A lot of us pose this question in our lives, but when it is applied to recovery from a psychosis, is there any point? What I mean is, is there any merit in being the same as you were before you heard voices, or a change to beliefs some people deem unusual.
Families want their ‘old’ son, daughter, brother or sister back and press this upon the voice hearer, but is this fair? Is this seeking for an old reality actually detrimental? I believe so.
Take for instance the simple task of making your dinner. Imagine you’re on the sofa and you want to cook dinner, you say to yourself, “I’ll make dinner.” You get up and make it, perhaps you will whistle or hum your favourite tune, you sit down and make it.
Now. For the voice hearer to make dinner as he tries to do so with his old ‘well’ thinking, this is what happens
“I’ll make dinner.” So good so far.
“No, you bloody well will not.”
The voice hearer takes it on the chin and gets up to the kitchen. He tries to whistle to cheer himself up.
“Why the hell are you whistling?”
And so an easy task ends in calamity. In the end the voice hearer becomes dependent on family and falls down the slippery slope of apathy and lethargy as every challenge goes wrong and his parents treat him as being very ill.
An easier way, although somewhat difficult, is to change your thinking and go underground. Scrap internal dialogue, it no longer works. Instead dream what you do and get up and do not deviate from the dream and you’ll accomplish the task easier.
But there’s more, our old self kept up a happy smiley mind. Should the voice hearer be encouraged to restore this happy mind? You guessed it, what is the point? Be kind and charitable, one of the few things that brings me joy, but to have happy activity going on in your mind no longer works, and again I think it’s detrimental to pursue such.
By all means stick to your religious beliefs, I don’t think there is a single proverb in any religion that says your mind has to be a happy welcoming place, or a hive of productive impulses, or one that is constantly seeking pleasure in social life and work.
Just be quiet and enjoy life and watch and be inquisitive and of course you will probably be with voices all your life but live with them, no longer struggling. As you dream things, say an old holiday you were on, why not share it with those around you, build up friendships and love.
And very soon you will realise there is a point.