Addictions with psychosis
Masters, I have been smoking about 24 years. I quit once but I started to hear voices and became psychotic. I really want to quit but when I deny myself I feel clogged. On the other hand, I have teeth issues and don’t want to lose them. I used drugs in the past and had an experience, the first psychotic episode, with an angry old woman who told me about my future, who was she? Was she even real? Why is psychosis so similar to everyone who experiences it? In my last psychosis I felt that everything in me was taken away. I tried to meditate to find the light but I felt nothing but emptiness. Now I’m interested in heart meditation. I have noticed that when I turn inside to meditate there is always some kind of interruption, many times I get sick. Is that because of the fear of it? ~Theo, Finland
ANSWER: You are in the midst of a “poor me” dark night of the soul. You know what is out of balance in your life and you have made the choices to continue rather than work your way through to a different approach to life. The “poor me” aspects come from the fact that you want to be comfortable rather than go through the withdrawal necessary to leave these addictions behind you. That’s your choice.
The dark night of the soul is the experience of feeling nothing but emptiness. You have hit a bottom of sorts where, with nothing in the way, you have the option of filling your world up with only positive thoughts and intentions of your own. You can allow the old things you don’t like to come back, or you can rewrite a new life without those destructive addictions. Again, your choice.
Your fears are controlling your existence. If it isn’t comfortable or familiar, you stop it before you even see what the result will be. You have created blockages so you have an excuse for not moving forward. You have used hallucinations, such as the old woman, to shut your thinking down so you don’t find constructive avenues to success.
Everyone’s experiences are different. Psychotics all connect to some energy that is beyond the physical so they think they are going to the same place and seeing the same thing but it is only their perspective. Take one step at a time. See what is having the most negative impact on you and begin to change your thinking about the strength you have to change your life. Then choose to change.