Abhijit Naskar's Blog - Posts Tagged "mental-health"

To understand mental health, we must first understand what is mind? And by understand, I mean realize, in our bones, what this mind thing is. So, let's try to figure out. I assume you know what water is - what it is made of. It's made of hydrogen and oxygen. That's why, water is H2O. Likewise, mind is made of neurons - most of which are inside our brain and the rest are spread across our body like a network, not just to drive our body, but also to receive information from the environment.

We have about a hundred billion neurons in our brain. And just so you know, the number of neurons remains almost the same, since the time of our birth, what changes as we grow up and live through time, is their interconnections. For example, when you practice a certain task over a long period of time, the neurons responsible for that task, get substantially interconnected, and as they get more interconnected, you become better at that task.

Now, where does mental health come in all this? Well you see, we are animals. Yes we are, technically speaking. But since we severed our dependency on mother nature, by building civilizations, modern civilizations, we became somewhat non-animal. Which means, we no longer rely on the internal mechanisms that helped up animals to survive in the jungle alongside other animals. And these mechanisms are what we call instincts. But by instincts, I am not talking about the way you use the term in everyday life. I am not talking about just gut feeling. Instinctual drives helped us survive in the merciless kingdom of the wild - the drive for reproduction, the drive for staying alert and so on.

Now, the drive for staying alert is the instinct that's responsible for most of our modern everyday mental health issues - anxieties, stress and so on. Why, because we are not wired in our brain to stay calm - we are not wired to remain peaceful - we come from a long line of ancestors, who had to remain alert all the time, in order to be able to fight any possible predatory attack. And this evolutionary instinct of alertness still remains quite strong in the human psyche, except, now, we have labeled it with problematic terms like anxiety, stress and so on.

We have started to delude ourselves with the belief that these everyday mental health issues are our enemies that have risen recently, but the matter is quite the opposite. As I said in my book "What is Mind", fear, anxiety, stress - these are not our enemies. You cannot get rid of them, by thinking of them as enemies. They are evolutionary wisdom in the face of danger. So, you should not try to get rid of them, rather you should try to befriend them.

Accept them as part of your life - accept them as part of your being - rid yourself of the fairytale notion, that you ought to be full of happiness all the time - rid yourself of the false belief that being sad is bad, that being upset or disappointed is bad - these are all human conditions - one can't erase them, just because one doesn’t like them or one's society presents them as evil. Only when you accept yourself, the way you are, along with all your joys, sorrows, miseries, disappointments, failures, achievements and ecstasies, can you truly step beyond the dualities of existence - only then can you become truly alive to life itself.

Mental health awareness doesn't mean fighting stress, anxiety, depression and other everyday mental health issues, rather it means consciously modulating the habits that intensify those issues. Once you are in control of your habits, instead of letting your habits control you, you would automatically be in a much better shape, both mentally and physically. In fact, if we put aside the severe neuropsychological conditions, there is no such thing as mental health awareness, there is only awareness. Awareness breeds health, whereas callousness breeds more suffering.

I am worried - terribly worried - I am worried sick for the kids - for the citizens of tomorrow - and this is no everyday worry, for everyday worries come and go, but this worry of mine is not going to fade away. I am worried for the sanity of our kids - and all the kids yet to come.

We have arrived at a point of time where the way we raise our kids is going to draw the line between sanity and insanity - it's going to draw the line between the will to live and the urge to give up. Never in history, the situation was so severe as it is now. And if you genuinely want your kids to have a healthy and happy life, then you no longer have the luxury to be callous about their daily habits.

Here I am not addressing your capacity for raising kids, for that's an instinctual response which comes naturally to all parents, but what I am pointing out is that even that age-old parental instinct of raising children is not going to be enough in ensuring that the kids grow up to be mentally stable members of a healthy society. Mark this, if you do not get serious right now, then the future that awaits your kids will be that of insanity, misery and death.

Technology - that's what revolutionized this planet beyond human imagination when it came to existence - and now in its newly acquired digital form, it has begun to revolutionize this planet once again, except this time the repercussions are turning out to be a thousand times greater than all of the previous technological revolutions combined.

