Jim Palmer's Blog, page 63

Spirituality and Mental Illness

I grew up with a mother who suffered with mental illness, which along with her alcoholism dominated the years of my childhood and youth. I devoted a chapter in my first book, Divine Nobodies, in which I shared about my own struggle with depression and how my “Christian” culture did more harm than good. The topic of spirituality and mental illness comes up a lot. Here are a few thoughts related to it.

Whatever the condition of one’s mind or body, our true Self is born out of the image, likeness and being of God. We have a mind and body but we are not our mind and body. The image, likeness and being of God is the underlying, unchanging and fundamental essence of who we are. Our true Self is never threatened or diminished, and is permanent and absolute, lacking nothing.

That Self takes on a mind and body in order to be human. Unlike our true and absolute Self, the human mind and body is temporary, subject to deterioration and decline, and its state of condition is a byproduct of each person’s life experiences, conditions and circumstances – some of which are in our control, many of which are not.

There are many causes and contributing factors to all kinds of mental illness, ranging from depression, to Bipolar disorder, to Schizophrenia. But whatever the mental illness may be and the factors that led to it, the true self remains unchanged. Then true self is complete and whole unto itself – nothing can improve it, nothing can diminish it. Every person with mental illness has the same and equal inherent divine worth as any other human being. Every person with mental illness is as complete and whole in their real Self as any other human being.

Our relationship with or to whatever we have in our lives is our spiritual path.

Stop right now and identify about what you have in your life. Maybe you have depression. Maybe you have Bipolar disorder. Perhaps you have an anxiety disorder, personality disorder, eating disorder, or panic disorder. You didn’t choose this disorder or mental illness, and you can’t just will it away with a magic wand or bright side it away with positive thinking. Trying harder, or praying harder, or ________ (fill in the blank) harder isn’t it either. So, consider the possibility that your relationship to what you have is your spiritual path. Your relationship to your depression, Bipolar disorder, or any form of mental illness… is your spiritual path.

For example, let’s say you have depression. Your relationship with or to your depression might include:

Creating a space of acceptance in your life for your depression.


Including friends, loved ones and significant others in the creation of that space so they can participate and support you in it.


Those times when you are experiencing depression.


Those times of reprieve from depression.


Those things you do to manage your depression, including medication, treatment programs, lifestyle/self-care choices – likely a combination of multiple things.


Expressing understanding, support, and compassion for others who struggle with depression.


Allowing others to be that for you.

Topics like depression and Bipolar disorder and other forms of mental illness did not often come up in the Christian sub-culture that I was once a part of. I wonder how many people suffered in silence and shame as a result. There are a lot of layers related to mental illness, and I think a good rule of thumb for any person who has not had to deal with mental illness is to: (1) Do some good study and research to gain more competent understanding; and (2) Allow those with mental illness to share what the experience or reality is like for them without the threat of judgment or fixing it.

To learn more about mental illness, explore the website for the National Alliance for Mental Illness

Or The National Institute of Mental Health

Some memoirs of those who have struggles with mental illness include:

The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath

A Legacy of Madness: Recovering My Family from Generations of Mental Illness, by Tom Davis

Crazy: A Father’s Search Through America’s Mental Health Madness, by Pete Earley

Forget the apocalypse; be the Zombie revolution (What I learned from Warm Bodies)

 

4 things I learned from the film, Warm Bodies:

1. Sometimes I’m the Zombie

There are days when it seems I’m staggering and grunting my way through life, and my humanity goes underground. In those moments I fall dead to life, unable to move, feel or respond with any sense of connectedness to myself or the world around me. In those times, only the 40-year habit of living keeps me going but for all intents and purposes I have vacated the premises of my heart. I’m the undead – someone who is deceased but behaving like I’m alive.

