After watching the video Normal is Over I was more energized and committed to continue telling my own story.
This is my story–Left of the Dial–it’s the only one I have to give you.
The ultimate purpose in championing living life Left of the Dial was to show how creativity healed me.
Art and music and fashion and writing and exercise have been the 5 things in life that helped me heal from a mental health condition.
I’m not going to back down and I’m not going to give up in advocating for “Recovery for Everyone.”
I don’t want to ever be so mentally or physically ill that I lose my power to take action to create a better world and better options for myself and my fellow human beings.
If we want to heal the planet we first have to heal ourselves.
At the end of a HealthCentral news article I wrote years ago I stated:
I”d rather be dead than psychotic.
If we don’t seek to improve our own lives we’re in no position to help others have a better life.
So the shocking cost of our own ill health is that we’re defenseless and powerless against those in power who control the economy.
Hence those in power will always control our resources of any kind–whether it’s our mental health resources or our natural resources.
Unregulated corporations have been given free reign to destroy our planet in the pursuit of profits.
Standing by while the world collapses is not a good thing.
Allen Frances, M.D. has published this year Twilight of American Sanity. The books details how our collective psyche is in denial about climate change and other pressing issues.
Frances rightly states and I agree with him: Mr. Toupee is not the problem.
The problem is that people have put their trust in beliefs that I would argue along with Frances are insane. They’ve elected a president who plays loose and easy with “facts.”
Not allowing women to control when they want to get pregnant is one such belief.
Overpopulation is the second leading cause of the ravaging of our natural resources.
The collapse of our mental healthcare system has been documented widely. It’s been going on for decades now that people are prevented from getting the right treatment right away.
I will go to my grave telling my story of getting the right treatment right away and being able to recovery fully.
I refuse to remain silent on the things that matter.
In the next blog entry I will talk about how I think mental health advocates can learn a lesson from climate change activists.
The time to act is now. It’s time to wise up and get real.
Everything I’ve written in this blog entry is interconnected. Therein lies what I think would be an effective approach to coming up with solutions.
Left of the Dial 