Description
Breakdown or Breakthrough: Signs and Symptoms of a Spiritual Awakening or Mental Illness?
Dr. Theresa Yuschok
March 3, 2016
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The process of spiritual awakening is a time of upheaval and may mimic signs of an emotional breakdown. We need to know the difference! With every symptom we need to consider biological, psychological, social or spiritual causes. A psychiatrist interested in spiritual issues, Dr. Theresa Yuschok will look at phenomena including sleep awakenings, hearing voices, ecstasy, depression, and personality changes through these various lenses. For example, insomnia may be due to medical illness, psychological conflicts, social stress or a soul call to prayer.
She will also alert us to red flags of false gurus and cults.
Spiritual emergence may take many forms: kundalini rising, shamanic illness, NDE (near death experience), peak experiences, or psychic opening with psychic experiences. After an overview of spiritual awakening across cultures, Dr. Yuschok will guide us through each of the rooms of “The Interior Castle“, a classic spiritual book of St. Teresa of Avila’s mystical development, and suggest practical applications of different states of consciousness for all.
Theresa A. Yuschok, MD is a psychiatrist at Durham VA Medical Center and on faculty at Duke University Medical Center. As President of the C.G. Jung Society of the Triangle, she has a long-standing interested in spirituality and mental health. Dr. Yushok has written a one-woman play, “The Saint with a Tambourine,” to make accessible St. Teresa’s book, The Interior Castle.
