Hearing voices doesn't mean you're mentally ill, icwales, May 2, 2007
Source: icwales, May 2, 2007
Just because you hear voices does not mean you have mental health problems, according to academics embarking on a study at a Welsh university.
Psychologists at Bangor University are planning to delve into the psyches of people who hear voices, but are not mentally ill.
They say contrary to popular belief, hearing voices is a phenomenon common to all cultures around the world and is a positive experience for most people.
Estimates suggest that at least 4% of the UK population have experienced hearing voices or “clairaudience”.
But little is known or understood about the phenomenon as those who do hear voices often do not tell others and it is thought the actual number is higher than 4%.
PhD student Katy Thornton, from the university’s School of Psychology, hopes to study people across Wales who are untroubled by the experience of hearing voices.
She said, “Contrary to popular belief, the fact that a person hears voices does not automatically mean that they have mental health problems. The majority of people who hear voices have benign or positive experiences. Hearing voices is different for each person. Some find it a spiritual experience; others may feel their voice is another part of themselves.
“Some people get help and support from their voices while other people’s voices might just talk about quite mundane matters. Each person experiences it differently – it might be a disembodied voice or it might be their own thoughts with somebody else speaking them.”
Miss Thornton, 25, said she became fascinated by people who hear voices after working at a Leeds Psychiatric Hospital for six months in 2002.
“It’s something I’ve always been interested in, especially after working in the psychiatric hospital with people who hear voices.”
Miss Thornton will spend the next six months cataloguing the experiences of those who hear voices.
Historically, hearing voices was considered an important, meaningful and in some cases divine experience. Many important religious figures have heard voices, as have influential thinkers such as Socrates, Carl Jung and Gandhi. Today, hearing voices is still seen as a gift in most non-western cultures, says Miss Thornton.
Psychology lecturer Dr David Linden, who will supervise Miss Thornton’s research, says the experiences of people who are relaxed about clairaudience is an under-researched area.
He said, “In clinical practice we would normally encounter patients who hear voices and are distressed by them.
“However, we don’t know what it’s like to hear voices and not be troubled by them and we’ve not paid the phenomenon enough attention.”
Those taking part will be interviewed and asked to complete questionnaires about themselves and their experience.
They will also be invited to have a brain scan, a non-invasive, risk-free process, which enables the scientist to detect activity as thought processes take place.
Miss Thornton says she is not going into the work with any preconceived notions.
She added, “I’m interested in the individual’s experience of hearing voices. People will have the opportunity to discuss their experiences and how they understand them in their own words.
“I’m not making any prior psychiatric or spiritual assumptions about these phenomena.”
Voices in the heads of the famous
The Greek philosopher Socrates, 470-399BC, is portrayed in Plato’s Dialogues as a teacher and man of reason who followed a divine voice in his head. Regarded as the father of Western philosophy he was devoted to the education of the citizens of Athens.
Carl Gustav Jung, 1875-1961, was a Swiss psychiatrist and influential thinker who stressed the importance of understanding the psyche via religion, philosophy, dreams, art and mythology. He carefully recorded his dreams, fantasies, and visions, and drew, painted, and sculpted them as well.
Gandhi, 1869-1948, was the leader of the Indian nationalist movement against British rule, and pioneer of the non-violent protest, who also reportedly heard voices in his head.
US President George Bush, left, has said God told him to ‘go and fight those terrorists in Afghanistan’ and ‘end the tyranny in Iraq’. The President made the revelation at a meeting with Palestinian officials in June 2003.
Divine The war in Iraq has been heavily criticised but Bush has said God told him to ‘end tyranny’ there
Comments
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I am interested in your research project questioning detrimental effects, if any, suffered by those persons hearing voices...... Just recently i have been considering similar research but not from a purely clinical aspect..........it is becoming well known that people experimenting with the Occult are vastly plagued by after effects, which may remain with them for ever in varying degrees.One of the after effects is hearing voices, either to deride the sufferer or delude the sufferer into believing that this is quite normal and as you say, they become almost accepting of their voices, or the voices show their real colours and persuade their host to carry out acts which they might not normally engage in, even to murder. In New Zealand where I live, very little credence is given to hearing voices, and as you experienced in Leeds, those sufferers with voices are usually immediately diagnosed as being mentally ill, or severely emotionally unbalanced, and some are diagnosed quite incorrectly as being multiple person disorder cases, the sufferer is foolish enough to say that they hear several different voices. As i understand it, MPD sufferers usually only have one personality at any one time, but may have several different personalities. In Golden Bay where i live, a small community, mainly agricultural but an area which attracts those seeking alternative lifestyles and practices, i.e. pagan and occult activities, there has been quite an increase in the number of cases of mental illness and hearing voices is quite common. All the hearing voices cases are diagnosed as mental or emotional illness without question and are treated with high power medication and general support in the community. Two cases in particular are quite interesting to me because in neither case do i see mental illness of any form, just that kind of flatness which comes from high dosage medication. Case 1. A young woman in the early thirties, single, unemployed (able), who is heavily medicated, and is a known hearer of voices, in fact she will chuckle at the voices and have 'silent head' conversations with them.............is able to drive and care for herself and seems perfectly normal except that she has a suspicious demeanour and does not possess a genial nature. This might be present regardless of the voices, but is probably not aided by the medication prescribed for mental illness. Case2. A young woman 20, never worked, does sheltered activities, parents cultivate drugs on their section of land, father might soon be imprisoned. The drug culture is very strong in our area, both cultivation and consumption, with a strong lobby group to de-criminalise drugs. This woman hears voices and they tell her to do anti social things, but she also responds to them, and so it appears that she is talking to herself and she blames the voices for all anti social activities........it may be quite right that she blames them for encouraging