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It is time for more holistic practices in mental health

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101–110 of 144 posts

Re: It is time for more holistic practices in mental health

#101

I strongly believe we don't have "mental health problems", yet we have a global style of living in "modern society" that is inherently incompatible with the way we evolved: e.g. office-based daily tasks instead of walking and hunting, foods fabricated to stimulate us instead of what we could find in nature, high buildings and cities with sound/light/air pollution instead of a calm, clean nature, always trying to "opt…

You appreciate "calm, clean nature" from the perspective of a technological civilization with most of the basic needs met. On its own it can just be a lot of boring nothingness with or without back-breaking labor.

Perhaps "optimizing for time/money" is as much who we really are as slow living and you're just ignoring the other half.

Re: It is time for more holistic practices in mental health

#102

I strongly believe we don't have "mental health problems", yet we have a global style of living in "modern society" that is inherently incompatible with the way we evolved: e.g. office-based daily tasks instead of walking and hunting, foods fabricated to stimulate us instead of what we could find in nature, high buildings and cities with sound/light/air pollution instead of a calm, clean nature, always trying to "opt…

Someone once told me something thought provoking - we as a species have never spent so much time away from touching the ground, it's almost as if it is lava.

We spend 1/3 of the day sleeping in beds, raised off the floor, sometimes in apartments 10s of metres away from the ground.

We spend 1/3 of the day working in artificial offices, sat on chairs, 10s of metres away from the ground.

The other 1/3 of the day we may be sat in cars/ other transport raised from the ground, sat at tables, sat on our sofas, in our flats doing chores etc. Even if we are walking from A to B, if you are a city dweller, you're probably still walking on tarmac separated with the rubber soles on your shoes.

He then asked when the last time I touched grass or soil with the soles of my feet (or even with my hands). At the time it was about April in London, so just coming out of winter. I think the last time I had honestly walked barefoot on grass/soil was possibly September - and I LOVE the outdoors, go running/ hiking often, very active lifestyle etc.

We have grown so far away from how we evolved, so quickly, and most of us are completely unaware of it. So yes, I ditto your comment - modern society, its stimulus and it's constant FOMO orientation, is absolutely causing our issues today.

I couldn't afford to buy a property in London with a garden to address this issue, so subsequently moved up to North Leeds. I now ensure I am outside in my bare feet at least once or twice a week regardless of the weather. This morning I spent five minutes walking through a stream barefoot to the base of a local waterfall, listening to the birds, playing with my dog, feeling the nature, and wow do I feel happy and focused today as a result. Megacity life if killing us.

Re: It is time for more holistic practices in mental health

#103
It's easy to forget that science has found many conditions that affect the brain that, because science can easily treat or prevent them, we no longer consider to be mental health conditions. Off the top of my head, hookworm, syphilis, lead poisoning, various vitamin deficiencies, various prion diseases, thyroid diseases, sleep apnea, ergot poisoning, fetal alcohol syndrome...

Sure, there are almost certainly many cases of anxiety, depression, and ADHD that are not amenable to "You have a chemical imbalance, here is a pill to fix it, get on your way." However, society has reaped enormous rewards from the idea common mental issues may have simple and understandable causes that can be treated or prevented in unfeeling, cookie-cutter fashion.

Re: It is time for more holistic practices in mental health

#104

I strongly believe we don't have "mental health problems", yet we have a global style of living in "modern society" that is inherently incompatible with the way we evolved: e.g. office-based daily tasks instead of walking and hunting, foods fabricated to stimulate us instead of what we could find in nature, high buildings and cities with sound/light/air pollution instead of a calm, clean nature, always trying to "opt…

I've always felt this way, and while I never thought I was alone exactly (the documentary, Koyaanisqatsi, literally translated as "life out of balance" suggests that some have come to this realization before I was even born), but I thought that perhaps others were better able to deal with modernity than I. That is probably true to some extent, but increasingly I think that most people are affected but aren't as conscious of the reasons for their malaise. Also, a lot of people still seem to be able to believe in religion (I'm sadly not one of them) which seems to help them.

