Feel free to sign my guestbook, and share your experience of my website or my work. Note: your email will not be made public, though if you share a link to your website that will be public. I also want to add that I cannot reply to people’s messages here. I’m really sorry about that!!
583 entries.
wrote on April 30, 2014
at
5:30 am
Hi Daniel
We\'ve been having contact at Youtube in the Autumn. I\'m from Gothenburg, now living in Stockholm.
You\'ve been a great inspiration the last half year. I\'ve been in to self-therapy and coherence therapy, also reading a lot. I admire your openeness and self-reflective perspectives, also that you are a person in the field that really puts the things you talk about on your self. For what I\'ve experienced it is really a rare thing that the person talking on the conference, seminarie or whatever is putting all the terms, theories, thoughts, fears and clouds on the person him/herself and their own background. I\'ve just purchades your two latest books - breaking with your parents and the book about truth.
For me in Sweden it has been really hard getting therapeutic help from the open care. In Stockholm the psychiatric system are really fucked up, good descent, honest help is rare. Cognitive Behaviour Therapy and medicine is POPULAR as hell. In Norway it is different. And also in Happaranda regarding the Open Dialogue you\'ve shown in your documentary. I have a big map at home regarding receipts, papers from the care here - now it has gone so far that I\'ve searched financial help from funds to be able to afford a good descent person that I can develop trust and a true honest self. We\'ll see how it goes.
So thank you for that. The interview with you from Self Anthoplogy is fantastic.
Question:
Do you know where I can get Martin Millers book about his mother Alice? Can\'t find it anywhere. I\'m talking about \"The True Drama of the Gifted Child\" and a biography of Alice - cant remember the name of the first one.
If you come to Stockholm - LET ME KNOW! I\'ve got a blog now regarding adult attachment and intimacy problems - also talking about the importance to nuance the word \"trauma\" and what it means to people who\'ve been experiencing trauma. The view of Trauma in Sweden are really rigid and one-dimensional. Unfortf this blog is in swedish though at the moment.
Hope to here from you
Best regards
Gustaf Lundh Stockholm
wrote on April 27, 2014
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5:57 am
a year ago, thanks to a psychiatrist friend, Jacob discovered Seikkula and with Daniel. I kept looking, reading, looking around, making things to understand before barely understood my work as a psychologist in mental health. Now I feel better, calmer and my work with me, because I am learning that there are people with visions and understandings that I gratify me. My way is not easy but now I feel less alone. Thank you Daniel and all other.
Gely. Spain
wrote on April 19, 2014
at
9:05 pm
With more love then I know how to express.
wrote on April 16, 2014
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8:59 am
Hello all together! It is very nice that there is such a project, which operates successfully on such a long period. For two years, we are working on a project that has similar approaches. It is extremely difficult to establish in Germany something. It must be financed in some way. You can read on the website that we have already tried a lot. We are encouraged by your commendable work to read and see. You work with respect and love for your clients. Very impressively! It is nice that your project is financed by the state and is integrated into the psychiatric system. Also we make it to be so. We would love to get in touch with you or visit you. Sincerely yours Raimund ALBERT (Manager)
http://www.lösungswege-pfalz.de/
wrote on April 14, 2014
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4:20 pm
Hey Daniel
It was nice meeting you today.
I watched your movie \"Coming off Psych Drugs\"
It is really fascinating. I never realized there was this group of
people who are really struggling silently and who have no voice.
The response must be huge. Thanks for putting it out there.
Edrick
wrote on April 13, 2014
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1:56 pm
I am not sure why I am writing here. I guess it\'s an effort to calm and quiet my mind an soul. I have been in therapy for awhile now. A journey I never intended to start really and had no idea where it would go. To be a grown woman, a wife, and a mother and face my demons of abuse, neglect, self destruction, and realize for the first time how cleanly I seperated myself from those events. I find I am at a place now where the rose colored glasses I have used for hindsight are cracked and no longer provide such a positive view and yet I remember that
View so clearly. I am an intellectual being and I find myself searching for answers. Answers to questions I really don\'t want to ask. I stumbled into this site and for what it worth. I found a momentary solace in the fact that someone somewhere has devoted their life to helping us out of the shadows.
wrote on April 12, 2014
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12:52 pm
Hello Daniel
Your work is so wonderfully insightful and supportive. offering people something very real. And I agree with the person here who says what a tremdous thing you are doing by offfering access to people for free. Bravo!
This helpfuil to me in so many ways.......