Selfies have begun to replace memories - likes and comments have begun to replace lasting conversations - illusive friends and followers lists have begun to replace real reliable friendship. And this is nothing to be taken for granted, for the digital innovation that set out to connect people, has slowly started to tear those people apart both from within and without.

Reliability has become scarce - commitment has become scarce - attachment has become scarce. The very socio-psychological mechanisms that sustain the stability and wellness of a society are beginning to collapse, and when they do, the very fabric of societal stability and sanity will get ripped apart, which I am afraid is no longer a possibility.

This has already begun to happen and the situations will get only worse, creating a society full of sociopaths, psychopaths and basically unstable, depressed and superficial human beings with no strength of character and conscience, and no sense of patience and sanity whatsoever. They will crave for appraisal - they will crave for attention - they will crave for flattery - they will crave for perfection. Everything about them will be artificial and superficial. And no matter how much they pretend to present their life as perfect, inside they will be dying every single second of their existence.

Now the question is, what are we going to do about it? Are we going to do anything at all? Are you going to do anything at all? Are you? I am asking again and again, because upon this question depends the very stability and sanity of our children and grandchildren. So if you can perceive the impending doom, then we can move to actions.

The best way to teach the children a habit is to adopt it ourselves. So, the first step to raise a society that will know the distinction between healthy use of technology and harmful use of technology, is to practice that distinction religiously in our own lives. This means that you must right this very moment start modulating your use of devices, by turning off all notifications except the most important ones.

You do not actually need to delete your social media accounts, but what you must do is - and I mean must, not should, because if I ask you, do you want to protect your child from committing suicide, then you would probably say, you must, not should - so, what you must do is, check your social media only once or twice a day - at most three times, but not more. And this applies to all the responsible adults everywhere, whether you are at home, at work or in transit. Because, if you can't be the role model for the children of this world, not just your own children, then you have no right to blame those kids for their behavior.

So, renounce the 24/7 smartphone scrolling behavior, if you actually care for the future of your kids - for the future of this world. Then comes giving a little nudge to your kids when you see them being consumed by their devices. You may say, they won't listen. Actually, they do not listen because you do not give them enough time from an early age. Spend time with them - watch a movie with them - go for an outing with them - do something with them whenever you have time.

Set the standards of healthy living in front of the children, by being an embodiment of healthy living yourself, then and then only will there be hope for the kids to turn into responsible, stable, patient and socially functional human beings.

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Mission Reality

Facebook is not just injurious to health,
It's now a full-on humanitarian crisis.
If you think it's just a harmless bad habit,
You're fanning the flames of social necrosis.
Social media ought to make people social,
Not make pavlov's dogs out of humanity.
Yet all that facebook actually does today,
Is drive society towards clinical insanity.
Social media is not necessarily bad,
So long as it doesn't feed on our stability.
Yet facebook has devised the perfect algorithm,
To learn, pump and monetize human instability.
Facebook is the definition of what AI must be not.
Algorithm without humanity is mental holocaust.

What is Happiness?

Happiness is a myth. It doesn’t exist.

What we call happiness is merely a temporary sensation of excitement that we receive upon the fulfillment of our expectations.

It’s not happiness, it’s addiction.

And since we have made a society out of this insane pursuit of addiction, our brain is never at a healthy state to actually fathom and more importantly produce true happiness.

And what is true happiness?

Contentment.

You’ve been working for hours. You haven’t had the time to even have some water. Finally you finish your work and drink a glass of water. The sheer feeling of joy that you receive at that moment – that’s happiness, that’s contentment.

You haven’t been near your loved ones for days, for you’ve been away for work. Finally you get home and take them in your arms – that’s happiness, that’s contentment.

Now let me tell you what is not happiness, what is in fact an unhealthy addiction which only ruins a person’s life both mentally and physically.

You’ve been using the same smartphone for over a year now. Suddenly the brand announces the release of a new model. And you get all hyped up to buy that model, despite the fact that you don’t really need it. That’s addiction – that’s an illness.

You visit a new place on vacation. But instead of experiencing that place with your heart, you bring your phone out and waste the entire vacation on taking pictures to post on social media.

