Mental health exists only in the absence of the mind, that is in the absence of compulsively thinking ill thoughts. We needs to be aware of such thoughts for them to lose their power over who we are, which is awareness itself.
However, popular culture seems to thinks of ‘mental health’ as one part of who we are; something that we have or own. We unconsciously identify with this state that we find ourselves in. When we are happy, we consider ourselves a rather good person. When we are unhappy, we are bad or wrong about feeling this way. We want it gone. We say ‘I’m unhappy’ instead of ‘There’s unhappiness’, as if it is who we really are. That is a falsehood.
Mistaking mental states for who we are fundamentally, will have us not want to let go of them, as it would endanger our sense of self. To be on the safe side, we make an unconscious decision to keep both alive, our mental health as well as our mental illness. Oppositions attract each other as we know: on the other side of pleasure is pain.
As long as we make mental health into our personal story, which is an accumulation of thoughts about ourselves, we experience mental illness. We keep alive the contradiction by strengthening thoughts on either side. Our story separates us from others; makes us something special, even if that’s just in our own mind. The story likes to be different so much that it even welcomes pain to distinguish itself.
We learn this in childhood already. Have you not used illness, sometimes even faking it, to get the attention of your caregivers? We continue to do this in adulthood but often without being aware of it. It has become part of our conditioning.
The truth is, any thoughts that we have about your mental health, contribute to your mental illness as they perpetuate the story we have about ourselves.
Stepping out of this is simple, but not easy. We become aware of each state we’re in, recognising it as an event in time, without wanting to get rid of it. Wanting unhappiness gone creates conflict between what is and what what we want, which ultimately strengthens unhappiness.
If we can simply accept it as a state without making it part of who we are, the state will pass and there is peace again.
Remember, a state passes, only the story of it sticks.