I
wrote on April 10, 2014
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10:27 pm
Hi Daniel,
Thank you for doing what you do. As a parent of a son with a mental illness, sometimes it is so scary and feeling hopeless during this journey of recovery for our son. Some days are really hard to believe there is a chance of recovery and you fear the only outcome will be jail, homelessness or death.
Looking at your videos on you tube have been a definate thread to hold onto in this darkness. You are making a difference for many of us. As a mother, I hope my son will be able to read your books someday and watch your videos and know there are people that understand and support him. Unfortunately, he is not there yet.
My son has the diagnosis of schizophrenia. He is 29 yrs old tomorrow. Before this darkness overtook him, he had graduated college and was so compassionate and full of life. He studied Global Cultures in school and chose to work and volunteer on social justice issues and advocacy to help better the lifes of his fellow humans. The irony of his current situation is there is very little social structure to help him. He has been dealing with this illness for the past 3 almost 4 years. As a family we have learned alot. Like many families, we are shocked and disapointed at \" the system\" . The reality is there isn\'t any system to help our son. It has become a piece meal regiment we are trying to offer him. After the initial hospitalization at a well known university,which consisted of a 3 day hold and 7 additional days to start his medication, we met with the Doctor for 45 min and given the \" hopeless message\" and were sent on our way to figure it all out.
This was the beginning of our education on this illness. We wondered how could such a devasting illness be given such minimum attention by the medical doctors. 10 days and off you go....and we found in several more hospitatlizations it was even less time... 3 - 6 days max...just enough to start the meds. The meds have not been an option for our son. He read up on the side effects and he already had a healthy distrust of big pharma and the billion dollar business before he got sick.
Now3 years later, he is working with Dr Michael Lesser of Berkely Ca, an orthomolecular psychiatrist. It works some, but not enough. The convenetional psychiatrist recommended by the hospital actually refused to work with him unless he remained \" med compliant\".
We are searching for all possible avenues to help him. We live in the Los Angeles area and we are trying to connect with a therapist that will work with him and accept where is at. I am sure you get many request for referrals and may not be able to accommodate the requests. If you do have any contacts or ideas on how to help us on this journey with our son, it would be appreciated.
Again thank you for your dedication and support for those that need the most help.
wrote on April 8, 2014
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4:39 pm
I have enjoyed reading some of the essays and comments on this website! I just was alerted on facebook that you are going to be allowing the distribution of your films for free. That is a tremendous risk and I admire you for stepping out like that. I hope to get back and visit again and read more. Thanks for all the encouragement and interesting essays which will give me lots to think about.
wrote on April 5, 2014
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8:22 pm
Hi Daniel,
I have been watching and listening to your youtube channel in recent months. I find the videos posted to be empathic to the child abuse to which I was subject. After listening to the audio version of \"The Drama of the Gifted Child\", I ordered the book from Amazon and am awaiting it\'s arrival. I am currently a college student living on my own, and I believe that I am in the depression phase of healing from the past traumas. I am finding myself in solitude often, and am noticing that I am very rigid about keeping things clean, and perfectly folding laundry and doing chores to the point where they become exhaustive and emotionally taxing. I find myself wanting to put that same exhaustive energy into my schoolwork. I don\'t know if this is some residue of the type of abuse I suffered. In the spirit of taking responsibility for my own healing, I feel that finishing my education is vital for financial independence from my taxing relations with my family. But I am very exhausted often, and was wondering if you had any insight into that. Pardon me if my question is vague.
Thanks!
wrote on April 1, 2014
at
12:23 am
Hi Daniel, I have just finished watching your video on YouTube. The childhood trauma one. Thank you. So much of it resonated deeply with me.
I am an artist and your talk reminded me that years ago I came to a realisation that all of my work was about loss. It\'s said that an art practice is about spiralling around a mountain. You gradually get higher but you are continually going over the same ground. The payoff is that each round gets you a bit closer to an understanding of what you are doing. Same with therapy I think. Luckily, in art, it\'s an endless spiral so the view is always fresh. Therapy?