her to do this, but ultimately the criminal voice can be subdued. I am a Christian, and a firm believer in the voices some people hear. Some criminals use voices as a means of evading punishment and I understand that it can be quite difficult to prove their existance. Scans might be taken at a time when the spirits that direct the voices are not present. My intended research is not into the voices per se, but to gain an insight into how many persons in a particular area or country are being either incarcerated in institutions, or highly medicated at home or in sheltered/half way houses, who have had some activity with the occult and therefore come under the attack of the supernatural. Occult activities are on the increase in most countries of the world as people experiment with the supernatural, and occult also includes those who parade before an audience, seeking to bring comfort to a select few, supposedly from spirits from beyond the grave. One thing is for sure....there are no spirits of the dead walking this earth, but there are tens of thousands of evil spirits 'time sharing' the people of this earth. Some victims are more vulnerable and interest begins in infancy and childhood and the spirits maintain their interest until a time that suits them. Evil spirits will 'take people out'...and it may be by death, or by a slow living death in the form of medication and the social stigma of mental illness.........Both the cases I quoted have involved drugs and supernatural activities which gives evil spirits the key to that person, and they will either be used for ongoing evil against others, or they will be taken out via other means, and the easiest is the hearing voices. BUT, you see there is an answer, which is long and fairly slow, but very certain, and that answer is being with faith based persons and renouncing the evil which they have allowed to enter into their lives. I speak from experience, I was unwittingly under attack as a small child, with a mother with undiagnosed P.N.D. who suddenly became normal overnight 11 years later, having been committed in St. Bernards hospital in Southall, all those years.........I was naturally vulnerable as a target. Children from safe, parentally sound homes are seldom under attack, but I had a brutal upbringing but I was a Christian. I delved into the occult in a vain attempt to find spirit relatives and gain answers, i went against all that I should have believed in as a Christian, and I became dreadfully ill for many weeks, but prayers of those who cared deeply for me, and a resurgence in my own faith led to a control of the situation, and I can assure you that with faith, prayers or caring individuals and repentance for delving into the occult, really does work. My husband advised my doctor of my distraught behaviour at home, where only I knew that I was not mentally ill.....if I had told my husband that I was tormented by evil spirits I would have been locked up faster than you could say "All Blacks"...........but faith began the slow healing process and although I am not out of the woods totally, life is more tolerable now, and my faith is stronger than ever. My doctor specifically asked me if I heard voices when i next visited him, and i knew the inference - so I lied and said that I didn't..................getting older is bad enough without being hindered by mind bending drugs which cannot help a situation. I am not sure how many hearing voices people would admit to occult or similar types of activities or even welcome the idea that the voices are not really them but beings that I know they would prefer not to think of.......Those people in the Church who are expert at dealing with this type of problem and understand exactly how and why some people are afflicted, say that spirits cause voices, whether nice little ones, the chatty little voices, the evil ones which encourage rape and murder, or those which help a presenter pass on messages for so called dead friends and relatives.....you can actually see them waiting for the voice to pass on the detail, it is not a dead relative, but an evil spirit. Three years ago, I could never have written this. For me evil was having a couple of extra chocolates when on a diet, a casual fling, cover up lies.......these just test out the waters, and Christian folk are more under threat than those who are not or confessed pagans......so another interesting point is to see how many were committed Christians prior to the voices starting, and what triggered the voices. Your research is into the Clinical side of hearing voices, mine lies with the spiritual side because I am a Christian.......and that faith enables me to doubt any clinical causes, and to continue looking at other more dangerous forces.......if you have a moment log onto the website of Bill Subritsky and see what he has to say about voices......I do know that more people hear voices than are prepared to admit to this phononema, even my former Vicar turned to me once and said quietly, Even I hear voices, and he had been South African before coming to NZ. If I was to study NZ's mental health statistics I would lay odds on finding that in the higher alternative lifestyle regions that the incidence of hearing voices would be much higher, and I would be interested to know whether the voices are across the spectrum of people or whether there is a higher incidence amongst drug users or former drug users, for whom much time is spent with what I call a 'vacant' brain and thought process, thus allowing other influences to creep in - which they do. All churches are having greater calls on their deliverers, and recently i met a Priest who is an Exorcist and a good one at that, and all denominations are finding themselves under increasing pressure to provide this type of service, and where those designated mentally ill, become quite normal again when confronted with this specialist type of spiritual healing. Not sure how you can use any of this, but please do not discount it without speaking either to someone called The Deliverer within the anglican church, or a good evangelical speaker......and any avenue is worth exploring..........how many of your recorded cases are/were Christians, how many of non practising faith...........it might be relavant.......certainly will figure highly in my researches. Yours sincerely Avryll Sixtus
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Shame you only working with Welsh people (i am in Cornwall). For some years I had very nasty voices but gradually I got rid of the worst ones and learned how to get useful stuff from the others. Its still unreliable and no good for the lottery but my voices are a great blessing if a bit weird. I have never needed or wanted psychiatric attention. Get in touch if I can help. Ric
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I too feel it is a shame that you do not look beyond your area, but recognize you need to have some kind of baseline. I am in the US, and lived my whole life hearing voices, dreaming and seeing visions, that to me were very spiritual, and which gently guided me to make choices that made my life better. However, When depression hit, all of that changed. It became fear filled images of death and dying, voices tand sounds that made it impossible to sleep. I have to wonder if for those who experience voices also find their voices influenced by mood.
