Transcendental Commentary on the Issues of the Day
Recently, the front page of the International Herald Tribune carried the headline "One in 5 Americans Is Mentally ill, Study Finds." The article described a government-sponsored survey consisting of extensive interviews by the National Institute of Mental Health with ten thousand adults. Findings were based on strict criteria for mental disorder, and a mentally ill person was determined as "one in need of professional help." The article said, "Nationwide projection of the data indicated that 18.7 percent of the adult population suffers from at least one disorder of mental health. Anxiety disorders were found most common, affecting 8.3 percent of adults. Substance-abuse disorders, including alcohol abuse, were next at 6.4 percent."
Whether determined by statistical study or by commonsense observation, whether in America or in any other modern culture, clearly mental illness is on the rise a fact we take more or less for granted as a part of today's way of life. Mental disorder is listed in the Vedic scripture Srimad-Bhagavatam (1.1.10) as one of the common characteristics of people in the present age: "In this iron age of Kali, men have but short lives. They are quarrelsome, lazy, misguided, unlucky and, above all, always disturbed."
His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, the founder and spiritual master of the Hare Krsna movement, proposed using a Vedic standard in determining mental disorder. His criterion was that anyone who identifies with the temporary material body, and thus works only for the satisfaction of the body and its extensions, disregarding the needs of the soul, is to be considered mentally ill. This definition of mental derangement fits practically everyone, indicating that the study by the National Institute of Mental Health found only the tip of the iceberg.
While the National Institute of Mental Health recognizes our growing need for professional help, today's psychologists and psychiatrists are not fully qualified, because they lack a proper understanding of the spiritual malaise at the root of all mental disturbances. That malaise is ignorance of the spirit soul, our eternal self.
A sane proposal, therefore, is that mental health officials consult pure devotees of Lord Krsna. The devotees are aware of the Vedic literature's sure and simple prescription for regaining full mental health: chanting the holy names of God. The Srimad-Bhagavatam (12.3.51) states, "Although Kali-yuga is an ocean of faults, there is still one good quality about this age. It is that simply by chanting the Hare Krsna mantra one can become free from material bondage and be promoted to the transcendental kingdom."
To mental health officials, this proposal may sound like religious wishful thinking, if not downright madness. And certainly they should not accept such a proposal without careful investigation. To conduct an investigation, psychotherapists could include in every therapy session fifteen minutes of chanting the Hare Krsna mantra: Hare Krsna, Hare Krsna, Krsna Krsna, Hare Hare/ Hare Rama, Hare Rama, Rama Rama, Hare Hare. We predict that they would be astounded at the results.
That's a headline we're waiting to read: "Chanting 'Hare Krishna' Increases Mental Health, Study Finds."