Professor Ed

Self Help Meaning, Two

admin — Thu, 23 Feb 2012 13:27:36 +0000

This is the second part of the qualitative study and grounded theory of peer mutual support.

Consumer Operated Services Support Community Functioning

admin — Thu, 23 Feb 2012 01:36:48 +0000

Consumer operated services are an important way in which people psychiatrically labeled recover.

; Consumer operated services are a form of peer mutual support or mental health peers helping other peers. The mental health research consistently shows consumer operated services to be most helpful. The research here presented is a sociology of recovery from mental illness.

This piece of research by Philip Yanos and myself show that

successful urban de-institutionalization is possible

with community based services run and owned by “consumers” or survivors of mental health services most often called consumer operated services.

Consumer operated services are linked to improved coping and functioning needed to live in the community successfully.

Consumer Owned Services and Functioning

Self Help Meaning, One

admin — Sat, 19 Nov 2011 01:28:34 +0000

This is part one of three posting of the full version of this seminal qualitative analysis of peer mutual support. It is perhaps the first grounded theory or theory from grounded in the experience of those doing it. This is how i feel theory should always be done rather than in the totally abstract reductionist way in which most science proceeds. Such objectifying processes kill the meaning of what people are doing and in the words of Jacque Maritain turning experience into an object is substituted intelligibility and not the intelligibility of people as they live. It is this lived experience which is vital and not the dead intellectual games of “scientists” who think they can control the experience of everyone around them. This control is the stated aim of the social “sciences” since August Compte. His formula “predict and control” has created the monologue we now experience in the Western world especially America where more and more only one voice is allowedd, the dead voice of the “scientist”.

The Meaning of Self Help

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Coping with Moods, Mental Health Recovery | mental health recovery

admin — Mon, 01 Aug 2011 01:27:25 +0000

Coping with Moods for Mental Health Recovery

The Origin of Everyday Moods by Robert E. Thayer has some most useful concepts for mental health recovery. He studied thousands of undergraduate students for about 15 years. He had people keep track of how they felt and how they changed moods and arrived at a notion that there are 4 basic moods: calm energy, tense energy, calm tired and tense tired. Each of these presents a unique opportunity for coping with moods.

The best mood is high energy and low tension, a state of security in which the mind is open and able to concentrate and the body has energy to spare. Undergrads do their best studying by far in this mood called Calm Energy.

Here mental health recovery is going smoothly. But if we grasp it too hard the mood goes away and mental health recovery becomes difficult. It is not skillful for coping with moods to try to grasp at them as we get tired.

The distant second best mood is high tension and high energy, called Tense Energy. The person has energy, but is anxious and distractible and is not nearly as productive as Calm Energy.

Here mental health recovery is difficult. This sounds like mania beginning. Or a panic attack. Coping with moods at this point is clearly indicated.

Third in rank is Calm Tiredness. As the name suggests on is fading toward sleep and it takes physical movement to keep from falling asleep.

For mental health recovery get some sleep. This is basic for coping with moods. We will have a post soon on sleep.

The worst mood is Tense Energy. The person feel insufficient energy to face the tasks at hand and yet tension keeps the mind racing. Beyond this is simple exhaustion. Tense tired is not the same as depression but it is the mood that usually underlies depression. It is the state when you can’t go to sleep and sift over the day again and again looking for the worst. Need to do something right away to maintain mental health recovery. Keep this up to long and a relapse is coming most likely. For internal links on coping click on this.

How to change moods? This is a great mental health recovery skill. The beauty of Thayer’s research is that it is grounded in the experience of thousands of people. He can say with some authority that the best way for coping with moods is to walk, or talk to a friend, or meditate or pray.

James Rippe, MD, at the University of Massachusetts has expanded on Thayer’s work to test combinations. Walking meditation, or prayer-walking are better than walking or prayer or meditation alone.. Perhaps its not surprising that people like Ghandi or Christ spent lots of time walking and talking to their disciples or in prayer or meditation.

Walk with friends and walk with your Higher Power.

How to start? Choose a prayer or mantra—peace, shalom, Not my will, but Thine—and repeat it rhythmically as you walk, say, every time your left foot hits the ground. Or simply stay with the breath. Even simpler. Just stay here at this present time. i often just stay with my feet whether walking, sitting, standing, or laying down. Kaizen recommends staying with the feet to deal with too many thoughts. He recommends staying with the brow line for sinking or down mood.

All these methods for coping with moods support mental health recovery.

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Zen Dharma Schizophrenia Mental Health Recovery, Hearing Voices Coping

admin — Sat, 30 Jul 2011 08:15:08 +0000

Zen Dharma Schizophrenia Mental Health Recovery, Hearing Voices Coping

Hearing voices is a common phenomenon.

Aaron Beck MD cites research that 5% of the population hears voices but it only interfers with the daily lives of 1% hearing them.

