Personal accounts exploring the shift from mental illness to spiritual awakening.
The first book in which people discuss their own spiritual emergencies and share what helped them through. Our authors are the experts of their own experience, and they share their wild journeys with courage, insight and poetry.
There are fascinating parallels in their experiences, suggesting minds in extremis go to similar places. These are beautiful postcards from the edge of human consciousness, testaments to the soul’s natural resilience. Our authors have returned from their descent with valuable insights for our culture, as we go through a collective spiritual emergency, with old myths and structures breaking down, and new possibilities breaking open.
What is there beyond our present egocentric model of reality? What tools can help us navigate the emergence?
‘This book is essential reading for anyone who wants to understand the connection between spiritual awakening and what we normally term ‘mental illness.’ It is full of inspirational and moving stories that show that psychological disturbances often lead to significant personal growth, if supported properly. As a culture, we urgently need a new paradigm of mental illness and treatment, and this and this book makes an important contribution to that shift.’ Steve Taylor Ph D, author of The Leap and Spiritual Science
Jadual kandungan
INTRODUCTION
Tim Read and Jules Evans
CHAPTER ONE
The ones who dream of tigers
Deborah Martin
CHAPTER TWO
The accidental guru
John Ablett
CHAPTER THREE
Chasing transcendence
Anna Beckmann
CHAPTER FOUR
Dissolving on the motorway
Louisa Tomlinson
CHAPTER FIVE
The in-between place
Jules Evans
CHAPTER SIX
The ball of light
Cornelia Cacu
CHAPTER SEVEN
Wrestling with angels
Stephen Fitzpatrick
CHAPTER EIGHT
The motherhood ear
Amy Pollard
CHAPTER NINE
The chaplain who thought he was Jesus
Satyin Taylor
CHAPTER TEN
The fire of becoming
Angela Cotter”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
The boy who stank to high heaven
Rob Charles
CHAPTER TWELVE
From fear towards love
Dan Sherwen
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
The master
Mike Benthall
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
The spiritual dimension of bipolar disorder
Sean Blackwell
CONCLUDING COMMENTS
Tim Read and Jules Evans
BIOGRAPHIES AND FURTHER RESOURCES
INDEX
Mengenai Pengarang
Tim Read is a medical doctor, psychiatrist and psychotherapist based in London. He was Consultant Psychiatrist at the Royal London Hospital for 20 years leading the Emergency Liaison service and the Crisis Intervention Service. He has trained in psychoanalytic therapy (IGA) and in transpersonal therapy (GTT). He is a certified facilitator of Holotropic Breathwork and has a special interest in working with expanded states of consciousness. His book ‘Walking Shadows: Archetype and Psyche in Crisis and Growth’ was published in 2015.