-SELF HELP RECOVERY- FREE, FREE, FREE...

Christopher2045- Thank you for your reply and you are right about your comments...

Many times I have said in my past posts that -I AM NOT A MENTAL HEALTH PROFESSIONAL- and I do not have a college degree in mental health etc... That being said I am a very good observer of human beings with mental illness and or physical disorders and or mental disorders and or addictions etc... So without repeating myself, let's get down to ideas that might help YOU...

There are many ways of addressing the ideas of ACTS OF KINDNESS and or CONTINUOUS ACTS OF KINDNESS etc... One way is in a group setting with a large number of human beings with various disorders... A second way is with family and or relatives and or friends and or caregivers etc... A third way is in a individual setting with limited and or nobody helping YOU... etc. etc. etc...

The following acts of kindness can be used in one or all of the above settings, YOU and or others and or members of this FORUM have to put on your thinking hats on and come up with ways to make these ideas work for YOU....

1. I found that when YOU are looked at straight in the eyes and or face that most of the time YOU find that person to be sincere and they have respect for YOU...

2. If YOU are uncomfortable with somebody looking into your eyes and or face then offer them a big SMILE and say HELLO etc...

3. I have found that I could bow to somebody that had mental illness etc... (Similar to an Oriental person that shows respect by bowing to another person in greeting them)

4. When I bowed to a human being with mental illness etc... they had a look on their face, why was I bowing to them... They usually loved my answer, I was bowing out of respect for them and what they had to put up with 24 hours a day...

5. Upon greeting somebody in the morning I almost always had a big smile on and told them GOOD MORNING and how were they doing....?

6. LAUGHTER and or GROUP LAUGHTER and or SELF DEFECATING LAUGHTER etc..., almost always gets somebody in DEPRESSION etc..., to momentarily come out of the depression and join the laughter...

7. HELPING others is almost a sure fired way to feel good with -FEEL GOOD CHEMICALS- throughout your body... Their are numerous ways to HELP others that I will get into more details because almost anything YOU do will keep YOU busy... This also can help YOU keep the voices etc... in your head at a lower level....

8. If YOU are lucky and have a family etc... trying to HELP you then find a family member and or members that can take some of these ideas and bring happiness and or laughter and or kindness etc. to YOU....

9. Don't be afraid to show someone YOU trust these ideas that YOU find helpful, they will get these -FEEL GOOD CHEMICALS- going through their bodies as they are HELPING you...

10. Keeping busy with -FEEL GOOD- ideas is a good start to seeing results that will make a difference most of the time in your fighting mental illness etc. etc. etc...

I am sorry that I have not added to my list of everyday kindness that I promised YOU... I am trying to think of better ways to explain my ideas of continuous kindness that will help people in their everyday lives that will be easy to use.... (This is why I needed your interaction to help me help YOU)....

KINDNESSTHERAPY wrote:4. When I bowed to a human being with mental illness etc... they had a look on their face, why was I bowing to them... They usually loved my answer, I was bowing out of respect for them and what they had to put up with 24 hours a day...

Kindness, this is so profound! It made me cry. It means so much, its so beautiful.

There have been times when I have needed this more than anything else in my darkest hours, and I would imagine the same for anyone who is struggling. I truly believe all people with mental illness should be both treated and viewed this way. The struggle is real, often excruciatingly painful driving the person to madness rather than the illness itself. Mental illness is a very real battle fought inside a person 24/7. I do not believe there is any greater torture or pain more powerful then dealing with the symptoms of mental illness. Please believe me when I say this. Few people realize let alone even come close to understanding because its well beyond any frame of reference they have access to. But to those struggling they know first hand.

De-stigmatizing mental illness and implementing empathy based treatment is essential both from a moral standpoint and a management/recovery standpoint. The mentally ill are repeatedly met with condemnation, hostility, abuse, harassment... just to name a few by society along with the very institutions meant to help them. Much of the mental health care system is absolutely devoid of empathy, devoid of seeing the mentally ill as actual human being deserving nothing less than profound respect with unconditional support. I learned a long time ago the mentally ill deserve to be treated as survivors, people falling victim to a heinous war at absolutely no fault of their own. Respect, understanding, anything helpful makes all the difference for these human beings.