It is thus inadvisable to suggest that “hearing voices” alone is a symptom of an “illness.”

Schizophrenia mental health recovery depends on coping or transforming this phenomenon only if it is interfering with daily life.

For those of us who have been or are bothered by “hearing voices” enough to interfere with daily life there are many ways to deal with them. In a series of blogs we will discuss several. Here we shall discuss a basic technique for schizophrenia mental health recovery. Later more.

“Voices” “heard” are thoughts.

As a Zen Buddhist once said to me, “Whether they are your thoughts or someone else’s thoughts, they are just thoughts.” Realizing this helps one maintain balance in the face of our own mind. Such balance is the basis of schizophrenia mental health recovery.

Another Zen saying,”Just because a voice is disembodied does NOT mean it is wise.” Treating “voices” like any other set of thoughts may be difficult but will help schizophrenia mental health recovery.

Something which may assist perceiving “voices” as just thoughts if you are bothered by them is a point made by Aaron Beck MD. Aaron Beck points out that “hot thoughts” transform into “voices”. “Hot thoughts” in “cognitive behavioral therapy” are emotionally loaded thoughts. When emotionally loaded thoughts present themselves forcefully and appear “real”. Realizing this again helps me gain balance and experience “voices” as just thoughts and assists with schizophrenia mental health recovery.

“Voices” are generally NOT commands, often called command hallucinations. This notion of commands is a very misleading stereotype on the media. The media is also very misleading about schizophrenia mental health recovery. On this see, What Is Actual Schizophrenia Recovery Rate Even when on the rare occasions that “voices” command something most of the time the commands are not followed by those hearing them. Chadwick and Berchwood point out “Without fail, voices believed to be malevolent provoked fear and were resisted…” The Omnipotence of Voices I: A Cognitive Approach to Auditory Hallucinations So schizophrenia mental health recovery is not hindered by a phenomenon which is unchangeable. Voices can be successfully coped with. They are not somehow immutable and written in our genes or brains.

The impression that command hallucinations are common comes principly from an overgeneralization of research by Lee who worked with a very small sample (53) skewed to this phenomenon. The work of Marius Romme,PhD cited by Beck shows that voices are rather common and coped with well by many.

Romme is a key researcher on schizophrenia mental health recovery in Europe and his contribution on the phenomenon of “voices” is key.

Romme says “The form and the content of chronic auditory hallucinations … compared in three cohorts, namely patients with schizophrenia, patients with a dissociative disorder, and nonpatient voice-hearers was not significantly different between the three groups. The subjects in the nonpatient group, unlike those in the patient groups, perceived their voices as predominantly positive: they were not alarmed or upset by their voices and felt in control of the experience. In most patients, the onset of auditory hallucinations was preceded by either a traumatic event or an event that activated the memory of earlier trauma.” In other blogs we shall deal further with this material. Romme found a rich range of “voices” not just command hallucinations. Auditory Hallucinations: A comparison of patients and non-patients. Romme’s work is cited as well as many other research papers on “voices” at Intervoiceonline.org see also for peer mutual support Beck and the data he presents help as he says normalize the hearing of ‘voices’ which Beck sees as a key element in schizophrenia mental health recovery.

“Hot thoughts” are at times so laden with emotion that they are heard as a voice outside one’s self, as if “out loud.” Often this seems to happen against background noise and one’s hot thoughts seem to be “read into” this background noise. These things can be learned and do not have to dominate a persons mind. They can recede into the background and schizophrenia mental health recovery happens, happens quite often.

Usually the “hearing of voices” is within one’s mind. “Mind reading” is an example of “voices” within one’s mind. One thinks one can “hear” someone elses thoughts. This is called thought insertion. Or one can think someone else is reading one’s thoughts. This can be terrifying as we think many things we would not like others to know.

Schizophrenia mental health recovery is aided by understanding thoughts as “hot thoughts” expecially in instances like this.

It might be pointed out that there are very famous people who “talk to spirits” or make a living hearing “voices”. People like Sylvia Brown, or James Van Praagh. Millions of people are entertained by this. There are books in stores like Barnes and Nobles and Borders teaching thousands upon thousands of people to channel.

But somehow people limit their perceptions when it comes to those labeled even though research consistently shows those labeled with schizophrenia no more dangerous than anyone else. In the presence of alcohol people with schizophrenia are dangerous but LESS so than someone without a psychiatric label. I will post on this in another blog. This kind of selective perception promoted so by the media is a major block to schizophrenia mental health recovery.

This block is due to the internalization of these kinds of destructive stereotypes as well as the blatant descrimination due to them.

I myself many years ago had a great fear of this “mind reading” phenonemon. It was a feedback loop. Fear brought on voices. Voices drove fear and thus more voices. What relieved me of this fear of others “reading” my mind happened more than 25 years ago. My wife an I were living with a Sufi in New York City who had taken us in off the streets while I looked for a job. He was just entering the kitchen where my wife and I were seated chatting. I was thinking a question. My Sufi friend answered the question. I felt comfortable around him and being a Sufi I knew he would not freak out. So I asked, “I was just thinking that. Did you know I was thinking about the same thing?”

