The Best and Most Effective Method for Treating Mental Disorders
What is the origin of our mental disorders and moral problems? What causes us to move away from happiness and peace and fall into anxiety and sorrow? Among all the different treatment methods, what is the most reliable and guaranteed way for treating mental disorders, and how can we achieve it?
The level of welfare and comfort for humans today is incomparable to any past generation. We are currently at the highest level of scientific and technological advancements. Access to many tools that our ancestors only wished for or could not even imagine is readily available to us in the shortest possible time. Logically, these advancements must lead us toward a greater sense of happiness and bliss, resulting in a calmer and more joyous life. However, the exact opposite has occurred.
Most of us are neither happy nor peaceful, nor do we even know the meaning of true happiness and peace! We must admit that the prevalence of spiritual and mental disorders is far greater in our generation compared to our ancestors. Today, there are few people who do not experience some degree of anxiety, sorrow, obsessive thoughts, fear, despair, and various other psychological issues. Global statistics show a sharp increase in mental health issues such as depression, divorce and declining marriage rates, homosexuality, violence and domestic murders (especially violence against children), rape, drug and alcohol consumption and related fatalities, and more. Psychiatric and psychological clinics are becoming more crowded every day, and the consumption of anti-depressant and anti-anxiety medications increases every year. Of course, strong family bonds and rich cultural/religious traditions give some nations an advantage, yet mental disorder rates are climbing there too.
Are these problems preventable and treatable, or must we accept them as the unavoidable consequence of today’s civilization? What is the method for treating mental disorders, and is there a shortcut or definitive cure for these diseases?
Shortcomings of Common Treatment Methods
The prevailing discourse in modern psychological circles suggests that mental and psychological disorders, at best, are merely controllable, and there is no definitive cure for them. Some patients have to take medication for years, and if they stop their drugs, the symptoms of the illness recur. Furthermore, most solutions offered in counseling sessions often do not dry up the root cause of the disease because they are not based on human innate nature (fitrah). Consequently, they do not have a lasting and long-term effect on the patient’s psyche. In recent years, the spiritual approach to treating mental disorders has gained attention from psychotherapists around the world and has found its place among therapeutic techniques. However, it has not been as effective as expected, primarily because true spirituality is worlds apart from what is recognized as spirituality in Western societies today. Moreover, spirituality does not form the foundation of these treatments but is merely employed as a complementary approach alongside other methods. What we aim to propose in this discourse is that, contrary to popular belief, a definitive method exists for treating mental disorders and moral impurities.
Moreover, the method for treating mental disorders is founded on a basis that is far more solid and comprehensive than purely psychological techniques. The vast majority of mental dead ends are caused by our lack of true ma’rifa of monotheism (Tawhid) and the resulting gap it creates between us and God. The more our stress, sorrows, and moral problems increase, the deeper the gap between us and God is, meaning we have drifted further from our origin and root.
Ma’rifa of Monotheism: The Best Method for Treating Mental Disorders
Every phenomenon in the universe has an inherent effect. For instance, the inherent effect of water is to wet things. It is impossible to find water that does not wet things, and objects remain dry upon contact with it. Similarly, the inherent effect of faith is happiness and peace. It is impossible to find an individual in the world who claims to have faith but is not joyful and peaceful. If you encounter someone who appears to be a believer and is committed to religious acts and rituals but is not internally happy and calm, be certain that they are not a true believer. Faith that inherently lacks joy, peace, power, vitality, and spiritual expansion is only a superficial form of faith; it is faith that has a shell but no core or depth.
But what is the path to achieving true faith? The path to achieving true faith is ma’rifa of monotheism (Ma’rifa of Tawhid). Monotheism is the closest and most reliable method for treating mental disorders and moral impurities. The more our ma’rifa of monotheism increases, the greater our spiritual power, vitality, and health will be.
Many of us grapple with a complex web of mental and moral problems. Oversensitivity and touchiness, anger, envy, resentment, suspicion, fear, lack of self-confidence, feelings of inferiority, arrogance and narcissism, hypocrisy and self-display, anxiety, prolonged sorrows, feelings of despair and regret, and other types of disorders perpetually wear down and internally torment our souls. Each of us faces a hundred-headed dragon within ourselves, and depending on the situation, one of its heads awakens to swallow our peace and vitality. What is the solution? How must we deal with this fierce dragon?