I did love the images interspersed into the video. I see that you are a film maker so that figures. I also see that you live in one of my favourite places. Greetings from Sydney and I wish you contentment.
wrote on March 28, 2014
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12:42 pm
aloha.
wondering if there is anyway to watch the film if i don\'t have a dvd player. i have a laptop that no longer comes with a dvd/cd drive...thoughts?
mara j
wrote on March 10, 2014
at
11:43 pm
When I read this article, and saw the video below, I immediately thought of you and your wonderful videos. If you weren\'t already aware of Geel, I\'m betting you\'ll find it interesting.
http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/psychiatric-community-care-belgian-town-sets-gold-standard-1.2557698
http://prideinmadness.wordpress.com/2014/03/09/geel-psychiatric-community-care/
I\'d sure love to see a Daniel Mackler video of this town. Incidentally, I\'ve shown some of your videos to at least a half dozen people and will continue.
wrote on March 3, 2014
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12:12 pm
Hello Daniel,
Your words are very encouraging and I find it very exciting to hear someone say this out loud.
The awareness that we are living out this survival life of comforrting ourselves in order to avoid the truth about our childhood experiences is a breath of fresh air and I really appreciate your personal touch as you educate and enlighten people to this difficult truth.
Steve Coffey
wrote on February 5, 2014
at
12:40 am
Hi Daniel, I have written in your guestbook a few months ago. Thank you for your youtube videos I found myself listening to you again trying to make sense of dealing with intense indescribable anguish of not being able to bond with others. I feel like a monster and started to believe that im innately evil. I loathe myself . Feel like my inner child is dead and false self completely took over. The emptiness hurts so much its even the words that I speak are not me. How do I get through this hell my willingness is shriveling??
wrote on February 3, 2014
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2:38 pm
Hi, thank you for your music and lyrics. I\'m so grateful to you that I posted your song against DSM diagnosis on my page.
Keep up the good work!
Cheers
C.c.
wrote on January 25, 2014
at
5:24 pm
hi anita -
i\'ll send a backchannel email. greetings!
daniel
wrote on January 25, 2014
at
5:23 pm
dear Metta---
i\'ll reply backchannel to your email -- and see if i can help you. i do know icarus folks, and also am willing to donate films, but shipping costs a lot!! maybe we can work something out about shipping!
all the best to you!
daniel
wrote on January 25, 2014
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7:54 am
Dear Daniel,
Greetings from the Davao, Philippines! My name is metta and I found out about your website, writings and documentaries through your youtube video called CHILDHOOD TRAUMA AND THE ART OF HEALING. It is very helpful and we are very grateful to have it as a resource for our plan to form a mental health collective/support group this year 2014. As for now we are in the process of studying or learning more about alternative approaches to various psychiatric issues. To be honest, our group is not expert and we don\'t have any experiences but we hope to be successful because this will be the first grassroots alternative/radical mental health collective in the Philippines.
Another is that we want to ask you if there is a chance that you can donate any of your DVD or books helpful for our group? Besides, we also have a community library, so we also accept donations or resources as we are just poor activist trying to make solutions to many complex problems created by this madness-driving capitalist, patriarchal system.
Another question is, do you have a friend or do you know someone from ICARUS Collective? They are also doing great actions dealing with mental health. Anyway, thanks for all your works and contribution!
best wishes,
metta
wrote on January 24, 2014
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2:29 pm
Hi Daniel,
So glad to find your site. I am a mental health professional and find that the current system of drugging clients and not providing healing to be against my morals and ethics. I\'m glad to know that there are others who seek a way to heal mental illness not just cover it up with \"Medications\".
Peace, Love and Light,
Tony
p.s. captcha are a pain. 🙂
wrote on January 22, 2014
at
11:47 pm
Hi Daniel
A second message, to say I\'ve been reading a number of your essays, and I watched your video on confronting parents, and listened to your \'bullshit\' song. I\'ve just been very moved reading your \'The Traumatised Are Safe\' essay. You are a very unusual person, in your capacity for fearless truth telling, even when this will mean triggering people into their fear, with possible nasty consequences for yourself. Although, as you clearly appreciate, what first appears nasty, inevitably is liberating, if it helps you to know the truth more deeply. I feel the same way you do about taking responsibility for healing myself, rather than passing on that burden to a next generation. And my husband has spent his life trying to work out how to help the children who already exist, rather than creating any of his \'own\'.
I am hoping we can connect via email (though that obviously depends on your time and inclination). In addition to the docos I mentioned in my last email, I have a couple of long documents about my confrontation of my mother which you may be interested in (a nonviolent action involving a peaceful vigil supporting my request for financial reparation, which landed me in prison for over three months for conscientiously breaking a domestic violence restriction order, and resulted in me defending myself in front of a jury). It was an amazing experience - we felt and learned so much, about my parents, the legal system, humans generally, and, of course, myself. Having been through all that, I resonated with many of the points you made in your video. I like the way you tell people what to expect, but don\'t discourage them from doing it. Obviously, every person needs to deal with their parents according to their own situation and inclination, but it is so often the case that I have to go into a situation, even knowing intellectually what the likely outcome is, to really access the feelings deeply enough to come to a clear and powerful understanding that really changes my sense of self.