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These " Voices " can be very informative. For instance, all the code info on one particular web site page, was exposed via " Voices ". Click on " K. Sean Proudler " for a little peek. If Hallucinations are real, then that means that these so called Hallucinations are so powerful, that they can even effect the writing of a book that was written long long ago. Or, it simply means that the " Voices " are not the result of Hallucinations after all. Choose !
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hi ric walker can u give some info on how u got rid of the voices"who stand looking'??? thank u
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i am the son of god and i hear vioces all the time but mine are real. bad luck loosers im the real deal! God and the Devil try to get me to join sides against jesus so i can become king. My mum knows but wont admit it so i think she must be a lesbian if she cnat understand. I am not crazy. neither was jesus. i am the king ia am back tis is my kingdom on earth. all who believe in me can come all who do not shall be smited in the year 2009... im tupacs brother as well.
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God, and Devil characters, etc. are today simply defined by the human mind and what it can comprehend. What exists on the other side, is that which exists on the other side, thus it is that which is beyond the scope of human comprehension since we are on this side and not theirs. That is part of what being on the other side is all about. And so it is to be understood that what truly exists on the other side is that which the human mind can not comprehend. However, as I have said, there is the limit to the scope of the human mind, and thus its limits can be taken advantage of by many of those on the other side who therefore due to being on the other side do not have limits of this nature. The annoying part about it all is that a human mind may be dropped into just a minute portion of the other side, and this petit portion of the other side is suffice enough in size to wrap completely around a human mind. Thus the human mind thinks it has been exposed to the ALL. Meanwhile someone else who has the similar experience is expose to a different portion of the other side, yet he or she too thinks that he or she has been exposed to the all. The end result is many different stories of completeness are being told, and so since not all of them can true, none of them are being believed. Many of the " I am the one. " stories come about, and they all end up looking like crazy fools. Now here is the real bummer of it all. Concerning the completeness of reality, there is a center, and so there is actually a central point of consciousness, and that this does belong to one person in particular. This is a consciousness present on our side. The other end of the complete consciousness, is of course on the other side. And so this poor dude on our side, being " The One " if you will, is also thrown into the classification of being some delusional nutcase. How do I know of this ? Click K. Sean Proudler and judge for yourself. The proof provided will still not convince as of yet.
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I am interested in learning more about hearing voices I also believe that too often people are medicated for experiencing such things and given labels that suggest they are mentally ill I am a suffer from such things from having worked in a mental health nursing home
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I have suffered from hearing voices for over 16 years, for the first 8 years they controlled me in a very negative way,I was consumed by fear and lived life as a recluse. I am now married with two children, I run my own business and I am able to live my life to the best of my abilty.I still hear the voices and at times they can be overwhelming but they do not control me anymore.I have my own beliefs which help me to understand the nature of the voices and I do believe that they can be just as many positive ones as there are negative,BUT I DO KNOW THAT TO THE PEOPLE WHO ARE VOICE HEARERS THESE ARE AS JUST AS REAL AS ANY OTHER INTERACTION.I wish anyone who suffers (has this gift) all my best wishes, but please understand that you are still your own person only you have the power to make your own decisions. God bless and good luck.
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I don't believe that all experiences of hearing voices are evil or demonic. About a month after the death of my son I not only heard his voice on two separate occasions clearly, full sentences, but also heard what I believed to be God talking to me one morning as I rose from my bed. It was very spiritual and comforting and I believe that God spoke to me because he knew I was deeply suffering and also that I was a "doubting Thomas" and needed affirmation that my son was OK and that "life" does goe on. Also the fact that I have many, many blessings in my life (despite losing my son). My second dear son, for one. And for anyone who says there is "no proof" there is a God, I firmly believe that he does reveal himself from time to time in an attempt to help (and recover) lost souls. I do, however, believe that toying with the occult can cause bad things to happen to people. Personally, I am a Christian and have never dabbled in the occult, however, was completely split from my Christian upbringing until this experience. You might say I'm "born again". Even to this day, my attitude is I have appreciated the words that were spoken to me, but I'm not about to try talking back (except in my prayers).