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The very word psychiatry contains the word psyche which has Latin/Greek roots: "psukhe" - meaning breath, life, soul. The question "Should there be a link between spirituality and psychiatry?" should simply be a statement. There already IS a link between spirituality and psychiatry. I am speaking from the point of view as a spiritual person who has most recently had a mental illness where I was in a hospital setting.

When I began feeling unwell I went to the emergency room. I was having physical symptoms. When nothing 'physical' could be determined I was sent to the psychiatric emergency service. I was already realising how modern medicine pigeon-holes and separates the mind/body.

While I can recognize that many of my symptoms were indeed 'psychiatric' (anxiety, stress, depression, post-traumatic stress disorder, etc) there were aspects of my 'work' that were transformational. In therapy I began to have moments of 'awakening' that I would prefer to call 'Kundalini' experiences. Various 'symptoms' included spontaneous 'kriya' movements. The movements were comforting and beautiful to do...and visually were like Tai Chi. Sometimes these movements were more like shaking and trembling.

Being a Quaker (a member of the Religious Society of Friends) I found the trembling and kriya movements to align wonderfully to 'Quaking' as I felt a true quality of the Inner Light within. I discussed my spiritual beliefs while in therapy. However, I was labeled as being psychotic. . . and yet, I felt more lucid and 'awake' than I ever had in my life. I tried to explain to the staff at the hospital that my 'depression' and 'life up to this point' was the psychosis (living in an unreal world, masking my depression with a fake happy facade as a way to escape the reality of my childhood'. I pleaded with them to take me off the anti-psychotic medication as it was actually making me feel 'depressed' and negating the spiritual feelings that were opening up to me.

One of the major reasons for the anti-psychotic medication was to 'stop' the spontaneous movements which occurred in therapy...although it was never told to me that this is why - I could 'sense' that the movements 'scared staff'. I was sent to a psychiatrist who I spoke to quite openly. I said "I KNOW my body needs to be doing these movements - for it is a release of emotional pain stored in my body". Part of my rationale was to say that I (as a human being) can 'know' when my body needs to make a bowel movement. A doctor can 'know' that it is perhaps a good thing to have a bowel movement at a certain time of day, but, they can not 'KNOW' when a person needs to have one. (Well, not without some major diagnostic tests perhaps) Haha.

Hmmm. This is kind of getting off track. Oh. The point is that what I 'know' as my own spiritual journey can not be 'known' by anyone but myself. Words can not truly define it.

The great thing about the hospital I was in is that they listened to me. They did take me off the anti-psychotic medication. And, interestingly one of the nurses in a different unit initiated a Recovery of Spirit group (unrelated to my journey) and I attended this group twice - as it was very beneficial in linking my psychiatric experience with my spiritual experiences.

Some useful links are:

http://biologyofkundalini.com/ article.php?story=Exploringthe Symptoms

A highly recommended book is:

"Spiritual Emergency - when personal transformation becomes a crisis" edited by Stanislov Grof, MD. and Christina Grof.

Learn more about this author, Larry Matthews.
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