During other periods of life, being a Zombie had its advantages. I survived a traumatic and abusive childhood and youth by becoming a Zombie. Shutting down and being dead on the inside was my way of coping, self-protection and surviving. But once that switch gets turned off, it’s not so easy finding it and turning it back on again. And even when you do, you know where to find it to turn it off again. It’s so predictable with me during those times come:

Jim gets hurt -> Jim goes Zombie

Jim gets scared -> Jim goes Zombie

Jim feels like a failure -> Jim goes Zombie

Jim doesn’t like himself -> Jim goes Zombie

Though the plug gets pulled and Jim drains out, I can still put on a fairly convincing act of being alive, at times even fooling myself. A time or two (or three) I’ve traveled quite a stretch of road before realizing that I had left myself at a rest area several miles… states back!

2. Our humanity saves us

All human beings desire and seek the same thing – acceptance, love, belonging, worth, freedom, connection, meaning, fulfillment and peace. And we all fear the absence of them. Though we imagine being separated from these and strive to obtain them, the truth is that we actually ARE all those things, and we can be expressions of them to each other.

The central character of the film, Warm Bodies, was a Zombie named “R” – he could only remember the first letter of his former name. Rediscovering his heart and his humanity, R was revived and reconnected to life.

Religion insists that we need to be saved FROM our humanity. But Warm Bodies depicts a scenario of being saved BY our humanity. It is often taught that the kind of holiness and godliness acceptable to God is something more and better than what we can be on our own as humans, forgetting that God’s being is the source of our being. In the Book of Genesis after God created humankind, God declared that it was good. And before Jesus ever did anything that was recorded in the gospels, God said, “This is my son in whom I am well pleased.” Before human beings lift a finger (including Jesus) we are pronounced as good and members of God’s family – not because of what we do but because of who we are. If there’s one message that comes shining through in the life and teaching of Jesus it is that Jesus wanted us to understand our own identity in him and as him.

The distinguishing characteristic of the kind of transformation that God approves is not becoming more “holy” but becoming more human – the transformation of a heart of stone into a heart of flesh. In the film, the Zombies rediscovered their hearts and were the ones who raised the bar on what it meant to be human for those who had technically been living all along. This strikes me as something God would orchestrate – using Zombies to show others what it meant to be truly alive.

3. Impossible is nothing in the presence of love

I wonder how many Zombies I cross paths with every day – people going through the motions of life but who are dead and numb inside. However we might see or experience others on the outside, and regardless of how Zombie-ish people sometimes seem, the divine spark is inside every human being. Sometimes that divine spark is a faint flicker, lost somewhere deep inside a person. Is it any wonder? People suffer deep hardship, hurt, and heartache in life and go Zombie just like I did. But it’s clear in Warm Bodies that the presence and expression of love is what awakens people to the truth of who they are and the treasure they carry inside them, and which IS them. At every turn it was the presence and expression of love that was waking people up, bringing people back to life, healing them, tearing down the walls that once divided people, making all things new, and creating whole new possibilities that people had never imagined possible.

Religion seems to always be finding something wrong with people, insisting we are bad, sinners, filthy rags and incurably repulsive to God. Is there really any mystery as to why people live destructively when they are emphatically told this is who they are??? On the other hand, people who associated with Jesus discovered and expressed their goodness, love, power, and beauty. It was the presence and expression of love in and through Jesus that allowed others to discover and be this as well. This is who we are and meant to be for each other. This is what transforms the world, and awakens the living dead.

4. Forget the apocalypse; be the Zombie revolution

So much of the energy of religion seems to be about doomsday and the apocalyptic ending of the world. Every day there is some other religious expert spotting another sign that the end is near. But in the Old Testament Book of Ezekiel there is a vision of new life being breathed into dead bodies, and them coming alive as never before. Jesus himself is a witness to the truth that the spark of divine life is never snuffed out. Despite all the talk of doomsday, death and destruction, I’m rolling the dice on LIFE. That doesn’t mean I’m going to sit back and hope it happens. It means I am going to divest my energies from the system of doomsday, death and destruction, and wake up each day, choose life and make love present in every moment… in every encounter… in every interaction… in every choice… in every thought… in every response. I’m going to take on life and love as a way of being in the world. If R can do it, I can! We have that same beating heart. And I’m betting all the other Zombies out there do too.

