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    Grace to the Humble: Recovering from Physical and Mental Illness
    Grace to the Humble: Recovering from Physical and Mental Illness
    Grace to the Humble: Recovering from Physical and Mental Illness
    Ebook96 pages1 hour

    Grace to the Humble: Recovering from Physical and Mental Illness

    By Mary Beth Smith

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    This book is the end result of the author trying to “get a handle on” her father who died when she was thirty-three. Beginning in her mid-forties she attempted to understand him. Endlessly calm and smiling, undisturbed by the yelling of his wife and the small spats of his children, he was like no other father. He was calm, fair and a man of integrity. This was remarkable since he had lost the use of his legs before three of his children were born. Only when she read chapter 11 of Abraham Maslow's Motivation and Personality did she realize that her father was a self-actualized man. Her father achieved psychological health through suffering and becoming humble. Other examples of the phenomenon given in the book are Lincoln, Bill Wilson, founder of A.A., and Arnold Beisser, who was completely paralyzed. Each of these three people dwelt with their tragedies in unique ways which are described here. The only common factor is that their illness humbled them. Humility seems to be required in order for someone to change.

    Abraham Maslow described psychological health as a syndrome consisting of several symptoms: their needs having been met, the self-actualized turn to helping others; they accept themselves and others; they are stoic; they act simply and naturally; they have some mission in life which is for the greater good; they are able to tolerate criticism better than others; they have compassion for others; they dislike pretentiousness; they do right and do no wrong; their creativity is more spontaneous than others. Abraham Lincoln was a self-actualized person. The author's father may have been also. Bill Wilson completely turned his life around to help other alcoholics. Without doubt, polio survivor Arnold Beisser was psychologically healthy. He was totally paralyzed yet worked as a psychiatrist using Gestalt therapy. He specialized in treating athletes having difficulties with their sport or mourning because they were forced to retire.

    Only when a person becomes humble enough to ask for help and to get it can they recover from a severe setback. For “God is opposed to the proud, but gives grace to the humble.”

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherMary Beth Smith
    Release dateMar 22, 2017
    ISBN9781370203819
    Grace to the Humble: Recovering from Physical and Mental Illness
    Author

    Mary Beth Smith

    Mary Beth Smith graduated from the College of Notre Dame of Maryland in Baltimore, Md. She worked as a computer programmer for 20 years. She enjoys cats, flying, motorcycling and lives in Cocoa, Florida with her husband novelist G. Ernest Smith.

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      Book preview

      Grace to the Humble - Mary Beth Smith

      Introduction

      What follows are stories about recovery from clinical depression and physical illness. The following are steps that I think work. It takes a long time to recover properly from severe mental or physical illness. You never get over the illness completely. Severe mental illness such as bipolar disorder or schizophrenia require that one take medication for the rest of one's life. A person paralyzed by polio or from an accident will never walk again. Some are never able to sit up or even breathe on their own. I suffered a clinical depression after a divorce in 1984. But depression is best understood by reading descriptions of Lincoln's. The mother of a friend gave him a Bible while he was in the midst of a suicidal depression and he used it for the rest of his life as a sort of lifeline.

      My father lost the use of his legs from polio when he was 35. He tried to live life as he had lived it before—trying to stick with hobbies he had had as a young man. He realized attempting to do what normal people do was not working for him. So he slowed down, talked less and volunteered for the March of Dimes. He discovered he was their perfect spokesman and was able to collect a lot of money for them. By the time I was born—five years after he contracted polio—he seemed, to me at least, to be a calm, funny and happy man. The section on my father is my attempt to discover how he became this way.

      In 1950 Arnold Beisser, a famous tennis champion, was completely paralyzed by polio. He was stuck in an iron lung for a year and a half and bed-bound a total of three years. He found that many people in the hospital resented having to help him but there were some who were compassionate. These were people who as children had had to help a disabled parent or sibling. While in the iron lung he had a mystical experience which helped him cope with that horror. Later he managed to befriend and marry the most beautiful nurse in the hospital. He had gotten his M.D. at the young age of twenty-three. Since the only physical ability that still remained to him was the ability to talk, he decided to become a psychiatrist. Also psychiatry doesn't involve much physical activity. He became successful at that profession. His wife was able to stop working and give him whatever physical help he needed. He became well known for his ability to counsel athletes who were having trouble with their game or facing retirement before they were ready for it. (He said they are never ready for it.) He wrote several papers and books on Gestalt therapy, as well as his autobiography, a book about friendship and one about the right to die.

      Bill Wilson had panic attacks, anxiety and depression which drove him to become addicted to alcohol. He got help from a religious group but realized it was too spiritual to appeal to alcoholics. After he had a mystical experience he became a changed man. He went from being a person who needed help to a person who wanted to help others. Starting with the religious group's four most important steps, he composed several more steps of his own. His first real breakthrough was helping an alcoholic when he himself had an overwhelming urge to drink. The two men, Bill Wilson and Dr. Bob Smith, together founded Alcoholics Anonymous which has helped millions of people.

      These are my twelve suggestions for recovery:

      1.   Admit you need help.

      2.   Get help.

      3.   Pray.

      4.   Slow down.

      5.   Practice silence.

      6.   Think before you speak.

      7.   Don't be picky about what you wear.

      8.   Don't be picky about what you eat.

      9.   Be compassionate towards your enemies.

      10.  Always do the right thing.

      11.  Follow your calling

      12.  Learn from criticism.

      Grace to the Humble

      Recovering from Physical and Mental Illness

      The essays here are best understood by people who have been through some particular tragedy and have thus been forced to grow up out of the narcissism that we all have which keeps us from healing.  It contains examples from Lincoln's life, Bill Wilson's, and survivors of polio.  It tells about people who have had to rebuild their lives.

      The Bible quotations are from the New International Version of the Bible.

      Chapter 1

      Lincoln

      For this chapter I used Herndons's Informants: Letters, Interviews, and Statements about Abraham Lincoln, Motivation and Personality by Abraham Maslow and my book, Abraham Lincoln: Ascent to Power 1840-1861

      Depression

      If you experience a manic psychosis or clinical depression, do see a psychiatrist. The medication he will give you is almost guaranteed to treat it successfully. However the medication will not bring you peace. Without peace resentment, anger and need for revenge will fester.

      I have gone to many meetings of the mentally ill and have listened to complaint after complaint about the members' unkind and tactless relatives. Instead of trying to gain peace, they were storing up resentment.

      President Lincoln, a depressed person his entire adult life, avoided this particular problem. Instead of storing up resentment, he refused to read the criticisms of himself in the newspapers and ignored comments about his stupidity and appearance. He didn't collect belittling assessments of himself and didn't react to them.

      He dwelt with depression, a miserable marriage, a homely appearance and the Civil War. Prior to the war he read, studied, made friends and entertained people with his comedy. He was the comedic genius of the Midwest. He would make people laugh so hard

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