MBFM: clarification RE: Webb, etc… (2 comments)
MBFM said,
30.07.10 at 3:12 pm ·
From MBFM a clarification concerning all entries relating to James Webb, Colin-Smith and Lachman
* I felt moved to write because I believe very strongly that it is not helpful to suggest that anyone has came to misfortune or brought ill health upon themselves as a result of studying western occultism objectively, and by demystifying it, as James Webb sought to do.
*Marya Hornbacher herself has *no* position on James Webb. If anyone dislikes what is written, the onus is toward me, MBFM. I am the one who chose to give these quotes and for educational purposes.
I quoted Hornbacher’s descriptions of her own experiences with bipolar alongside extracts from Colin-Smith’s recollections of James Webb to demonstrate similarities.
The quotations from Hornbacher are given to educate the reader on how differently the experience of bipolar can be seen when one shifts from seeing things magically to seeing them medically.
Having the benefit of medical advances that Webb did not live to witness, Hornabacher understands the bipolar condition as biochemical, not a punishment for curiosity or a curse for having ventured into forbidden territory, but as a medical condition, not a punishment, a condition feels *may feel mysterious but is not mysterious*.
The quotations from Colin Smith are from her memoir Call No Man Master.
Returning to James Webb:
He never denied the human appeal of esotericism and occultism and he did not dismiss the human anxieties and concerns that make it appealing. He was warmly sympathetic to the human predicament, but insisted that esotericism and occultism and what he called ‘the flight from reason’ can and must be studied objectively as social movements, not kept fenced around with ‘dare not trespass’ signage.
His misfortune was to have a medical/biochemical condition at a time when the condition was not fully understood and treatments were not adequate. His wife, parents and his friends loved him and did all that they could.
That isnt damnation.
My grandfather died of TB because drug treatments were not available. He wasnt damned, he simply harbored the TB baccilus had compromised immunity and lived before strepomycin and INH became available. That wasnt damnation. And grandpa didnt incur any curse from the French Freemasons, he was just a bloke who had TB in 1940.
At the back of her memoir, Madness, published in the late 2000s, Marya Hornbacher gives current statistics for bipolar affective disorder and demonstrates that even today, despite great advances in medical care, this condition is still claiming lives, breaking relationships and many sufferers go an average of ten years before diagnosis–and this has nothing to do with their being students of occultism or esotericism. Its a difficult condition to live with, period. No magic about it. Just a lot of heart ache, suffering and for friends and family, as well as for the sufferers themselves.
A condition that is caused by biochemical imbalance brought about by bipolar affective disorder and is not ‘damnation’ or something that can come out of no where as a punishment for daring to study esotericism or occultism objectively, as an outsider.
3) It should by noted that there is more than one form of bipolar. Ms Hornbhacher was diagnosed with rapid cycling bipolar 1. Other forms are typed as Bipolar 1 and 2. Another author who has been successful in academia and has described her own exeperiences with bipolar is Professor Kay Jamison.
4) The persons who knew and loved James Webb did all they could to help but, living 30 to 40 years ago, when bipolar disorder was poorly understood by the medical profession as well as by the lay public, could only do so much. Many friends and spouses do all that they can and become exhausted.
Persons with bipolar are taken on drug trips caused by their own biochemistry. I recommended Marya Hornbacher’s memoir because she does such a remarkable job conveying what it is like to be in a body and a mind that are literally abducted by the biochemical shifts brought about by untreated bipolar.
The most important thing is early treatment and adherance to treatment.
It is painful to face that one has to be medically dependent and that some occupations are not possible. My social worker friend had a patient who was forced to give up working night shift as a cab driver. He was unable to get full benefit from his medications until he sacrificed the extra income and worked day shifts.
We are in a society where sleep is considered self indulgent and optional and where it is considered normal and necessary to live as a night owl, especially if young and ambitious. But for some of us, this is just not possible.
Flying through time zones can trigger manic episodes in persons who are vulnerable to bipolar. A person on Craigslist mentioned that his or her first bipolar episode was triggered by a plane trip to Australia.
The threats posed by modern life are real but are not usually identified for what they actually are. Its not the Freemason conspiracy that we have to fear, its that so very many of us are not getting the kind of sleep, at the times of day/night and are not getting the amount of sleep that we need.
We remain creaturely in fundamental ways and some of us pay that price more obviously than others when put under stress and not able to sleep 8 plus hours and rise with the sun.
James Webb was not damned and not punished. He had and suffered with a medical condition better understood today than in the 1970s.
The lesson is powerholders must be accountable for their power and any pattern of power usage needs to be identified and studied objectively if too many begin to show up giving damage reports showing a similar pattern.
Magic doesnt exist unless we already believe
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MBFM said,
30.07.10 at 5:11 pm ·
Colin-Smith
“Already he (Webb)had difficulty in finding friends who could keep up with him. He had accumulated an enormous library. He worked at his desk for very long hours, sometimes even falling asleep there from exhaustion. I had warned him affectionately of the tendencies I saw, but he didn’t take my comments very seriously. ”
If you get and read Hornbacher’s memoir Madness, she describes the very same thing–the difficulty finding people who could keep up with her when she was on hyperdrive, how silly and pedestrian people seemed when they expressed concern, suggested she delegate work, slow down.
And Hornbacher tells that divorce rates for persons with bipolar are very much higher than in the population at large.
For every person with untreated or under-treated bipolar, there is a retinue of collatoral wounded–families, friends, co-workers, and those who have to take care of medical, legal and financial disruption.
A person who had bipolar said they did well as an admin assistant to a series of bipolar CEOs ‘I could keep up with them’ my informant said.
And wrote, ‘Its hard to believe that all that chaos in my life could be caused by a change in neurotransmitter the size of the active ingredients in one aspirin tablet. But that is what one of my prescribing psychiatrists told me.’
New Man, New Age, New Socialism 