He answered, “No things like that are ‘just in the air.”

So if “just in the air” then no one need read my mind to pick up on thoughts about the same thing. Hence I need not fear another knowing my thoughts. This ended a feedback loop of “mind reading”, embarrassment and fear at someone knowing my thoughts driving more “mind reading” and so on. Schizophrenia mental health recovery seemed much more possible when I realized this.

Once a cognitive underpinning of things like “mind reading” has been challanged then other methods are more viable like interferring with subvocalization. Subvocalization is the slight movement of our throat muscles when we think. Thinking is thus a form of behavior which can be changed.

Zen Dharma Recovery is thus applied to schizophrenia mental health recovery as it is with anxiety, the various forms of mania and depression. One can think non-thinking, the basic Zen Dharma Recovery art.

When “hot thoughts” as voices are powerful enough to interfer with daily life one needs a way to be relieved. “Hot thoughts” as “voices” are like all thoughts subvocalization. One needs to be mindful of the phenonemon. Zen Dharma Recovery is based on this. Once mindful one can do something. Humming a tune will interfer with them, slow them down, since it interferes with subvocalization. For some it brings complete relief. For other a little. For a few none at all.

For optimal effectiveness the cognitice underpinnings of “voices” needs to be challanged as I said earlier. This challanging need not be that the voices are unreal. Rather it can be the sorts of things that the Zen students or the Sufi had told me. If one reads the scientific literature on “voice” hearing one will see that voices are given credibility not just due to thinking them real but due to the “authority” given them. The Zen and Sufi wisdom I have heard over the years challanges the “authority” of the “voices”. Schizophrenia mental health recovery is enhanced when the “authority” of “voices” is undercut. Then a technique like humming is much more effective.

Zen Dharma recovery is mindfulness and letting go of thoughts or thinking non-thinking. It allows freedom and can be a basis of schizophrenia mental health recovery.

Iistening to music is another way to let go. In this method one can more easily pay attention to music instead of the noise of “voices” in one’s head if the voices have less authority. Less authority, less interest, the more easily distraction will work.
It is also easier to directly challange the “voices”, to say “go away” successfully.

Of course as we have discussed in other posts on this page, ujaya breathing can also bring relief when one is not in a social situation where one can hum.

Here is a brief description of ujaya breathing once again. See also Zen Not-Knowing Ujaya Breath Supports Anxiety Recovery and Bipolar Mental Health Recovery Anxiety Mania

Just very slightly close your throat muscles and breath without effort otherwise. A simple way to do this is to silently say “hum” to yourself as you breath in an otherwise unrestricted way. In yoga, full ujaya breath is much more controled. Silently say “hum” instead of counting. Or count silently with the throat slightly constricted or slightly closed.

We had a yoga instructor in our training a while back. She taught ujaya breathing as follows. Imagine a very small soda straw in one’s throat. Close the throat muscles on the soda straw holding it very gently. This of course allows the throat to close a little. Breath will be slightly audible doing this. One can count: one on out breath, two on in breath, three on out breath, four on in breath, five on out breath, six on in breath, seven on out breath, eight on in breath, nine on out breath, ten on in breath. begin again, one on out breath, two on in breath and so on. One can count with a slightly tightened throat instead of saying “hum”. These methods will assist schizophrenia mental health recovery and allow more consistent attention to the tasks of everyday life, to focusing on the task at hand in one’s daily life.

What ever mindfulness or breath method you chose, practice from two minutes to twenty five minutes a day in a comfortable position. Consistency is more important than how long you do it each day. When you need the skill it will be there.
There are many other ways to deal with bothersome “voices” to aid in schizophrenia mental health recovery some of which we shall discuss in other blogs.

So to summarize:
Schizophrenia mental health recovery happens frequently.

Schizophrenia mental health recovery is based on research.

Schizophrenia mental health recovery is aided by understanding the research of Aaron Beck, Marius Romme and others on “voices”.

Schizophrenia mental health recovery can be supported by Zen Dharma Recovery.

Some books of interest.
This first book from The Center for Psychiatric Rehabilitation has a chapter by Dr. Courtenay Harding with a summary and analysis of 10 longitudinal outcome studies of schizophrenia demonstrating that it is not a degenerating biological disease but has rather high recovery rates. She trains at the Coalition of Behavioral Health Agencies in New York City.

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Healing Objectifying Self Meditation | self

admin — Fri, 29 Jul 2011 01:54:46 +0000

We unwittingly take our “self” to be an object we can manipulate. However, it is not an object.

