I was recently made aware of this ‘article’ appearing in various forms through social media – now I say ‘article’ because I am generously applying the term to what should be referred to as propaganda. The issue of mental health policy has been in the forefront of minds recently – bombastic reporting, social media mobbing, and good ol’ stigma come in droves when tragedy strikes. That specific issue is so emotionally entrenched that I almost dare not address it, but I do feel it is connected to this post – in the same way that social media drove the anti-vaccination issue, and the autism-misinformation ‘debate’. I am of the opinion that articles like the above trend because sections of the populous are attempting to find meaning, and even fault, within a system they do not understand.

That makes such things even more dangerous, because they are disingenuous at their core, and I’m going to tell you why.

Let me start off by stating that I am a subscriber of the Chardinism that we are ‘…spiritual beings having a human experience’. It is a comforting notion, it rings true with a gamut of belief systems, we can employ it with different clients as it is necessarily void of dogma (despite the religiosity of Chardin himself), and it resonates with me personally. My library is as full with arcane texts as it is scientific tomes. Let me also state that I do not say this lightly; I am fully aware of the inherent contradictions within my own life, the struggle this might represent for clinical practice (in that we therapists deal so heavily with existence that we must battle to introduce the existential into our clients narrative), and that we must tread softly into the realm of spirituality because our client’s material self deserves equal respect, and by metaphorically calling out in the middle of a theatre performance ‘the actors are all playing make believe’ we can upset the audience.

With that said, I am cognizant that the spiritual is an integral part of our bio-psycho-social-spiritual assessment, indeed it is now part of the syllabus for social work qualification; largely because we respond to the needs of the client, and the client brings us this experience. If we fail to acknowledge the importance of spirituality within treatment we immediately fail our clients. From Socrates to Sagan we find it present within our great thinkers, regardless of their persuasion.

In my own practice, when my supervisor asks of me “How do you feel about transference and countertransference?” I challenge that: if we (as therapists) are aware of this transaction taking place then we are speaking of meaning, not of feeling – that we are operating within the realm of metaphysical objectivity; transcending the legacy of experience in order to assist reparation of self. Our client transposes an existent object onto our persona, and communicates through this dynamic. Recognizing this as transcendent, yet unifying, touches upon the spiritual, upon interconnectedness, and on how we might become something other than our experience. Part of the journey to self-actualization is in acknowledging the transient nature of our experiences, and working with resistance in order to untangle these attachments from our psyche, and ultimately from our self – so that we might emancipate ourselves.

We are all able to: wonder in awe at the cosmos, feel transcendent moments within nature, engage in self-contemplation/inner-exploration/spiritual-study, and join through interpersonal experiences. We find kinship and connection with others regardless of belief, and we employ universalism in order to communicate terms that dwarf base ego interaction – in short we are all (potentially) familiar with the realms of the metaphysical, the spiritual, the religious, and the interdependent human experience.

We are able to engage with all of the above, and utilize psychiatry and pharmacology to assist with the delivery of our clinical services. This occurs daily. Of course poor clinicians exist, yet they reflect a systemic issue, not an issue of the profession itself; but we are all shamed when they bring harm to a client. Our consumers are free to explore their own pathway though, and we should support their choices – much as homeopathic medicine can operate in tandem with primary care.

I must also say that I am a pragmatic realist, acutely aware that we inhabit a reasoned and mechanical universe, one where matter (in and of itself) is the constant – we exist here, and that is that. First and foremost we must honor that. Our clients (more often than not) come to us with life experiences, with events and occurrences that can be measured and addressed through empirically evidential theories and modalities.

With evidence being the key word, I’d firstly like to challenge the undertone of articles like the piece referencing Dr. Somé. In some sense these are the other-side of the coin from stigma – initially that seems like a good thing, but the coin itself is the problem: the attempt to see something highly complex in sophomorically simplistic terms. Stigma is bad, we know this; we scorn those who lump all mental illness into the same pot and just stir at it like they are trying to vortex difference away. By the same measure, those who outwardly, or overtly, imply that psychiatric professionals are the enemy of others experiencing mental health issues are a subtly insipid type of propagandist. As a long-term social services advocate I can proudly say that we are not in it for the money, we give more of our time and energy to helping others than we give to our own lives, and we rely upon evidentially sound practice. I referenced Sagan before in order to eco his statement that science and spirituality are not opposed, they (as with all things) are interconnected. And science gives us a wonderful view into our universe. Logic also, and it is with logic that we must consider the etiology of disorders and psychosis, specifically the invasive presence of: physical trauma, sexual violence, substance abuse, abusive parenting, loss, displacement, and physical illness such as HIV, brain tumors, and syphilis.

I could actually stop this post right there. It is illogical to consider that the emergence of a mental disorder due to chronic child abuse, or the presence of a brain tumor, somehow marks the wondrous birthing of a spiritually communicative healer. It is also equally aberrant to suggest that schizophrenia is due to the presence of malicious entities. While it is true that causative factors are not always required for diagnosis, it is pertinent to note the offensiveness present in new-age thinking – to suggest that we abandon decades of study, experience, intervention, assistance, and documented results in favor of hokum is infantile.

I can find no empirical studies proving the intervention of spiritual healing. There is a likelihood that a culturally competent, and condition specific, process may alleviate and bring meaning to certain complaints, traits, symptoms, and experiences – but that is not absent in modern psychotherapy, indeed Letha See advocates for an eclectic and culturally conscious intervention that challenges the Eurocentric model of clinical psychology.

If one is to present information, such as the article referencing Mr. Somé, it must be reasoned, logical, and honest. A garbled and weakly anecdotal piece of writing that mashes the subtly deceptive use of title (there is a vague reference to his holding doctorates in Political Science and Literature, no education history on the website, and certainly no obvious clinical skills), 24-year-old observation, and pseudo-science only adds fuel to the fire of anti-intellectualism.

This article represents a worrying trend in culture, bolstered by the easy delivery of social media, that “my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge” – it becomes all the more concerning when those connected to the field perpetuate mythos. If the future of psychiatric intervention means that engaging in the critical assistance of those in need has professionals battling against superstition (and unfounded theory , or even deception) then we will all lose out.