In clinical practice today, mental health practitioners begin with the assumption that all mental illness begins with pathology and is cured through discovering and fixing what's wrong. Patients, perhaps sensing this, arrive at their doctors appointments with questions based on this assumption: why do I feel like this? Why can’t I get what I want out of life? Why am I so sick and how can you help me?

As a culture, we have a tendency to dwell on our weaknesses with the thought that through sharpening our understanding of the things that contribute to the problem, we will find the solutions. This is and has been a very useful approach for fixing most simple and many complex problems in medicine -- it gives us a way of understanding where dysfunction occurs, provides a tool for analyzing these dysfunctions, presents a way of categorizing and naming things and inspires a methodology for returning the human being to a state of non-dysfunction.

Unfortunately, using only this approach for understanding mental health and the amelioration of the causes of human suffering is incomplete at best and harmful at worst. Though we have made significant advances in our understanding of the way the brain works, the simple explanations psychiatrists have used to understand and explain mental illness (i.e. depression is caused by a chemical imbalance) are not proven fact, and new discoveries change these frequently. Consequently, the treatment we provide often leave both patient and practitioner frustrated with the results. Through this model, we try to correct what’s wrong without recognizing just how right things are already. We stand on our mountain peaks and look out over our failures, not recognizing just how far we’ve come, what we’ve overcome and how strong we actually are.

A different way of looking at mental health is through a resilience based approach or one that examines the strengths and capacities that appear both inherently in the developing human being and which we have learned explicitly through our exploration of science, spirituality and philosophy. This model is based on the assumption that human beings are fundamentally whole, and through the recognition and cultivation of certain traits, skills and capacities, we can live happier, more productive and more meaningful lives.

This is by no means a new idea. Not only has it existed in various forms throughout history, but it is being studied by scientists and doctors today. Even so, though a resilience based approach has gained some popular acceptance, its principles and wisdom has barely penetrated the edifice of modern medicine.

I hope to do several things with this blog. First, I will examine the medical and psychiatric research to see if a resilience approach to healing has merit. Second, I will identify resilience factors that exist in human physiology, psychology and culture. Third, I will point my readers to studies, books and techniques that have proven both safe and effective in the cultivation of resilience factors. Finally, based on what I find above, I will try to articulate a way we as a culture and world can move forward through education and social interactions to help us become happier and healthier.

I understand that this is a daunting task. All I can say is that I will do my best. Over the life of this blog I hope to put out some ideas I've been working on, review and present the scientific literature in a way the public can understand, present my own patient interactions where I use this approach and, finally communicate with my readership for the purpose of ameliorating suffering, improving resilience and better understanding this complex subject.


I look forward to beginning in earnest soon.