Taking the self as object is a basic process by which we unwittingly produce stress for ouraelves and thus one of the ways we create our own suffering especially anxiety. Taking ourselves as object is not a skillful means to end suffering. It is based on ignorance of the constantly fleeting notions we have of “self” changing each moment.

Now “I am worse than her because she has a better car.” Now “I am better because I am more fit the he is.” We think we can capture a constantly changing “self entity” we actually construct moment by moment with our comparisons to others and manipulate it to be what we want, our pre-designed notion of ourselves.

This leads to all kinds of fears and anxiety. We are attempting to grasp something that cannot be grasped.

Mental Health Zen Dharma Recovery skillful means will be discussed in a moment. Now let us see a little more about the manipulation process.

For example I am having trouble learning how to post a blog with my computer!!!

Now I could manipulate “myself” to feel better. I could tell my self various things. How smart I am. Or how others can’t do this. Or just “so what”. Or I could figure out how to use this thing called a computer to post this blog.

This manipulation of self is called retroflection in the psychotherapy of Fritz Perls website.

One of his principle books is Gestalt Therapy: Excitement and Growth in the Human Personality

The process consists in “identifying” ourselves by thinking we are this or that image or set of thoughts and clinging to them. Then one manipulates how the body/mind feels to fit the image or set of thoughts.

One can further manipulate by trying to fit what one thinks the image is others want.

This process of taking the self as object is the core of schizophrenia Victor Frankl MD points out. He is author of Man’s Search for meaning. Man’s Search for Meaning book review (Buy the book Man’s Search for Meaning: The Classic Tribute to Hope from the Holocaust. Viktor E. Frankl)
It was written in a Nazi concentration camp. His discussion of taking ourselves as object is in The Doctor and the Soul: From Psychotherapy to Logotherapy.
Schizophrenia which is often called hopeless is not at all. (See for example our blog: What Is The Actual Schizophrenia Recovery Rate)

The process of trying to take ourselves as a object keeps one’s body/mind in a constant state of stress.

One is always straining to be something other than one is at the moment. This strain wears one out.

The process of taking the self as object is also the core of separation and thus is the source of suffering. There is always an image in our head between us and the persons around us. Instead of talking to the pretty woman or handsome man our attention is on an image we think we need to be. Not on the person in front of us.

Mental Health Zen Dharma Recovery Meditation, a skillful means to heal from taking yourself as an object:

What to do? Be one with one’s self . Instead of an object.

How to do that?

Let us do an example, an awareness experiment. Hold your right hand in front of you. Stare at it as if it were an object. How does that feel? Pretty strange for most of us.

Now put your left hand in your right hand and rest them in your lap. Feel the right hand as part of you. This is the feeling of “being one with”.

When you meditate on the breath, let your awareness meld with the breath. If one counts the breath, “one” on the in breath, “two” on the out breath, “three” on the in breath, “four” on the out breath and so on up to 10, one merges with the inner sound of “one” “two” and so on. This comes with practice. The thoughts of the next number fade away the more one practices. One is the sound of the number. Once learned this begins to pervade one’s experience and one joins with what one is experiencing like the right hand merged with the left.

One lets go of thoughts and images as they arise and no longer “identifies” the “self” with images or thoughts. One’s mind settles down, peacefully abides.

Another way of describing the basic skill for letting go of ourselves as an object is simply letting go of thoughts and images. This is done with Zen Mindfulness and Ujjayi breath if one has difficulty letting go of mental stuff.

Here are some links on that:

Zen Not-Knowing Ujjayi Breath Meditation Anxiety Recovery

Zen Dharma Schizophrenia Mental Health Recovery Hearing Voices Coping

Healing from treating one’s self as an object is important in bipolar recovery. Bipolar Mental Health Recovery Patterns
See for more skillful means Ed’s Zen Dharma Recovery Mental Health Meditation Links

As a student of Bernie Glassman for a short time I was able to deepen giving up making an object of my self. Infinite Circle is a classic commentary on basic Zen texts. Very difficult to comprehend. Instructions to the Cook and Bearing Witness are basic instruction and easy to understand. Bernie is a clear writer. Very helpful in getting into the Zen life style.

We is no longer an object.

I maintain this page at considerable cost to myself as a promise to God to give away all i know about mental health recovery. I firmly believe recovery should be free. If you want to support this work please buy from Amazon through this page. I get about 3% of the sales. it is small but helps considerably with my costs.

One might ask what is the self?

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Zen Mindfulness Emotional Strange Loops Mental Health Recovery

admin — Wed, 27 Jul 2011 13:36:07 +0000

Zen Mindfulness, Strange Loops , Mental Health Recovery

We are often “fragile” or in a space/place where we are easily hurt or more sensitive than may be helpful. This is the space/place where strange loops can develop easily and interfer with mental health recovery.

A strange loop or feedback loop is a term taken from the world of computer programming. Zen mindfulness can help our mental health recovery with awareness of these loops operating in our lives.