Re: It is time for more holistic practices in mental health

#105

I strongly believe we don't have "mental health problems", yet we have a global style of living in "modern society" that is inherently incompatible with the way we evolved: e.g. office-based daily tasks instead of walking and hunting, foods fabricated to stimulate us instead of what we could find in nature, high buildings and cities with sound/light/air pollution instead of a calm, clean nature, always trying to "opt…

Do you believe that people were happier in pre-modern times?

Re: It is time for more holistic practices in mental health

#106
post #45

I talk a lot to people who are training to become therapist, to PhD's in psychology, and read a lot of psychology papers. If there is one thing it's time for then it's for academia to get out of their ivory tower and face the real world. As Taleb puts it: “I will repeat the following until I am hoarse: it is contagion that determines the fate of a theory in social science, not its validity.” Or as Yarkoni & Westfall…

Research has shown that there is very little difference between therapeutic protocols, and most of the difference between them can be explained by the degree of engagement of the therapist in the life and challenges of the patient.

Basically, the value of therapy is a sympathetic, grounding person sitting down with you and helping you sort out your life. The therapeutic modalities matter vastly less than the interpersonal skills and "centeredness" of the person you're talking to.

Re: It is time for more holistic practices in mental health

#107
post #17

It is incredible how bad we are, at the end of the first quarter of 21st century, at having a well planned and executed strategy to improve mental health of people. Compare it to physical health. For instance, everyone is advised to take regular tests (like blood tests). While things can still be improved a lot, this simple proactive measure helps detect many health problems before they cause serious damage. For ment…

"Maybe advances in AI can bring proactive mental health monitoring to more people."

Not sure I like the sound of that... bit dystopian sounding.

Re: It is time for more holistic practices in mental health

#108
post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

they all already exist. Especially the drugs for muscle mass, which are safe and very well characterized.

I'm curious what you mean here, other than potentially anabolic steroids? I would not call these "safe", so I think you might have meant something else?

Testosterone and human growth hormone were the the main ones I had in mind, but I think there is much more a specialist could so that would be safe and effective

Re: It is time for more holistic practices in mental health

#109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If your baseline is a questionaire, then the questions you would think to ask are going to be informed by your preconceived notions of the issue, and you're forcing the raw data out there to conform to these formats you've set for it. Generally, you'd run a bunch of interviews to develop a question bank, and then run a bunch of pilots to figure out which set of questions work best. I do agree that there's a big pro…

That's a very interesting perspective, thank you. If you don't mind me asking, do you have a sense of why this feels necessary in psych - is it deference to some preferred school of thought that needs to sign off on your work, or is it more that you need to signal that you know lots of theory? How did you go about it, when they made you put in a theory chapter? What would happen if you turned in some psych work that…

> What would happen if you turned in some psych work that was robust in its method, but without explicit references to theory?

It would get rejected. I actually replicated a really interesting negative finding (around optimism and health) multiple times with a good design, and couldn't get it published as I didn't have an explanation for why this happened (i do now, but have been in the private sector for well over a decade at this point).

> it deference to some preferred school of thought that needs to sign off on your work, or is it more that you need to signal that you know lots of theory?

Always seemed like physics envy to me at least.

Re: It is time for more holistic practices in mental health

#110
post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The ball is not supposed to do anything, the ball has no intention. The ball just is, and it follows the laws of physics.

I think you're only aware of a narrow definition of "supposed to", you're saying the same thing I am. Edit: to expand a bit. My point is exactly that - if the universe is deterministic. This only applies up to the limit of precision that it can use to calculate its own physics laws but otherwise it should be deterministic. And within a deterministic system all objects are supposed to do certain things, according to t…

I see; then I concur.

Even within a non deterministic universe — physics suggest it isn’t — there’s still no room for anything outside physical laws.

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