Today I had the honor of participating in a screening of the documentary “Crazywise” followed by a panel discussion by Dr. Gabor Mate and Phil Borges.  The content within the documentary shared so many of my thoughts which have led to many of my professional behaviors and values as they relate to the mental health system in our society and our approaches to healing.  I have designed my coaching and consulting business around ideas and movements like these. 

The description of the documentary from the website (CrazyWiseFilm.com) is as follows:

“What can we learn from those who have turned their psychological crisis into a positive transformative experience?

During a quarter-century documenting indigenous cultures, human-rights photographer and filmmaker Phil Borges often saw these cultures identify “psychotic” symptoms as an indicator of shamanic potential. He was intrigued by how differently psychosis is defined and treated in the West.

Through interviews with renowned mental health professionals including Gabor Mate, MD, Robert Whitaker, and Roshi Joan Halifax, PhD, Phil explores the growing severity of the mental health crisis in America dominated by biomedical psychiatry. He discovers a growing movement of professionals and psychiatric survivors who demand alternative treatments that focus on recovery, nurturing social connections, and finding meaning.

CRAZYWISE follows two young Americans diagnosed with “mental illness.” Adam, 27, suffers devastating side effects from medications before embracing meditation in hopes of recovery. Ekhaya, 32, survives childhood molestation and several suicide attempts before spiritual training to become a traditional South African healer gives her suffering meaning and brings a deeper purpose to her life.

CRAZYWISE doesn’t aim to over-romanticize indigenous wisdom, or completely condemn Western treatment. Not every indigenous person who has a crisis becomes a shaman. And many individuals benefit from Western medications.

However, indigenous peoples’ acceptance of non-ordinary states of consciousness, along with rituals and metaphors that form deep connections to nature, to each other, and to ancestors, is something we can learn from.

CRAZYWISE adds a voice to the growing conversation that believes a psychological crisis can be an opportunity for growth and potentially transformational, not a disease with no cure.”

Here are a few of the thoughts that stood out to me while watching the documentary and listening to the panel:

1. The Diagnostic Statistical Manual has evolved into a way to avoid truly listening to people.  The sheer numbers of diagnostic criteria that has been developed makes almost everyone diagnosable and this is inappropriate.  For example, grief from loss is a normal human feeling, not a diagnosable mental disorder.

*The focus in certain settings is often on finding that diagnosis for funding/grants, insurance, billing, etc.  I will add that the over importance of diagnosis (and medicating) takes away such an important part of healing which is relationships and connections.

2. We live in a psychotic world, many of us are psychotic, if we accept the definition that psychotic is being out of touch with reality. 

*How many of us does this apply to?  How many in our society are detached?  How many hide behind a screen or conspiracy theories or isolation or our jobs or some other type of dissociation?

3. Healing is about relationships.  We CANNOT heal in isolation.

4. Suppressing feelings leads us to lose touch with ourselves and has negative consequences. 

*How often do we see this in society?  Boys don’t cry…Anger is hostile…they are unstable…women are emotional…How many can you identify?

5. Culture and cultural practices are so important in healing,

6. Diagnoses are nothing without meaning and explanation.

7. We need to spend more time feeling our feelings rather than talking about them and explaining them.

8. Crisis can serve as a portal to growth.  It can be seen as an opportunity.

As I watched this documentary, I could see client after client over the course of my career who could have had much improved outcomes had the “system” that is in place treated them as a human, as a relationship, as a life and focused on their feelings, the root of their pain, and their healing rather than their diagnoses.  There is so much information out there that promotes the use of non-Western practices to heal and there is much success.  Healing occurs through connecting with our mind, body, spirit, nature, and others.  Healing is possible and I love all the people who are sharing it with the world! I love sharing it with the world!

*I have no connection to “CrazyWise” and am sharing based on my own experiences.  There are benefits to diagnoses and medications in some instances and none of this blog should be taken as medical advice.  I did purchase the DVD and am excited for its arrival so I can watch the documentary a few more times and really absorb everything they shared.