Anyway, I\'d love to hear where you are up to with your own \'terrifying\' journey foward.
Cheers; Anita
wrote on January 20, 2014
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1:11 am
Hi Daniel,
I\'m a nonviolent activist and independent psych researcher from Australia. Your site is really informative - I had a similar experience of having middle class parents and being supported academically, while suffering abuse that led to me having to end my relationship with them. I enjoyed your lively and insightful interview on Open Paradigm. Your anger (fully justified) at the current mainstream psych system is palpable, as is your commitment to change. Good on you for genuinely caring so much for yourself and others.
Thought you might be interested in the following article:
Fearless Psychology and Fearful Psychology:
http://anitamckone.wordpress.com/articles-2/fearless-and-fearful-psychology/
and The Peoples Charter to Create a Nonviolent World:
http://thepeoplesnonviolencecharter.wordpress.com
Lots of love; Anita
wrote on January 19, 2014
at
6:14 pm
i am glad that i broke contact with my parents. when i was together withs them in a room, it was THERE thoughts, beliefs and espacially there need for denial, what counted. i could not stay for some months constantly in contact with my personal feeling (or hopefully inner wisdom), as long as i was in contact with them. there are big problems with that decision of me too, but i would not know a better solution so far. i find it very well explained by you, how the emotional need of parents as well as the young adult having learned to be dependent on them makes the emotional healing impossible.
There are surely many exeptions of this rule, but as i don´t belong to these exceptions - thank you for your videos, which encouraged me to this step.
wrote on December 25, 2013
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10:14 pm
Hi Carol,
Greetings! I\'ll reply backchannel -- but you can purchase it on this website under the DVDs (English) page with Paypal.
All the best --
Daniel
wrote on December 25, 2013
at
3:10 pm
I would like information about purchasing a DVD copy of Take These Broken Wings.
Thanks
wrote on November 26, 2013
at
1:12 am
Thank you so much for sharing your story and also all the work you do on documenting alternative treatments such as Open Dialogue and Healing Homes.
wrote on November 19, 2013
at
9:38 am
A beautiful work and very innovative. Something very important to have in mind (and in the body ...or this is the same)! Congratulations!
wrote on November 3, 2013
at
5:27 am
Hi Daniel. I have not read any of your work but I have seen your youtube clips. I am intrigued by this form of caring therapy and hope to access something similar in Australia. .... xif it exists. I am a young. Female and have been suffering at the hands of my doctor\'s for too long. I hate them and am at the point of relinquishing their care but its sad that I know its only a matter of time before they send the police to bring me in. I live in brisbane queensland Australia. If you have any contacts near where I live I would greatly appreciate the help. Thankyou very much. Maddy
wrote on November 2, 2013
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7:34 pm
Dear Daniel,
first of all, let me say I\'m truly grateful for your videos on YouTube, I watched all of them and a lot of them 2-3 times (and I probably will buy some of your books when I have more money). I\'m VERY attracted to \"finding my true self\", growth, healing from childhood trauma etc., and I do want to go this way. Unfortunately, I had a discouraging experience lately; it was when I moved to a different city, away from my parents and acquaintances. In the second night, I smoked some pot (never smoked it again since), when suddenly an intense anxiety came up, which was hard to endure, it stayed for days, till I decided to move back, because I felt so damn isolated, helpless.. it was just too much horror, and I feared that I now have lost my comfort forever..
Now I\'m again preparing to move, now to a nearer city... I see that coming again, and it will (I\'m still not completely free of it, after 2 month)... Now I\'m again full of willpower to go through this, but I know all this will vanish again when such a horror comes back.. It was like I was losing myself, I had nothing to hold on to, my usual phantasies, pleasures etc. vanished, replaced with anxiety, fear of losing happiness forever, ending up in suicide..
*sigh* I don\'t know what to write, I just hope you have any tips, you could provide any information, I don\'t know.. It\'s messy.
With best regards,
Sepehr
wrote on October 31, 2013
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11:48 pm
Daniel,
Have you seen the video yet?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4BX6WTL88j4