Leaving a mental health diagnosis behind
You’re recovering when you’re no longer talking about it
If you are healing from mental illness, it’s likely at some point you’ll have an epiphany: You will realise, that you are no longer interested in the diagnosis or the trauma that preceded it. Instead, you just want to live.
In her bestselling memoir, Building a Life Worth Living, world-renowned suicide expert, Dr Marsha Linehan suggests ‘we study what pains us.’ Linehan is primarily known for being the inventor of Dialectical Behavioural Therapy (DBT), the gold standard treatment for Borderline Personality Disorder. However, in 2011, she also revealed that she too was once battling the same disorder she now treats.
We study what pains us. The sentiment is expressed best by legendary Swiss psychoanalyst Carl Jung who spoke of the wounded healer. According to him, it is the wound itself which gives you the power to heal.
However, the idea that suffering itself teaches us is timeless. When Buddha declared The First Noble Truth, there is suffering, he added that it should be understood. When Jesus went to Gerasene and cast out the demons tormenting the madman among the tombs, he did so, by identifying what it was. Suffering is a great teacher, but there also comes a time to let it go.
