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ryan g's picture

Change and Mental Health

Submitted by ryan g on Wed, 12/10/2008 - 5:27pm.

I'm still wrestling with the role of change in mental health.

 In regards to the scenarios that you laid out, part of me wants to reject the first one for reasons I was saying this past week.  It doesn't seem very useful to not define the direction of change.  However, going back to my acceptance idea... If that was the ideal and the focus of mental health was to be completely in the moment, content and at peace with the current conditions, change would still happen anyway, right?  Because of the nature of the brain.  If you or anyone else wasn't consciously trying to do anything to facilitate this change, then that would seem like undirected change to me.  Perhaps this is the realm for what is traditionally called faith in spiritual traditions.  

On the other hand, perhaps there just isn't any practical sense in trying to rule out change as a natural part of what we are trying to accomplish (as I was sort of trying to do with my whole acceptance kick).  In this sense, I think I like your second scenario for its flexibility.   

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