Wiki Feedback. see also Douglas R. Hofstadter I Am a Strange Loop (See all Science Books)
These loops used to be called a vicious cycle. The term vicious cycle was used by Abraham Low MD to describe the process of relapse in 1937 in his book Mentral Health Through Will-Training

Put simply a feedback loop, or strange loop, is for example fear of fear causing more fear and eventually panic. Zen mindfulness allows us to see what is going on and do something. This supports mental health recovery.

In current research this particular loop is called anxiety worry. This loop is called a strange loop because we begin with fear. And we end with fear while trying to get out of it. We take a step to stop it by pushing it away (or fearing it). This paradoxically increases the fear. So we think we are moving away from fear and we generate more. We end up where we started but worse off. In modern psychology Steven Hayes Ph.D. has done excellent research on this. His solutions are based on mindfulness.See Get Out of Your Mind and Into Your Life: The New Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (See all Mental Health Books)

We may be restless, irritable, discontent, tense and preoccupied. We may have a great deal of trouble relaxing ( and often turn to alcohol, drugs, food or lust )

This temporary loss of the ability to relax may be aggravated by a sense that we are “different’ , “too different” from those around us. We may feel that we “stick out”, are too noticeable for being “different”. This sets the stage for a feedback or strange loop. But there is hope. Mental health recovery is possible if we use Zen mindfulness skills to be aware and slow down or stop these loops. “Weird”, “different” “crazy” “hopeless” are all labels we can let go of instead of swallowing them whole. Zen mindfulness training as suggested and described partially on this website can help learn to let go.

Often when in “treatment settings” especially “hospitals” the constant and consistent messages are that we are different, very different, not normal and usually worse.

Indeed that we are “dangerous”. And we ARE observed 24/7. This social context is often internalized. We swallow the messages whole See Fritz Perls on introject in Gestalt Therapy: Excitement and Growth in the Human Personality (See all Psychology & Counseling Books)
We swallow messages whole without examining them and our conduct to see what this “stigma” is all about. We do not chew up what we take in by examining it.

We take these “stigmas” into us. Zen mindfulness can help us be aware, examine and chew up what we take into our minds.

We are constantly “prodded and poked” psychologically. “How do you feel?” and “How are you today?” are not meant as they usually are in everyday life. We know depending on how we answer we may be “written up”. “Privileges” can be denied.

We are being conditioned to fear our own minds.

This process of conditioning is not intentional but it is all pervasive. This is conditioning that will lead to feedback or strange loops, vicious cycles. Lets see how.

No wonder when “on the outside” again we tend to freak when someone asks innocently how we are doing. We have been conditioned to respond to this as a psychiatrists or nurses probe to find our “mental status” or what they may think it is. These kinds of questions are turned into anxiety triggers by the conditioning we have received.

This freaking at “How are you?” or “How do you feel?” is not odd given where we have been and how we have been treated. These are the ways in which behavior management has conditioned us. For critique of behavior management from the point of choice see Glasser’s book Choice Theory: A New Psychology of Personal Freedom (See all Health, Mind & Body Books)
A brief summary of Glasser’s ideas can be found at Choice Theory

Many labeled people report behavior management to be traumatizing. A person is not even seen as have the capability of choice but rather as a completely determined biological organism instead of as a person. So trauma informed questions are helpful at this point. In trauma informed treatment “what has happened to us? ‘ not “what is wrong with us?” is a healing question. Ask your self this.

At times then the question “How do you feel?” triggers this conditioning, we feel stigmatized. We feel self conscious. It may trigger us while shopping when asked innocently “how are you?’ by a cashier.

Feeling stressed we might have trouble falling asleep that night and begin to think we are going to have a crisis. We begin to worry. This worry makes it harder to fall asleep. And the increased difficulty falling asleep makes us worry more. This is a feedback loop, a strange loop or a vicious cycle.

Other strange loops may begin. For example, a fatigue strange loop. A small sensation of fatigue like any person may experience is we think due to our “illness”. We worry about relapse. The “stigma” we have taken into ourselves is kicking in. This worry increases the fatigue. And the fatigue the worry. The deeper the fatigue the more haunted we are by the possibility of relapse.

Other “experiences” begin to be noticed and we begin to label them as “weird” as “signs of relapse”. Perhaps we feel “spaced out” or “irritable”. We begin to notice perhaps a “strange” itch at night. Or a weird sensation on the tongue, an awful buzzing in the ears. We label. We use strong language to describe the sensations caused by stress.

We describe our stress experiences as “weird” or ‘”strange” or “awful.” TV ads for psych drugs or TV shows push our thinking in this direction and we begin to act as our own doctors and diagnose ourselves.

We have a “critical doc” within us, renting space in our heads due perhaps to our frequent encounters with MD’s in our life as well as to the all pervasive messages of the media.

We may join a Facebook “support” group where we find “sympathy” for our “awful” suffering that we are not given by the people we are living with. This encourages us to think we are “symptomatic” in order to continue to get the “support”.

