Marika Candelaria - Week 5

This week’s readings were based on a fascinating topic of incorporating shamanism with mental health issues and psychology. Recently, I have been taking a psychology class which mentions the various medications to treat mentally ill people. It is interesting to learn about the different views of a shaman and how to heal and treat people who we think have mental illnesses. However, it might be hard to distinguish between a person who needs a shaman or medication to treat them. Introducing shamanism and spiritual healing in our studies could develop an education to distinguish between a mentally ill person who needs medication or a person who needs assistance through spiritual healing. Western medicine could still help treat patients but some might not be treated from these medications because they continue to have spiritual messages. I think that spiritual healing is also a coping mechanism and a source of therapy to gain self-identity and knowledge of the illness you are going through. It provides an awakening to the present life and what you could do to help yourself. In my psychology class, they briefly introduced different spiritual methods of healing and how to treat patients with other beliefs and religions. However, there is only a small amount of acknowledgment on this topic. In correlation to this week’s lecture, we discussed the benefits of cannabis, LSD, and other forms of drugs to mental illnesses or spiritual awakenings. People could gain different perspectives of life and realize that there is more to their existence. Because western and South Asian healing both use this method, I think that shamanism should be further discussed in psychology to address the significance of treating the mentally ill. This could bring up new topics about using these medications properly and bringing diversity in western treatments or therapy sessions. One question I have in mind--How can we bring western treatments and spiritual healing together in psychology classes today?