In response to receiving a self-help quote from a friend.
The problem is, it's all so unnecessary. I felt so liberated when I was off of Effexor 1 just a month ago. Then I had a really bad day and I went back on the drug. But had laughing gas or coca or opium been available to me (and not outlawed based on fearmongering) I would have gotten thru that patch and continued drug-free.
So, I appreciate all the advice of the Brene Browns of the world, but for me they are what the poet Shelley called "frail spells" when confronting the problems of depression and antidepressants 2.
In fact, I would claim that the entire self-help field is a product of the Drug War because it outlaws everything that works, psychologically speaking. Self-help authors are then reduced to the expedient of describing how a sane person would behave, in the hopes that their readers will be able to translate those words into feelings. This can help, but from my impatient point of view, such help is a "frail spell" - and irritating, too, because almost none of these authors realize - let alone point out - that we have outlawed all the drugs (extant and potential) that could help us achieve these goals, something that their Christian Science biases seem to reject up front.
Meanwhile materialist researchers completely ignore the power of psychological common sense. They do not care that laughing gas 3 would make me laugh -- they do not care that coca would lift me up -- they do not care that opium would give me pleasant dreams. They see no benefits in those things. They are, in fact, blind to everything that would truly help me, as they search under their microscopes for a "real" cure -- which is just a metaphysical search for a sort of holy grail of materialist morality. This understanding of the world has been cemented into the American mind by the sheer money that it has generated for the medical industry, and so it's hard to get a fair hearing, because almost everyone involved owes their very career to the materialist mindset.
Marcus Aurelius had plenty of great things to say about living successfully with oneself -- and it's comforting to read them, something that I did on a daily basis for years. However, he was a big fan of opium , too, and I dare say I might have written some such soothing thoughts were I able to indulge on occasion in that drug, which, despite drug-war dogma, CAN be used safely -- and I believe should be a legal alternative to daily antidepressant use. It would not just be the opium that would help me - but the looking forward to nightly use, as the drinker looks forward to their beer. It's the therapeutic power of anticipation, something that materialist science does not seem to recognize. I see no moral difference between daily opium 4 use and daily antidepressant use - and in fact the former is time-honored while the latter is a modern invention based on the materialist dogma of targeted neurochemical intervention.
In a sane world that recognizes psychological common sense, a vast array of psychoactive drugs could be used strategically on an as-needed basis, such that dependence would not be acquired, unless actually desired.
If the previous paragraphs sound absurd, it is only because Americans (and the world) have accepted a bunch of lies and assumptions as facts thanks to Drug War propaganda - above all, the propaganda of censorship, thanks to which we are not allowed to read or see anything that shows "drugs" in a good light.
But I very much appreciate your concern. Thanks!
I think you raise a good point about lowering one's expectations, however. One does not have to change the world but to simply do their part and should try to be satisfied with that. My part, as I see it, is to try to spread the word about the poisonous tendrils of the Drug War, which has destroyed the 4th amendment, outlawed free speech about drugs, and suppressed religions based on spiritual states. I do this by writing essays and by sending snail mail correspondence to the movers-and-shakers in the psychiatric, philosophical and psychological realms, in the hope of having someone at last say, "Aha!"
One of the reasons the Drug War is tolerated is because the victims suffer in silence, countless millions around the world living with unnecessary grief and pain because politicians have conspired with materialists to outlaw a whole pharmacy's worth of psychoactive drugs in advance, a totally anti-scientific and inhumane situation.
I can think of no greater intrusion than to deny a person autonomy over how they think and feel in life. It is sort of a meta-intrusion, the mother of all anti-democratic intrusions.
To oppose the Drug War philosophically, one has to highlight its connections to both materialism and the psychiatric pill mill. And that's a problem, because almost everyone is either a Drug Warrior or a materialist these days and has a vested interest in the continuation of the psychiatric pill mill.
There is an absurd safety standard for "drugs." The cost/benefit analysis of the FDA & co. never takes into account the costs of NOT prescribing nor the benefits of a productive life well lived. The "users" are not considered stakeholders.
If any master's candidates are looking for a thesis topic, consider the following: "The Drug War versus Religion: how the policy of substance prohibition outlaws the attainment of spiritual states described by William James in 'The Varieties of Religious Experience.'"
The drug war is a slow-motion coup against democracy.
It's rich when Americans outlaw drugs and then insist that those drugs did not have much to offer in any case. It's like I took away your car and then told you that car ownership was overrated.
The Drug War is the legally enforced triumph of human idiocy. We have rigged the deck so that our dunces can be right. The Drug War is a superstition. Indeed, it is THE modern superstition.
Outlawing opium wOutlawing opium was the ultimate government power grab. It put the government in charge of pain relief.
as the ultimate government power grab. It put the government in charge of pain relief.
Mayo Clinic is peddling junk. They are still promoting Venlafaxine, a drug that is harder to kick than heroin. The drug is only a problem, though, because of prohibition. It would be easy to get off of with the help of other drugs!!! WAKE UP, MAYO!
America is insane: it makes liquor officially legal and then outlaws all the drugs that could help prevent and cure alcoholism.
I can think of no greater intrusion than to deny a person autonomy over how they think and feel in life. It is sort of a meta-intrusion, the mother of all anti-democratic intrusions.