We never look at the social context of our “symptoms” to see what might be going on. William Glasser in Choice Theory suggests we look at social context. As he says “All long-lasting psychological problems are relationship problems.
The problem relationship is always part of our present life.” Again see Glasser’s website Choice Theory and Choice Theory: A New Psychology of Personal Freedom (See all Health, Mind & Body Books)

Here is a list of helpful questions to look at what is going on in your social life. First in your romantic relationship. Are there any long term unresolved conflicts. Or dissatisfactions. Especially ones you don’t talk about.
Then look at larger family. Same question. Are there unresolved conflicts you do not talk about.
And at work. Same question. Unresolved conflicts?
And at your friends and religious life. Same question.
And are there any medication side effects interfering with your relationship with the significant person in your life?
Need to look. They are there anyway. So then find someone you can talk to. Most especially another person of the same sex.
And get to a recovery international support meeting either in person or on line or by phone. Recovery International Their skills are based on the feedback loop understanding and help stop them. These stressful social situations causing stress lead to new sensations which we label “weird” or “strange”. We begin to freak out and a feedback loop begins. Seeing the stressful social situations helps us see that what we are experiencing is NOT so unusual. This helps stop feedback loops.

Instead of thinking of our social context as real and valid and stressful enough to bring up unusual sensations, we think of ourselves as a solitary “biological” being who is “abnormal” This is sold to us on TV to sell a quick effortless fix, a pill, “meds.” NO effort needed. But the side effects may be intolerable. This is NOT to say some meds are not necessary at times. They are. And just quickly jumping off them will surely cause a psychotic crisis. The brain adjusts to the presence of the drug. It grows more neuron receptors for the shortage of dopamine and begins to produce more dopamine. If you simply stop the meds abrupty your brain will be flooded with dopamine and you will become very disoriented and psychotic. The same with seratonin. The brain adjusts and you will experience a severe seratonin shortage by just jumping off. So don’t. Seek medical support for any med changes.

Back to the questions “How are you?” or “How do you feel?” When these questions trigger our conditioning we often respond with labeling and blame. We label as “weird” instead of “new” or just something we have not felt before. We begin “symptom talk” when we label as “weird”. This is accompanied with blame talk. Blame talk begins in our minds. We either blame the person asking “how are you?” by thinking “They have no right to be asking this?”. And this grows. We also call this “anger talk.” Anger talk blames the outside world. Or we blame ourselves. “What is wrong with me?” we may ask out of fear that we indeed are “weird”. This is fear talk. Fear talk blames the inside world. In anger talk we blame others. In fear talk we blame ourselves. But again we do not look at social context or our effort or lack of effort in that context. These loops of symptom talk and fear talk and anger talk deepen unless we know how to step out of them.

On using Zen Mindfulness and Ujjayi breath to slow down thinking driven by feedback loops see:
Zen Not-Knowing Ujjayi Breath Meditation Anxiety Recovery
Bipolar Mental Health Recovery Patterns
Zen Dharma Schizophrenia Mental Health Recovery, Hearing Voices Coping

Just very slightly close your throat muscles and breath without effort otherwise. A simple way to do this is to silently say “hum” or “ha” to yourself as you breath in and out in an otherwise unrestricted way. In yoga full ujjayi breath is much more controled. Silently say “hum” or “ha” instead of counting. Or count silently with the throat slightly constricted or slightly closed. See a dharma talk on letting go of thought boxes that drive symptoms. Zen Dharma Recovery Mental Health Video
This method of Zen Mindfulness Mental Health Recovery can be used with to cope with any “symptom.” d
This closing of the throat muscles cuts way down on thinking. Why? Well thinking is subvocalization. We very very slightly move our throat muscles when we think. And this type of breathing interfers with subvocalization. Hum a melody and see how much you think. Not much. Ujjayi breathing does the same thing. Or counting the breaths with a slight pressure on the throat muscles.

An excellent video by Jon Kabot-Zinn on Peaceful Abiding or Mindfulness Meditation is found at Mindfulness Meditation. As a regular practice this aides in recovery. Ujjayi breath which enhances mindfulness needs to be practice but a regular mindfulness practice with a completely natural breath and no ujjayi breath in addition is very useful for mental health recovery.

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Here are some links to do that.

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Zen Mindfulness of Emotional Strange Loops Supports Mental Health Recovery.

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Perverse financial incentives driving medicaid costs and deepening disability.

admin — Mon, 18 Jul 2011 02:42:45 +0000

The perverse financial incentives driving medicaid costs and deepening disability.

An incident in a large metropolitan area of Colorado. A medicaid client is admitted to a hospital. He is missing both his legs. He uses a wheel chair. A bit over weight but otherwise healthy. Not obese. No history of any mental illness and no history of psychosis.
He is admitted for routine surgery.
The surgery requiring anesthesia goes well.

