I’m a little behind in my reading and just came across a New York Times Book Review piece on THE MIND AND THE MOON: My Brother’s Story, the Science of Our Brains, and the Search for Our Psyches, by Daniel Bergner. This is an examination of the experience of people who hear disembodied voices in their heads and how they’re treated by the medical and psychological professions. Knowing a number of people who regularly hear voices in their heads and many others who are deliberately trying to do so, I thought this might be pertinent. One of the matters discussed is a relatively new approach to this phenomenon wherein the subjects are supposed to learn to manage these communications rather than eliminate or suppress them… hmmm! The article ends:
Fortunately, Bergner reports, alternatives to biological psychiatry are being developed all over the world. Caroline, the woman whose story Bergner tells, now works in one such program, providing peer support to others. She has learned to listen to her own voices, too. When Bergner sat down with her for the first time, she said, “I’ve told them that you’re not here to hurt them.” In programs like Caroline’s, medication may be included, but the spirit of treatment is “person-centered.” The phrase doesn’t do justice to the extraordinary, intimate and wise interactions that Bergner describes in these places. Their goal is to listen to all voices, external and internal, with “ceaseless empathy,” with “deep and true interest.”
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/05/09/books/review/mind-and-the-moon-daniel-bergner.html.
