I am concerned that my concerted efforts to argue my point may have caused me to persuade others to fit a square peg into a round hole. I'm not changing my stance, I just don't wish to make anyone feel uncomfortable. Such areas of debate are new to me, where there are multiple viewpoints each claiming a set of black-and-white truths. I'm concerned there may be people who feel caught between these viewpoints.
It's a small point.
I'm not really going out to convert the world, but rather to help it. The Diagnosis: Schizophrenia! blog is here to support people like me, and if it opens others' minds a little bit, then all well and good.
That was a small point about beliefs, about the difficulty of negotiating a discourse between absolute skepticism and psychism. What I'm doing here is describing my experiences and making a testimony in the face of a contradictory and authoritative body of thought - that of Western orthodox medical psychiatry -, and this involves some arguing.
I will now go on to outline my beliefs, and not so much my religious beliefs as my beliefs about reality.
I believe that there is an extra-sensory reality, with which humans in this world [of dense physiology] are able to communicate. By the term 'extra-sensory reality' I mean to indicate a belief in an afterlife and Heaven, and all manner of realms between Earth and Heaven. I believe that some people have the sensitivity to communciate with this extra-sensory reality either receptively or actively. For me this is a question intimately connected with belief in God, since we are talking about a spiritual reality and hence also spiritual sensitivity. Really the absolute skepticism of Western orthodox medical psychiatry versus people with beliefs in psychicness is like a skirmish on the edge of the major battle about belief going on between Science and Religion. A common question looking at what I have just written is Why? Why do I believe in an extra-sensory / spiritual reality? 1) Personal experience. 2) the experience of mystics around the world and throughout history 3) religious accounts in holy scriptures.
In the end the biggest proof is personal experience... and yet the voices of skepticism can be very forceful. My personal experience vastly outweighs the influence of skepticism in the world, for me, yet I still occasionally think, are the spirits real? But there is so much reallness about the experiences I have of them.
This remains a tenuous area of Life, because we are dealing in that which is not seen or heard by eyes and ears, rather something that is slightly beyond us - and beyond science. Perhaps scientists must become happy with an ultimatum that God is beyond their reach.
As I said before the psychiatrist who monitors me is likely more concerned with voices and beings that injure me, rather than voices and beings that are helpful to me. Maybe there is a future when the psychiatrist will see that the person they are dealing with is being affected 'supernaturally', and pass them on to the relevant spiritual healer for consultation and attempts at resolution of the complaint. I believe that a change in medical thinking could come about in the not too distant future, at least a relaxing of opinion, to be less black and white.
Secondly, I believe that people on Earth within dense form can be affected by spiritual people, just as they can communicate with spiritual beings. This could be anything from contracting a compelled form of alcholism, or undergoing an alteration in sexual behaviour, to having thoughts about the self that are devoid of love. With me it's the final version of supernatural influence. It's not so much voices that are a problem, as the forces of spirit people, the forces of their will upon my thinking. These are beings that have forgotten that they are of the Light and harbour strong ill-will towards others not of their kind. Picture me: is it impossible that a person can go into a pyschiatrist's consulting room and complain about persecution that is real?
Somehow some spirit people close to the Earth have latched onto me, and being spirits it is easy for them to have access to my inner mind and alter my thinking. (Spirits are more telepathic than we are).
One day I will be well and will have emerged from mental darkness, a place of injury, self-doubt and gloominess.
Thirdly, I believe that there are certain adepts on Earth who are able to manage relations between Earth people and spirit people, whether they be priests (performing exorcism), or spiritual healers (often called shamans) who perform 'extractions' or 'space clearings' with the help of higher spiritual allies. I have personally experienced the spiritual power of such people, the priests and healers. It is not just a matter of faith, you can actually feel something happening and observe something changing.
I believe that not everyone who makes passionate claims about the paranormal is making accurate claims. There is a place for medication. And surely some people must be making passionate claims about the paranormal that are true.
I was haranguing my general practitioner about psychic empathy and quoted a book about it. Buy it here: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Sensitive-Persons-Survival-Guide-Alternative/dp/0595098002/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1257037107&sr=1-1 . I must have done well - the doctor ended up saying, "Well, we're always open to new evidence." I had told the story of the author of the above book who was a PhD who suddenly had a number of experiences of empathy that were to her beyond doubt.
Well, that's about all I can think of for now. Thanks for reading.