This is a billable service under medicaid.

He awakens in the post op recovery room confused and disoriented. He seems to be hallucinating. This is called post operative psychosis. The usual treatment is to wait a good long time, to discharge under care. This person had parents capable of caring for him with whom he lived.
In this medicaid case this was NOT done. The doctors did not wait. He was given an atypical antipsychotic. And again no history of psychosis. or any other mental diagnosis.

The prescribing of the atypical and the drug itself are billable under medicaid.

He quickly develops out of control diabetes. A common side effect of the atypical class of drugs is diabetes along with obesity, high colesterol and high blood pressure. It is not always so fast developing. But it sometimes is. The metabolic side effects are a principle reason people given them and other psychiatric drugs die 25 years younger than average. He is taken off the atypical successfully. it takes time to do this. Cold turkey can cause further problems.

But the longer time to detox is billable to medicaid.

The patient now is kept for a longer time in the hospital for stabilization of his blood sugar.

This is a billable services under medicaid.

The patient now needs special care to be discharged. Disease management must be found.

This is a billable service under medicaid case management.

The patient is discharged and under disease management care.

This is a LONG TERM billable service under medicaid.

The various drugs for diabetes cause weight gain. They make diabetes chronic. The patient was missing legs. He was otherwise self sufficient. Now he will probably be over weight and chronically diabetic. All of course billable under medicaid. He is now likely to develop additional health problems due to being over weigh, like pressure sores which for a diabetic are very expensive to treat.

And this is even more billing under medicaid.

And in this case in Colorado metropolitan area one company owned by the hospitals and the large mental health provider and other medical and mental health entities collects ALL the medicaid billing for each of the medicaid billable services for this unfortunate young man.

This is a perverse financial incentive driving the deepening of disability for many many medicaid and probably medicare clients.

This is a big money maker for managed care companies who exploit medicaid and medicare and the patients treated by them.

The senerio as is, is bad enough but it gets worse if the contract is an “at risk” contract for both physical and mental health.

Why does it get worse? The industry standard profit for an at risk contract in medicaid is usually 6%. But the 6% is calculated on the total revenues. The total revenues are driven much higher by multiple services as in the case of the unfortunate young man we describe. And thus the 6% is on a much larger base. The amount is considerably higher than just an operation. Hence much larger profits the more patients can be multiply billed for medical diseases caused by improper use of atypicals .

Thus managed care in medicaid is a death and disability machine.

And it may be in private insurance.

What is the probable cost?

Veterans Administration senior psychiatrists say on co-occurring medical costs from proper atypical use in the VA is 30% lower per patient.

And the VA care is considerably better. People are generally not disabled so severely by perverse financial incentives. I am a volunteer researcher with the VA mental health QUERI committee which sets research policy.
On psychiatric usages Dr Sederer Medical Director of the Office of Mental Health of New York State has said his principle cost in medicaid is co-occurring medical costs from the multiple use of atypicals. There are no incentives to take people off of atypicals they are already on. So many are on 3 or 4. Each additional atypical adds high risk of metabolic side effects like diabetes or obesity but does not add treatment benefit except in very rare cases.
Another common and illegal problem is the off label use of atypicals for sleep and anxiety. FDA has guidelines not often followed.

Off label use is use NOT for psychosis. It still causes diseases. And drives up costs. And billable medicaid services and profits.

Is this consciously done? Very angry managed care psychiatrists, physicians and senior executives have said and written to me: “I don’t make a cent on this. I don’t get paid to do this.” I pointed out as politely as I could that market incentives don’t operate consciously. But as long as money is made no one looks. It is only when there is a loss that someone looks. However, regional executives of mco’s are rewarded for sending the quarterly profit margin to corporate offices and that is usually calculated as a percent of revenues. As I have said revenues are driven up by co-occurring medical billing for diseases caused by what happened to this young man. By the improper use of atypicals.

The solution? One pot of money. All medical and mental expenses come out of it. NO SEPARATE BILLING for each service caused by the addition of services because of medically caused co-occurring medical conditions. The managed care company or large provider is responsible for all costs of care for each patient for out of same pot of money. This is REAL capitation. NOT phony capitation with lots of hidden perverse financial incentives. And safe guards against not admitting or dropping patients. And NO pre-existing conditions exclusions.The industry would staighten out over night.

Over night medicaid and probably medicare costs would drop and over night fewer people would have their manageable disabilities turned into expensive life draining unmanageable disabilities for which you and I pay unnecessarily.

Is accountable care actually going to do this? Perhaps if it is done properly. That is why insurance and managed care companies hate Obama. Perhaps accountable care will correct this but it will depend on the billing mechanisms more than on the pretty sounding rhetoric. However it is only a partial fix. The basic problem is that at present the separation of acute care and long term care will continue in accountable care to drive the kind of perverse incentives I have described here. If one causes a disease say by off label use of atypicals in acute treatment then one can make money in the long term treatment of the disease caused. But at least the perverse incentives are fewer. Again that is why insurance companies hate Obama. Off label use is not recommended by the FDA and most states have rules to use them. These rules include generally eliminating “other products”. This is generally not done in my experience.