Clear perception is the doorway to peace and wholeness.

Consider the possibility that the “Second Coming” is our becoming aware of reality, not the return of it.

The most common miracle Jesus performed was the restoration of sight. Jesus once said, “If the eyes are good, the whole body is good.” In other words, clear perception is the doorway to peace and wholeness.

Jesus declared that the kingdom of God had come. Some people could not accept this teaching because they assumed that the coming of God’s kingdom would mean an instantaneous change in people’s circumstances. Jesus instructed them instead to look inside themselves to find God’s kingdom. Why? Because it was not necessary for them to look any further than the underlying, unchanging, fundamental essence or nature of their own true Self.

We have bought into the notion that things are not as they should be, and we are awaiting for an epic change. This is supposedly the big thing that God is supposed to do or us someday. But what is God to do exactly? The reality is that the underlying, unchanging and fundamental essence and nature of all things (including you) is complete unto itself, undisturbed, never threatened, and cannot be made better or diminished.

Our only problem is that we don’t know or believe this. We take things at face value or how they appear on the surface, and look no further or deeper than this. We are just like those in Jesus’ day – waiting for the big ending and missing the truth of the way things really are in this present moment.

What seemed to happen is that I became…

What seemed to happen is that I became…

less interested in religion and more interested in life;

less interested in doctrine and more interested in truth;

less interested in piety and more interested in love;

less interested in heaven and more interested in peace;

less interested in hell and more interested in suffering;

less interested in church and more interested in people.

5 thoughts on “knowing and doing the will of God.”

5 thoughts on “knowing and doing the will of God.”

1. The divine intention for the liberation of all beings and living things is always afoot in the world around you. All creation aches for liberation, and the desire, journey and struggle for freedom is happening everywhere, all the time, and with everyone.

2. You are never separated from the will of God.

One does not need to go searching for or chasing the “will of God,” as if it is some specific and distinct thing out there somewhere to find or do. At the seat of your soul is that intention for liberation and this is so for every human being. Look not further than yourself, look no further than your family, look no further than what appears to you as you walk out your front door, look no further than the next person you interact with, look not further than your next phone call or email exchange, look no further than the next moment. You don’t have to “find and do” God’s will. God’s will is the air you breathe – always happening all around you.

3. God’s will is not something you do, it’s something you are.

The premise of “being like Jesus” in terms of somehow taking on the similar deeds, actions, and behaviors of Jesus’ life is flawed. The only thing Jesus was ever doing was responding to situations as they required out of the truth and awareness of who Jesus was. In other words, God’s will for your life in every moment is to be your Self. When you are seeing with your true Self, listening with your true Self, responding with your true Self, relating with your true Self, speaking from your true Self, creating from your true Self, expressing from your true Self… you are actively participating in that divine intention afoot in the world to liberate all living things and beings.

4. Realize the interrelatedness of all things.

As long as you take yourself to be a person, a body, and a mind, separate from the stream of life, having a will of its own, pursuing its own aims, you are only living on the surface and whatever you do will be short-lived and of little value. Causes and results are infinitely happening in every moment. Everything affects everything. In this universe, when one thing changes, everything changes. Hence the principle, be the change you desire to see in the world. This is a nice thing to quote on your wall, but another thing altogether to take it to heart and live. Your personal liberation contribute to the liberation of all human beings and living things. People dream of transforming the world but they will not do the personal work for their own transformation, which is the only true and sustaining change that happens all around.