Most psychological techniques, and even the solutions offered in some books on Islamic ethics, do not solve the root cause of the problems or completely eliminate the dragon. Instead, they merely engage us with the dragon’s heads.
According to these approaches, we must fight the demon of lust for a while, struggle with anger for a period, counter the feeling of sorrow for some time, stand against our envy for a while, and so on. In the end, we often fail to completely eliminate all of them, and even if we succeed, we lose a great deal of time and energy. This is despite the fact that God has provided us with a master key called monotheism (Tawhid). Relying on this master key, we can simultaneously open all the locked doors and eliminate all impurities at once.
We have witnessed and experienced the miracle of monotheism many times in our own era. It was through the power of monotheism that combatants on the war fronts, during the Imposed War between Iran and Iraq, achieved overnight what should have taken a lifetime and reached the highest spiritual ranks. Some of them, before entering the fronts, were struggling with some mental and moral issues just like other people. However, as soon as they entered that environment, due to the special wombs of time and place and the luminosity resulting from the monotheistic beliefs present on the fronts, they transformed in a short period and soared to such heights that they became the envy of many long-time religious practitioners and claimants of piety. Therefore, before doing anything else, we must first invest in the ma’rifa of monotheism. The more our knowledge of the sacred essence of God and His dominion over the universe increases, the sooner and easier our mental disorders and moral problems will be resolved.
What Does Ma’rifa of Monotheism Mean?
In simple terms, ma’rifa of monotheism means that each one of us reaches a point where we consider ourselves only a servant of God and submit to the servitude and obedience of no one except God and His representatives.
This means that when we address God in prayers, saying, “You alone we worship, and from You alone we seek help,” our heart confirms our tongue. It means we do not just ask for help from God verbally, but practically seek the support and affection of others. Monotheism means that “There is no deity but Allah” is not just a verbal recitation for us, but a way of life. Every single one of our choices, relationships, behaviors, and thoughts must negate the existence of any god or beloved other than Allah. Monotheism means reaching the conviction that “There is no power and no strength in the world except the power of Allah” and “No one and nothing in the world is the source of effect except Allah.”
Achieving the truth of monotheism means aligning with the main stream of creation and the Supreme Power of existence; it means being liberated from multiplicity and diversity. A person who attains the truth of monotheism has reached unity and is saved from the duality and dispersion in choices, relationships, behaviors, and thoughts. Monotheism is calming because it directs all our energy and forces into one direction and one path. The monotheistic person is not seeking to please everyone else. They have only one duty: to seek the pleasure of God.
The sign of a person who has attained the truth of monotheism and whose heart confirms the Oneness of God is that they do not take the world seriously and do not grieve over any worldly misfortune. Of course, they try to provide a good life for themselves and their family, but if they lose some worldly possessions or fail to achieve something they desired, they do not succumb to sorrow, anxiety, or depression. The true monotheist is holistic and views issues from a horizon far beyond and above material perspectives. They see the guiding, superior Hand of God, like a skilled mentor, behind the small and large events of life, leading them and their life’s journey toward the sublime purpose of creation.
The believing and monotheistic person is not a beggar for the affection of others because they are connected to the source of love and affection. Whenever they feel depleted, they are immediately filled from within. Such an individual never feels a sense of inadequacy or complex and does not fight with anyone to gain the trivial possessions of the world. The true believer is like a heavy, stately ship on the sea, cutting through the waves and moving with dignity and composure toward its goal.
If the method for treating mental disorders is based on monotheism, individuals become self-sufficient from pursuing complex, costly, and ineffective therapeutic paths, and many mental disorders will resolve themselves automatically. This, however, is dependent upon the treatment process being followed with sufficient patience and perseverance so that the monotheistic ma’rifa gradually penetrates the heart over time. In subsequent lessons, we will discuss the importance of patience and time in the method of treating mental disorders.
In conclusion, it is necessary to point out that the principle of monotheism is founded upon self-knowledge. Only a person who has known themselves can know God as He truly is. If self-knowledge is not acquired, knowledge of God will remain limited to theological, doctrinal, and philosophical discussions, having little effect on daily life and individuals’ lived experiences. Consequently, as we have repeatedly emphasized since the beginning of the Self-Knowledge School until now, the only way to achieve bliss as vast as eternity is self-knowledge.