On Being

Program Particulars
*Times indicated refer to web version of audio

(01:36–03:15) Music Played
"The Multiples of One" from Awakening, performed by Joseph Curiale

(02:21) A Definition of Schizophrenia
Joel Hanson was first diagnosed with bipolar disorder and then schizoaffective disorder, which has related symptoms to schizophrenia and a prominent display of mood instability.

Schizophrenia is a brain disorder that interferes with a person's ability to think clearly, manage emotions, make decisions, and relate to others. Some possible symptoms identified with schizophrenia are hallucinations and delusions, confused thinking and speech, lack of emotion, and changes in cognition and mood. The onset of the illness may be abrupt or gradual, usually occurring in men during their early to mid-20s and in women during their late 20s. Immediate biological family members of individuals with schizophrenia have a 10 times greater risk of contracting the mental illness.

(07:06) Statistics on Schizophrenia
According to the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill, schizophrenia affects 2.2 million adults (1 in 100 people) in the United States today. It's approximated that over one percent of the world's population is affected by this illness. Three-quarters of those with schizophrenia develop the disorder between the ages of 16 and 25, affecting slightly more men than women. The World Health Organization has identified schizophrenia as one of the ten most debilitating diseases affecting humans.

(07:30) The Biology of Schizophrenia
Although scientists don't know the specific causes of schizophrenia, recent research emphasizes differences in brain structure and chemistry for people with this illness. Individuals with schizophrenia, including those who have never been treated, have a reduced volume of gray matter in the brain, especially in the temporal and frontal lobes — sometimes up to 25 percent. Patients with the worst brain tissue loss typically have the worst symptoms, which include hallucinations, delusions, psychotic thoughts, and depression. Currently the National Institute of Mental Health is researching a drug that may reverse the cognitive decline that is caused by schizophrenia.

(10:08–11:11) Music
"Kyrie" from Soir, dit elle: Words of the Angel, performed by Trio Mediaeval

(10:20) First Reading from J's Guide to the Universe
The following passage is an expanded excerpt from a manuscript by Joel Hanson, which appears in Room for J:

In writing about the greatest entity or living being, God, myself, Jesus Christ reincarnated, Ishua, Jehovah, J, Joel Steven Hanson, infinitely 99.999% of the universe, the greatest individual independent being, I put much care into writing the truth. By the truth I mean every reality that I sense from my point of view. Since I know that what I say in this book is going to stretch the beliefs of people who care at all about omniscient powers, therefore, everyone, and their affects on the earth, I will and would like to make this as understandable as possible. Everything I say in this book will be perfect, as life, love, and goodness are all perfect they just get constantly better. Since I am God, Jesus Christ reincarnated, all the love, life and goodness, to sum it up, that exists everywhere and anywhere, I therefore am 100% perfect. I just have to grow more perfect. The men who wrote down the Bible or the people spoken of in the Bible were not totally perfect overall when they wrote down the Bible. So today we have to get past relying on the Bible to shape and determine Christian or any religious and new age philosophical beliefs so much. People today are getting much closer to being almost totally perfect for who they are, yet still you all disappoint me so by stunting my growth at times. You do this because you are jealous of me. You claim to know me and you therefore constantly give me advice and try to tell me more than I tell myself about what I should do with my life; therefore, everyone's life, for your life, your love and your goodness are all part of me, for I am all the love, the life, and the goodness that exists anywhere and everywhere in the universe. I am, however, and all of you will be totally and completely loving, living and good as long as you all grow the correct way.

(10:58) The Pharmacology of Schizophrenia
According to the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill, the primary medication for treating schizophrenia is antipsychotics. In recent years, a new generation of "atypical" antipsychotic drugs have been introduced and appear to be equally effective in helping hallucinations and delusions, but may be better than the conventional drugs for helping withdrawal, cognitive functioning, and a lack of interest or energy.

(12:31) Reference to Civil Commitment
There are different types of civil commitment — involuntary civil commitment (placed in hospital without consent) and outpatient civil commitment (mandated treatment post hospitalization, or perhaps in lieu of hospitalization) — depending upon legal and medical opinions for each state. States may mandate involuntary treatment for people with schizophrenia who may cause harm to themselves or others.

