you see what you can cope with. It’s like living in the symptoms of a deeper illness. Most of my fears turned out to be cryptic clues. When I was in my twenties I had terrible panic attacks. The fear was so intense I thought I would have to kill myself to stop it. I was convinced I was possessed by a devil. This was not true, but it pointed to the truth. There was a kind of devil inside me. A terrified child full of anger. Anger that my mother thought was evil.

Are you plugged in? Some people are mentally unwell but have no knowledge of it. They live in a kind of illusion they inherited from their parents and environment. This illusion is very powerful, it is tooled up with a set of beliefs and behaviours that are all you need to be in the world. Because it is an illusion, it needs to be fuelled by self will, ego and often addictions. The illusion is just like the Matrix, a make believe world that feels completely real to the subject but is actually a veil hiding the truth. The truth being who you really are. Becoming mentally ill is like being unplugged from the Matrix, or taking the red pill. Everything you thought was true about the world, starts to look suspect. And the more you look at it, the more the illusion crumbles between your fingers.