When is a crisis a breakdown and when is it a breakthrough?

Question: Serge, I am on a spiritual path and am going through a very difficult patch. Perhaps you can help me as I think I am having a breakdown – everything is collapsing in my life – and I have gone to my doctor who wants to send me to a Psychiatrist. But something tells me that perhaps this is not right and that what is happening to me is more about my spiritual life. So should I visit a spiritual teacher? I am not sure. I am in a big muddle. What do you suggest?



Serge: I have much sympathy with you. Being on a spiritual path is never easy and is always full of big challenges. Dr Roberto Assigioli, the founder of psychosynthesis, told us that ‘Spiritual development…is a long and arduous adventure…beset with difficulties and dangers and we should not be surprised if we go through certain critical stages accompanied by neuro-psychological and even physical and psychosomatic disturbances.’ In a similar vein, the great Sufi poet Rumi told us that:

‘The spiritual path wrecks the body
And after restores it to health.
It destroys the house to unearth the treasure,
And with that treasure builds it better than before!’

 So we need to keep our senses open and remember that evolving spiritually is about transforming ourselves, which in turn is about our allowing a false sense of who we are, to die, so that a new and more authentic ‘us’ or ‘self’ can gradually emerge into expression – or ‘be born’ - in its place. It follows that if the old us or the old form, stays in place and is not allowed to break down, that the new us has no ‘space’ through which to break through. And sometimes, if we happen to be going through a particularly powerful spiritual emergence, a lot of breaking down of our old patterns can take place, often causing a lot of suffering and sometimes making us feel as if we are about to die. Which in a way we are! Only it is to our old self. So experiences of pain and suffering are an integral part of certain phases of our sacred journey. The question for you to ask is: is the crisis you are experiencing of a spiritual death-rebirth nature, or are you having a psychotic break?


The problem, if you are having a crisis around a spiritual emergency and you go and visit a traditional psychiatrist, is that while he is probably a competent drug technician, he may have little understanding of spirituality, and, in his ignorance, he may well pathologise you and give you a dreadful-sounding label to your symptoms. He may also fill you full of mind numbing, anti-psychotic drugs and pack you off to the nearest loony bin! This may have a very damaging effect on your spiritual life as you may well tend to see yourself through the same ‘reductive lens’ that he is perceiving you through, making you believe that there really is something ‘badly wrong’ with you when there isn’t! It may well ensure that what might in effect be a genuine breakdown (of the old you) wanting to happen, so that a new you can emerge, is prevented from doing so.


Conversely, but less likely, the total opposite may also be happening, and you may actually be having a serious psychotic break, and are not accessing anything ‘spiritual’.  If this is the case, it can be just as dangerous if you were to encounter some loony ‘spiritual teacher’ (and they exist, believe me) with no understanding of psychology, and who may inappropriately ‘spiritualise’ your experiences and tell you that what is going on is wonderful and that you should just drink more wheat grass juice and pray and meditate more and you will soon experience Nirvana!  Here, what is not understood is a) that meditation in a psychotic state is acutely dangerous, and b) that in certain instances, powerful medication may be absolutely essential.

And to complicate things even more, we can sometimes be going through a spiritual crisis and be having a psychotic breakdown all at the same time! I have several times encountered people, who, at one level, were tuning in to very deep spiritual realms and having access to profound spiritual information, yet, who, at another part of their being, were very deeply disturbed.

Indeed, one of the problems many of us on a path, face is that there is often a strong connection between our emotional vulnerability and our possessing thinner veils around us which allow us to reach with greater ease into the deeper spiritual worlds.

What is vital when we are undergoing big crises, is that we be correctly diagnosed and be connected to a support system that is most appropriate for where we are at. I believe you should either meet up with a Psychiatrist who is also spiritually knowledgeable or connect to a spiritual teacher who is also trained in the whole domain of the many different kinds of emotional disturbances that can afflict us, whether we are on a path or not. The important thing is how inwardly solid your basic structures are. If you are going through a spiritual crisis, as I suspect you may be, and emotionally you are also fragile, you may not be able to sustain the intense heat of the spiritual fire currently burning inside you. And that can be problematic.

Please feel free to ring me if you want. I also suggest you go onto the web and type in Spiritual Emergency, England and you will connect in with several important networks that can also assist you. I hope this can be of help.