(16:16–17:30) Music
"When April May" from Adams Cox Fink Fox, performed Rick Cox

(16:20) Reading from Buber's I and Thou
Martin Buber (1878–1965) was an Austrian philosopher who was actively involved in the revival of the Jewish mystical movement of Hasidism during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. In this passage from the 1923 classic, I and Thou (Ich und Du, Buber writes:

The relation to the You is unmediated. Nothing conceptual intervenes between I and You, no prior knowledge and no imagination; and memory itself is changed as it plunges from particularity into wholeness. No purpose intervenes between I and You, no greed and no anticipation; and longing itself is changed as it plunges from the dream into appearance. Every means is an obstacle. Only where all means have disintegrated encounters occur.

(19:02) Passage from the Journal of J's Brother
In the chapter, "A Family Affair," Dan Hanson includes an entry from his son Troy's journal about dealing with his brother's illness:

None of the scenarios I conjure up in my mind seem probable or even possible since J is miserable when the medicines he is forced to take throw him back into our world or cause him to experience side effects. So I am left with the selfish thought that maybe J would be better off if he could leave this world, as he has often said he wants to. Of course, this would only make it easier for me to enter the acceptance stage of grieving. But accept what? That J is and will no longer be the person that he was? Everyone changes. That is part of life. Even drastic changes occur and eventually you are forced to accept these changes or come to a mutual appreciation of the differences and then move forward. But J is no longer a person. J keeps saying that he is waiting for the aliens to come and take him. Well, they already have. But they played the cruel trick of leaving the shell of J and inserting a seriously flawed replica. I have an idea for a movie title: "Schizophrenia: Invasion of the Soul Snatcher."

My only hope is that whatever is next after this life is kinder and more accepting of J. But that doesn't put my struggle to rest, because I don't necessarily believe there is anything else and J is still breathing on his own. We let people go all of the time when their body and physical brain can no longer survive on their own, while the mind and soul may very well be healthy and intact. Can't we do the same when the reverse is true? Isn't he suffering needlessly and excessively? But that is only in my eyes. I know what J thinks and that he would be happy to explain his thoughts to almost anyone willing to listen for hours, and probably without taking a breath. For that matter, we don't really know what a person who is "brain-dead" is thinking; we're left with having to interpret what they would want in that situation.

(19:30–20:00) Music
"Marla Hun er en Jomfru Ren" from Kom Regn (Come Rain), performed by Anne Lise Berntsen and Nils Henrik Asheim

(20:02) Second Reading from J's Guide to the Universe
The following passage is an expanded excerpt from a manuscript by Joel Hanson, which was included in his father's book, Room for J:

I must tell you now that you all have a hard time with change and proper growth because you all would call knowledges not a word, you only define a word as something used from the past, something everyone else has used. You do not define a word as I do so much, as something that exists through all space and time, something created new right at this moment. Only you, in all way less significant humans, consider words to be something most humans agree upon to be a word from the past set in books called dictionaries or created by other writers. So please let freedom ring and accept my new words. I warn you I will make you accept them, otherwise, and you will feel ashamed because you had no part in deciding to use the best word ever written. Why are you all scared to create new words now and in the future? Why only rely on the past for words? The past here on earth is not that good so why do you rely on it so much and neglect and abuse the gifts of the present and the future as you do not create your own language, nor do you honor, respect and understand mine well enough. You all are so scared because you not realize well enough that fear is ultimate evil so you do not change out of your state of fear because you not know the important value of changing fear to courage. You all copy other writers so much that you never create your own words and stories.

I am on a spiritual quest that connects to the far depths of the least advanced living organisms, planets, stars, nebulas, all celestial bodies, animals, people, aliens, angels and all Godly energies and ties them all together. In my perfection, I will probably come to writing a second edition of this book during my human lifetime as Joel Steven Hanson. Hopefully.

I know, and it has been said, that ignorance is the opposite of love; there is no love in ignorance. I believe that! If one ignores something they cannot understand it ever, for they are pushing, sometimes, good things that are necessary to better their lives away from them. I ask the readers of this book to pay attention and care about what I care deeply about. I would not write this if I did not know it was worth the care of everyone.