-Riccola- Your above post has helped me in many ways, the answers I am looking for just might be in your latest post... What If, what I am looking for is full time EMPATHY and or full time LOVE and or full time KINDNESS and or full time HELPFULNESS etc. etc. etc.... which can be so powerful that they might be powerful enough to help human beings with mental illness etc.... THANK YOU again for your insightful posts etc....

---YOU--- are in deep trouble, if YOU read all the news etc., they are blaming YOU for everything bad that is happening.... YOU are a perfect storm of random violence occurring almost every day and nobody is protecting your interests, etc. etc. etc..... Think about it and do something to let everybody know that YOU will fight for your freedom.....

KINDNESSTHERAPY wrote:---YOU--- are in deep trouble, if YOU read all the news etc., they are blaming YOU for everything bad that is happening.... YOU are a perfect storm of random violence occurring almost every day and nobody is protecting your interests, etc. etc. etc..... Think about it and do something to let everybody know that YOU will fight for your freedom.....

It is kind of sad though. Those struggling with mental illness are far more likely to be a victim of violence then actually become violent.

We watched in total surprise as he buried all of us with his speed and accuracy of what he was doing.... At the end of the day I went too a couple of higher staff members and told them what happened and did they know what happened and why, they just laughed and laughed and could care less of what happened and why.... Then I realized what might be an answer to some of these problem that these human beings had might be right at our finger tips of a good observer... Buy the way he went back to his slow speed the next day and was all smiles for the rest of the day....

Why I gave -YOU- this story is that I have years of this type of observations buried in milk crates in my basement.... The next story will be about the NORMAL BEHAVIOUR of human beings with supposed mental illness etc. etc. etc....

SORRY, I SCREW UP THE FIRST HALF OF MY POST AND DO NOT KNOW HOW TO GET IT BACK.....

In my last post that I posted yesterday, half the post got screwed up and I lost it while trying to post it.... So I will post a condensed version here because I think it is important to tell YOU what I saw and heard while working at the rehab work facility for human beings with various disabilities etc....

We had a work crew made up of human beings with various disabilities and a supervisor (Me) working on a project of filling ten's of thousands plastic eggs with extra strong laundry detergent. We were doing this for a couple of weeks when one of the workers who was kind of slow and the rest of us covered for him... The interesting part of the story is that one day he picked up speed of filling these eggs accurately to about TEN TIMES what he had been doing, we just watched him do this in amazement.... He worked the rest of the day at this speed and had the biggest smile on his face because he knew he was being exceptional, we were all happy for him because he was being NORMAL and or EXCEPTIONALLY ABOVE NORMAL....

I went to higher ups in the chain of command at the end of the day and told them what had happened and did they have any ideas of why and or could we duplicate what had just happened...
They just laughed and could care less about the MIRACLE we saw, the next day this worker went back to the old slow speed he had been doing.... This and many, many other examples of observations that I put on my recorders are sitting in my basement and what MIRACLES might be on these recordings and now YOU might understand my frustrations because nobody gives a $#%^....

Here is another observation that I came across that will surprise YOU.... When I first started working at this rehab. work facility I mentioned to a fellow worker who was my age and also very observant that there seemed about twenty or more different disorders among the clients in the cafeteria. He agreed with me on this and then I asked him how did they all interacted with each other without fighting and or killing each other etc... he laughed and told me to stick around and I would see chaos firsthand. Well he was right to some degree, it took almost two years of what I call -KINDNESS THERAPY- to have an affect on the clients... We the support staff started to treat these human beings as NORMAL human beings with -CONTNUOUS KINDNESS- and after awhile they started to treat each as NORMAL HUMAN BEINGS....

My first hand observations were astounding because now the clients trusted me and let me see and hear their true feelings etc... This is when I realized that the clients had two faces, one was for people who only wanted to see a person with mental illness etc. etc. etc... act like they had mental illness and acted out and acted like they were dangerous etc.... The other face they let fellow clients and people they trusted was a NORMAL FACE devoid of any mental illness etc. etc. etc... That's right, I saw many clients act normal and were normal when they were treated as a NOMAL HUMAN BEINGS...