5. Fear is not relevant to your standing with or relationship to God.

There is never a moment when you are standing outside of God’s approval, love, and acceptance. Your standing with God is secure, never threatened, never diminished and can never be improved upon on the basis of anything you do or don’t do. In fact, the most important work of liberation you will ever do for yourself and the world is to realize the above. Take to heart the fact that central to the will of God for all creation is the divine intention for YOU to know that you are as God created you – accepted, secure, whole, complete, love, peace, free, good, beautiful.

23 of my own religious rules I broke, and glad I did

23 of my own religious rules I broke, and glad I did:

1. Whatever it is you believe, it must pass the mind’s test of logic and reason.

2. Don’t trust or follow what you feel deep inside.

3. Don’t try this apart from the institutional structures and programs of church.

4. If it has anything to do with God, ultimate reality, and the deepest longings of your soul, count on it being near impossible for someone like you to figure it out.

5. Don’t fraternize with non-believers or people of different religious or spiritual beliefs.

6. Just assume that what others say the Bible says is actually what the Bible says, especially if the person saying it is someone who is supposed to know that sort of thing.

7. That deep feeling of love, peace, freedom, joy and contentment can’t be God. Instead, you should probably start feeling guilty about where you are falling short with God.

8. Reduce your life only to those things that you can fit into the “God” category. If necessary, justify other things by creatively establishing some remote correlation.

9. When you become progressive or more enlightened, look down your nose (in compassion of course) upon those poor souls who have yet to reach your level.

10. Assume that everything you’ve been told or currently know is all there is to truth and anything refuting it must be wrong. In other words, you’ve arrived with virtually nothing left to learn except for trying harder with what you already know.

11. If you keep applying the same formula or beliefs and it doesn’t produce the result it promised, assume the problem is you.

12. Don’t waste your time with the small stuff, do something big or join something big.

13. Have a social justice persona. Remember that the image can suffice even if you don’t really have the time or inclination to respond to people in need along the everyday paths of life.

14. Make sure a majority if not all of your conversations are overtly connected somehow to “God.” Unless the word is actually used or some closely associated word, the conversation doesn’t really count in terms of eternal value.

15. Be at least slightly skeptical and conflicted about truly enjoying very ordinary moments in your life like the feeling of the warm sunshine on your face, playing a board game with your daughter, walking your dog, taking photographs, enjoying the quiet, lounging around with your family – that kind of meaningless stuff.

16. Proceed as if figuring out truth is a matter of your intellect.

17. Make sure at all times there is some burning question you have to answer or some enlightening understanding you must attain before you can rest.

18. Don’t take personal responsibility for the insanity of your beliefs and practices that were damaging and destructive. Blame and resent others.

19. Measure and judge others based on where you are. Just assume if it’s a place where you currently are, everyone else should be there. If it’s something you now believe, everyone else should believe it. If it works for you, it should work for everyone.

20. Draw your conclusions from the data gathered through your physical senses. For example, come to a determination about others based on their appearance, attitude, and actions.

21. Just accept at the outset that your humanity is your enemy.

22. Equate God’s blessing with improved circumstances or existing in a constant state of “good feelings.”

23. Don’t ever let yourself fully give into love and freedom.

Life is my religion (Note from Jim)

I’m popping in to share a brief update. I’m on the final stretch to finish my next book, Notes from (Over) the Edge. My deadline is the end of next week. Yikes! The timing worked out pretty well with my adjunct teaching. I’m on a two-week break before the fall quarter begins in which I’ll be teaching three classes again.

In the meantime, there are a few other places you can track me down:

My Goodreads Author Page

My Personal Facebook Page

My Community Facebook Page

My Twitter

Life is full these days. Jessica started high school!! Geesh, seemed like just yesterday we were watching the Wiggles and Clifford! Whitney graduated from Navy basic training. We all went to her graduation ceremony in Chicago/Great Lakes. Currently she is at A School in Pensacola. Yesterday Heather and I took Cera to the One Direction movie. I know for sure I lost my Man Card on that one. I won’t admit to also having seen the Justin Bieber movie multiple times as well as all three High School Musical movies… multiple times.