(22:46) Reference to R.D. Laing
In the chapter "The Death of a Child and the Birth of a God," Dan Hanson cites passages from Laing's 1963 work, The Divided Self:

R.D. Laing reminds us "the cracked mind of the schizophrenic may let light which does not enter the intact minds of many sane people whose minds are closed." Indeed, he suggests that some of the prophets in the Bible may have been schizophrenic. But he also points out that somehow each of must learn to live in consensual reality. After living with J all these years I don't doubt for a minute that J sees and hears things that the rest of us block out. I have also come to believe that J's reality is just as legitimate as our reality and to appreciate his insights. But I know too that I must help J live in this world.

There was a time when society made room for people who lived in a different reality or as the French philosopher Michel Foucault put it, "when insanity was considered part of everyday life." But that time has long passed. Our world values only that which is reasoned and rational. Or to put it the other way, we do not value that which is not rational.

R.D. Laing also said, "If, then, he once stops pretending to be what he is not, and steps out as the person he has come to be, he emerges as Christ, or as a ghost, but not as a man; by existing with no body, he is no-body."

(24:36–27:31) Music
"Fields of Alfalfa" from Unspeakable, performed by Bill Frisell

(27:56) Papers on Schizophrenia and Religion
Religious delusions are one of many symptoms associated with schizophrenia. Sylvia Mohr and Philippe Huguelet published a paper in the scientific journal Swiss Medical Weekly, which examines the relationship between schizophrenia and religion and its implications for caring for individuals with this disorder.

(28:32–28:50) Music
"River Out Back" from Midnight on the Water, performed by Mark O'Connor

(33:32–34:21) Music
"Song of Hope" from Song of Hope, performed by Bruce Stark

(34:45) Quote from Margaret Mead
Most chapters in Room for J are headed with a quote from wise voices from different generations. Read these quotes along with Margaret Mead's heading for one of the final chapters, "A Message of Hope":

If we are to achieve a richer culture, rich in contrasting values, we must recognize the whole gamut of human potentialities, and so weave a less arbitrary social fabric, one in which each diverse human gift will find a fitting place.

(38:29) Reference to "Feeling of Being Judas"
Dan Hanson cites a famous biblical character from the Christian tradition, Judas Iscariot. The New Testament gospels portray Judas as one of the twelve original apostles of Jesus who would ultimately betray his teacher for a bribe of "thirty pieces of silver." After the Last Supper he led an armed band of Roman soldiers to Gethsemane and identified Jesus by kissing him. According to the gospel of Matthew, Judas later repented and committed suicide. To be compared to Judas is to be labeled a traitor or, at the least, disloyal.

(40:31–41:05) Music
"Overcast" from Dopamine, performed by Mitchell Froom

(43:27) Quote Attributed to Carl Jung
"Bidden or unbidden, God is present" is a translation of the Latin, Vocatus atque non vocatus, Deus aderit, originally written by the Dutch humanist and Renaissance philosopher Erasmus. The saying is commonly attributed to the famous Swiss psychiatrist, Carl Jung, who popularized it after discovering it in a 1563 edition of Erasmus' Collectaneas Adagiorum. Jung had it inscribed over the front door of his house in Kusnacht, Switzerland and explains the inscription in a letter dated November 19, 1960:

By the way, you seek the enigmatic oracle Vocatus atque non vocatus deus aderit in vain in Delphi: it is cut in stone over the door of my house in Kusnacht near Zurich and otherwise found in Erasmus's collection of Adagia (XVIth cent.). It is a Delphic oracle though. It says: yes, the god will be on the spot, but in what form and to what purpose? I have put the inscription there to remind my patients and myself: Timor dei initium sapiente ["The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom."] Here another not less important road begins, not the approach to "Christianity" but to God himself and this seems to be the ultimate question.

(47:20–48:04) Music
"Kyrie" from Soir, dit elle: Words of the Angel, performed by Trio Mediaeval

(49:20–52:30) Music
"Listen" from The Intercontinentals, performed by Bill Frisell