The following material is being developed as part of a UCLA pilot being co-directed by Ed Knight, PhD,CPRP. Alex Young MD is principle investigator. On recovery see Bipolar Mental Health Recovery Patterns
Zen Dharma Schizophrenia Mental Health Recovery Hearing Voices Coping
Mindfulness Meditation Enhances Depression Mental Health Recovery Life Style
Zen Not Knowing Ujjayi Breath Supports Anxiety Recovery

Insurance company influence on the House of Representatives and Senate needs to stop. It disables people more than they are. AND it drives medicaid costs sky high.

Medicaid does NOT have to cost a fortune and drive up costs with perverse financial incentives.

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Universe Contracts Expands Equinimity Supports Recovery | recovery

admin — Mon, 20 Jun 2011 01:31:23 +0000

Face the wind with equinimity. Strong wind comes, weak wind comes. Recovery comes with the wind. Recovery goes with the wind. Equinimity (balance) supports recovery.

The universe contracts and expands. We breath in and out. All the contractions and expansions are done with less suffering if done with balance or equanimity, rating none better or worse. This balance brings recovery like the wind. All are lessons to be learned in the once-happening participation in being. The funding comes, the funding goes. The weather comes, the weather goes. Life comes, life goes. “Mental illness” symptoms come and go. Mental health recovery comes and goes and and comes again.

Equanimity comes with meditation and mindfulness practice. These practices bring recovery.

The universe itself is of such a nature that it balances, that it has equanimity.

“The rain falls on the good and evil alike.” as Jesus said in the Sermon from The Mount. Rain gives not a whit whether the person on whom it falls is good or bad. Whether it is a “flower” or a “weed”. It just falls. And a few lines later Jesus suggest be like the rain, be like Abba, The Father. The word in Greek Jesus used for mental illnesses was not “demon possessed” but “moon stuck” because of the coming and going as the moon does. That is all moon struck meant, all lunacy means. It comes and goes. Mental health recovery is supported by this realization. Clinging to passing good moods brings on suffering.

Jesus was a non-dualist. These passages show that clearly. Fr. Thomas Keating especially his Daily readings for contemplative life helped me realize that. This book was essential to the Christian view of my recovery. To stop the guilt tripping. The self indulgence of guilt tripping hinders equinimity. ( Here is a link to that book).

Daily Reader for Contemplative Living: Excerpts from the Works of Father Thomas Keating, O.C.S.O., Sacred Scripture, and Other Spiritual Writings

It is also a thing to remember. When we are doing well, the rain falls on us. When we are doing poorly, the rain falls on us. The great Christian Meister Eckhart of the 13th century pointed out that the door of love swings on a hinge of indifference. The rain and the hinge are alike in this quality. Eckhart taught a form of silent prayer similar to mindfulness meditation. Link to Meister Eckhart:
Selected Writings (Penguin Classics)

If one is overly involved one suffers. if one is not involved at all one suffers. And we like the rain fall on all. We are happy recovery comes. We are sad, recovery comes.

We need not be controlled by the tyranny of mood. Then like the hinge, we swing the door of love open.

Meditation on the breath, connecting with the breath and letting go of thoughts, concepts, images, judgements, justifications brings balance. It is the letting go. The balance in the face of suffering or happiness comes from the non-labeling. It is in the labeling that the pain or suffering resides. So as the universe expands and contracts let us breath in and out. And let go.

Extreme mind body states (symptoms) quite down with letting go.

This kind of balance support mental health recovery. Mental health recovery is possible for all. Do not forsake the course because moods, or symptoms, or “mental illnesses” or mental health recovery come and go. Persevere in equanimity and recovery will be there. Persevere in mindfulness meditation and recovery will come. Breathe and let go!!! Breathing brings recovery. Breathing brings equinimity.See also Healing Objectifying Self

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Recovery Garden

admin — Wed, 20 Apr 2011 13:27:09 +0000

Recovery Garden

This is a power point of a workshop. It is about me. So it is principle about schizophrenia recovery. I have many other symptoms as well. This is a gift as i have been able to find ways to transform them all. To view click on the title. It will upload to your computer. Then open on your computer and it will be visible. This is a free upload that you may use for your self. It is a powerpoint that Ed Knight uses in some of his trainings.When i was laying on my back in the back yard meditation on the night sky about 4 or 5 years ago I said I would give away what i knew about recovery. The Garden is used by Ed Knight as an analogy for the work of mental health recovery. Weeds are used as a principle analogy for blocks to mental health recovery. The reason we have trouble dealing with weeds or blocks to mental health recovery is we have been taught we can’t and we believe it.