Speaking of Man Card, I’ve been training regularly in the gym. It wasn’t easy walking away from my endeavors as an endurance athlete before my near-fatal car wreck in 2010. I’m not sure I’m going to be doing another 50-mile run anytime super soon but I’m making considerable progress.

We added three cats to our lives. Two of them we adopted from the Nashville animal shelter, and one of them is a three-legged cat. Heather wants to adopt one of those retired racer greyhounds.

I am so grateful for all of you who leave blog comments, send me emails, and share some of your own spiritual journey with me. Your encouragement means more than you know! I get plenty of hate mail from people who accuse me of being Satan’s spawn, and so the encouraging emails keep me going. Thank you!

A couple of posts that seemed to raise people’s ire and go viral were:

15 Things Jesus Didn’t Say, and 15 Things Jesus DID Say.

A lot of people contact me and ask if I’m a Christian. You can follow my spiritual journey through my first three books: Divine Nobodies; Wide Open Spaces; and Being Jesus in Nashville.

I usually tell people:

I am…

An Inclusivist

I believe all of life is sacred, every human being is beautiful, and each moment matters.

An Atheist

I don’t believe in a “God” whose love and acceptance is conditional, or who advocates fear, shame, oppression, injustice, ignorance, repression or hatred.

An Agnostic

There is twice as much that I don’t know, than I do know. The mystery of it all cannot be cloaked in certainty.

A Student of Jesus

I want to be courageously human, a powerful expression of love, acceptance, peace, beauty, goodness, freedom and compassion in this world, and live without separation from myself, God, others and life… as I see Jesus did.

A Possibilitarian

I believe in the possibility of humankind awakening to our profound interconnectedness, and the possibilities of the power of love to transform our world.

I write a lot about Jesus but don’t count on it lining up with the typical message of Institutional Christianity.

Thanks for sharing in this journey with me!

7 Religious Rules to Consider Breaking

7 Religious Rules to Consider Breaking:

Rule #1: Don’t cultivate friendships with people of different religions or spirituality.

Rule #2: Mistrust what you most deeply feel.

Rule #3: Limit your experience of God to the people, places and programs associated with institutional church.

Rule #4: Never question the underlying premises you’ve been taught about God.

Rule #5: Believe you need to be rescued from yourself and cured from your own badness.

Rule #6: Resign yourself to the idea that the big payoff happens after you die.

Rule #7: Make it about having correct theology rather than being love in the world.

God has no religion.

“Dear World,

I did not come to start a new religion. God has no religion. God existed long before there was religion and will exist long after it. Everything that was good and beautiful about me is present in each one of you from the start. People think God only became a human once, 2000 years ago as Jesus of Nazareth. But you are a living, breathing, human expression of God now.

The greatest need of all people has always been and continues to be to know there is nothing wrong with them, that we are loved and accepted by God without condition, and that being the unique blend of humanity and divinity that each of us are is God’s gift to you and the world.

This was the meaning of my life. This is the highest truth that defies, fulfills and transcends all religion. This is is the truth that sets you and me free. Being Jesus means being you – all that you are and were created to be.

We are all sons and daughters of God, born into one human family. There is no separation. You are not separated from God or one another. I am the truth, and that truth is God and humankind as one. There is no message more “Christian” than that.

Jesus of Nazareth”

- Jim Palmer

Any belief in God cannot be true if it promotes…

Any belief in God cannot be true if it promotes…

… a disparaging view of myself,

… a disparaging view of others,

… separation between human beings,

… fear,

… shame,

… hatred,

… pride,

… conditions to love

… conditions to grace,

… injustice,

… conformity,

… oppression,

… repression,

… inauthenticity,

… judging others,

… indifference,

… prejudice,

… racism,

… sexism,

… unnecessary restraint.