Psychotherapy And Values, Part Two

1) Mental health, in the way I wish to explore it, is not something that is defined by a majority vote; that is, consensus does not define health, it only defines agreement (and the emperor may still, indeed, have no clothes on, regardless of his kowtowing subjects agreement to the contrary).

2) Mental health may not be a given in any set of cultural or social circumstances.

3) Mental health may exist only relative to what is True, regardless of opinion.

4) If this is so, then it becomes necessary to search for and to discover what is True, and then to align oneself with this Truth in order to become mentally healthy.

5) Since what is True is not variable from culture to culture, mental health takes on a larger meaning than previously thought.

6) It is therefore possible to be situated well within cultural norms and expectations, and at the same time to not meet criteria for mental health. Hence the state of the world.

"An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind", said Mahatma Gandhi. This is a succinct expression of the difference between consensus and health; and of the foolishness - we might even say of the insanity - of merely following the crowd, or the cultural norm, or the prevailing value, when these are contrary to Truth.

The thing about the Truth is that, while it is the same everywhere, it becomes confused with relative, local, specific cultural forms of expression, and then these forms of expression are mistaken for the Truth, defended to the death, and imposed upon others. Confusion, rather than Truth, prevails.

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