That’s addiction, that’s illness. You know why? Because when you get home, you realize, you have plenty of pictures of the vacation on your phone alright, but you have no meaningful memory of that place in your heart.

In usual circumstances, our brain doesn’t distinguish between addiction and true joy. It can only do that, when we stop running and start living. Because at the end of the day, joy is not about fulfilling expectations, joy is about learning to live beyond expectations.

Peace is not a statement,
Peace is existence.
Love is not a sentiment,
Love is sentience.
Awareness is not a practice,
Awareness is absolution.
Moderation is not restriction,
Moderation is jubilation.
Ignorance is not inferiority,
Ignorance is upliftment.
Failure is not the end,
It is the road to development.
Acknowledge the whole, quirks and all.
You have all the powers to treat the world.

Life is one big prejudice unless you question everything. You say, you don’t have any prejudice! Let’s put that to test, shall we! Read the following phrases, pausing a few seconds after each.

Hallelujah!

¡Viva la libertad!

Shabbat Shalom!

Allahu Akbar!

Black Lives Matter!

We’re Here, We’re Queer!

My body, my decision!

Now bring your faculty of reason into action, and think, which of the terms induced a negative emotional response in your mind? It’s nothing out of the ordinary, it’s just common animal nature.

How your brain got conditioned to react in such a way that’s a different matter. The main thing is, your brain just reacted exactly like the brain of pavlov’s dog every time it heard the bell. The only difference is that, a dog doesn’t have further brain capacity to question such conditioning, but a human does.

Most dread the very notion of dark,
Darkness strikes horror in their heart.
Yet darkness gives me a sense of calm,
I feel quite at home when in dark.
Darkness makes me alive,
Darkness gives me flight.
Darkness makes me aware,
Of the tiniest glint of light.
Darkness electrifies my dampened veins,
It pours back my nerves with vigor.
Just when everything seems to fall apart,
The mind awakens with unforeseen power.
So, never try to keep darkness at bay.
Once befriended darkness takes you a long way.

Ride a bike ‘n you get sick less,
You pay for the doctor less.
Ride a bike ‘n you emit carbon less,
You pay for the gas less.
Ride a bike ‘n you release endorphins,
Hence you have less stress.
Ride a bike ‘n the heart pumps better,
Thus you feel exhaustion less.
Pills in need are pills indeed,
To pop pills willy-nilly is to abuse health.
Comfort in need is comfort indeed,
To abuse comfort beyond need is to abuse oneself.
Ride a bike everyday to keep the pills away.
Use pills in need but don’t make them life’s way.

“Simple, Sonnet

Serenity is born of simplicity,
Insecurity is born of clutter.
Patience empowers perseverance,
Selfishness brings down disaster.

But what’s a life without difficulty,
Difficulty delivers durability.
Don’t be ashamed of darkness in life,
It’s in darkness we shine most brightly.

There’s nothing shameful about fear,
It’s a problem when the reason is baseless.
Trouble of privilege is trouble of lies,
Reject all privilege and rush to the helpless.

It is human nature to shed tears when in agony,
Taking pain to wipe another’s tears is humanity.”


“Basit, Şiir

Barış doğar basitlikten,
Korku karmaşıklıktan.
Sükunet doğar sabırdan,
Belalar bencillikten.

Ama dertsiz hayat nasil hayat,
Zorluk bize cesaret getirir.
Karanlık hiç de ayıp değil,
Karanlık bize parlamayı öğretir.

İnsan korkmazsa kim korkacak –
Sebebi doğruysa korkmak ayıp değil.
Servetin derdi yalan derdidir,
Dünyada gerçek dertler eksik değil.

Dertte olduğunda herkes gözyaşı dökmeyi bilir,
Ama başkasının gözyaşını silmek için
derdine katlanmak, çok azı bilir.”

Doomscrolling is nothing new, people used to do the same with tv remote, switching channel after channel, rarely settling on any one program. And heads buried in social media news feed is nothing new either – before smartphone and internet heads used to be buried in actual physical newspapers. Only the means have changed, not the habit. This is not advancement, it’s recurring derangement. I’ll call it progress when you put down your phone or remote and actually listen to another person. Sure, phones can be a supplement to organic conversation, but never a replacement.