Schizophrenia, Alcoholism, and Buddhism-A Potent Cocktail
Introduction A man who knows he is flawed has taken the first step towards wholeness.
Forty Years ago, a young, struggling twenty-something designer working in the office of an internationally renowned architect in Mumbai, India, a recent graduate from the Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur, abusing both alcohol and hashish every night, I was cursed with a diagnosis of paranoid schizophrenia.
Today, I am blessed with the self-realization that I am flawed. Aaaahh, I hear you go, surely you could have figured that out a long time back. But, dear reader, you underestimate the underlying arrogance of youth, an IIT’ian, a designer and a schizophrenic.
Matchbox 20 sings something like:
“I’m not crazy, I’mjust a little unwell
I know, right now you cant tell…
But stay awhile now baby and then you’ll see
A different side of me
I guess all concerned had to stick around for a long time, many couldn’t make the distance — I lost dear friends along the way — but after this half a century I am in the process of taking the first step towards wholeness, this book I am writing is part of this therapeutic journey, and with each line I type I get a little, little better.
Do you know who or what Matchbox 20 is? Obviously a band, one that the kids listen to nowadays. In the United States you get matches in little folders, like the ones’ you get in 5 star hotel bars in India; I think there must be 20 matchsticks in each of those folders. If someone from this band spent a lot of time in bars, he would be a prime candidate for being ‘a little unwell’; hopefully he has already shown his fans and family the ‘different side’ he sings about.
The Pali word sukkha is usually translated as happiness. As the different side of dukkha, however, it means the end of suffering, a state of being in which happiness is not subject to the up and down movement of the elbow (in bars) or anything else, a flattening of the sine wave of the emotions that is. abiding joy. It would be difficult to find a more deeply thought-about definition of joy than that of Gautama Buddha He says in the Dhammapada:
“Let us live in joy, never falling sick like those who are sick. Let us live in freedom, without disease, even among those who are ill.”
He goes on to say:
“It is good to meet the wise, even better to live with them. But avoid the company of the immature if you want joy. ”
It took me forty Years to meet the wise and live with them, forty Years spent in the wilderness of immaturity, you look back and you think, O God, was that really me?
This is a book about trying to come of age, a book about finding the way back after having been there, I’m going to try to share with you my love for rock ‘n roll and the insights it gives me from time to time, I’m going to explore with you the Way, the Tao and I am going to lecture you on how to design outstanding healthcare facilities in the context of the developing world. I hope to amuse and entertain you while doing all this,
Please feel free to let your mind boggle. Nothing like a good boggle a day to keep boredom away. This is not going to be an intellectual book. As any Buddhist will eagerly tell you, thinking sucks. Rather, I want to make you laugh and feel with me, because I believe that in laughter and getting in touch with our emotions lie what we need, stay awhile now and see.
Take a step with me.
Forty Years ago, a young, struggling twenty-something designer working in the office of an internationally renowned architect in Mumbai, India, a recent graduate from the Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur, abusing both alcohol and hashish every night, I was cursed with a diagnosis of paranoid schizophrenia.
Today, I am blessed with the self-realization that I am flawed. Aaaahh, I hear you go, surely you could have figured that out a long time back. But, dear reader, you underestimate the underlying arrogance of youth, an IIT’ian, a designer and a schizophrenic.
Matchbox 20 sings something like:
“I’m not crazy, I’mjust a little unwell
I know, right now you cant tell…
But stay awhile now baby and then you’ll see
A different side of me
I guess all concerned had to stick around for a long time, many couldn’t make the distance — I lost dear friends along the way — but after this half a century I am in the process of taking the first step towards wholeness, this book I am writing is part of this therapeutic journey, and with each line I type I get a little, little better.
Do you know who or what Matchbox 20 is? Obviously a band, one that the kids listen to nowadays. In the United States you get matches in little folders, like the ones’ you get in 5 star hotel bars in India; I think there must be 20 matchsticks in each of those folders. If someone from this band spent a lot of time in bars, he would be a prime candidate for being ‘a little unwell’; hopefully he has already shown his fans and family the ‘different side’ he sings about.
The Pali word sukkha is usually translated as happiness. As the different side of dukkha, however, it means the end of suffering, a state of being in which happiness is not subject to the up and down movement of the elbow (in bars) or anything else, a flattening of the sine wave of the emotions that is. abiding joy. It would be difficult to find a more deeply thought-about definition of joy than that of Gautama Buddha He says in the Dhammapada:“Let us live in joy, never falling sick like those who are sick. Let us live in freedom, without disease, even among those who are ill.”
He goes on to say:
“It is good to meet the wise, even better to live with them. But avoid the company of the immature if you want joy. ”
It took me forty Years to meet the wise and live with them, forty Years spent in the wilderness of immaturity, you look back and you think, O God, was that really me?
This is a book about trying to come of age, a book about finding the way back after having been there, I’m going to try to share with you my love for rock ‘n roll and the insights it gives me from time to time, I’m going to explore with you the Way, the Tao and I am going to lecture you on how to design outstanding healthcare facilities in the context of the developing world. I hope to amuse and entertain you while doing all this,
Please feel free to let your mind boggle. Nothing like a good boggle a day to keep boredom away. This is not going to be an intellectual book. As any Buddhist will eagerly tell you, thinking sucks. Rather, I want to make you laugh and feel with me, because I believe that in laughter and getting in touch with our emotions lie what we need, stay awhile now and see.
Take a step with me.
What is the Purpose of Mental Illness – Eckhart Tolle
Psychosis or Spiritual Awakening: Phil Borges at TEDxUMKC
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