Carter Flay delivers a candid personal speech about navigating spiritual exploration during the onset of mental illness, describing how impulsive religious behavior intertwined with depression and mood episodes before therapy helped him find stability. He closes with a message encouraging listeners to prioritize grounding and reason, and to recognize how religious language can be misinterpreted by those experiencing mental health crises.
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Transcript
[03:01:15] hey
[03:01:15] oh I like that polo I like that
[03:01:23] polo
[03:01:33] hello hello yeah thanks before we get started can I get a little shout out to
[03:01:43] my mom right there
[03:01:51] um I was having a
[03:01:53] tough time for a stretch of several years. Mom took NAMI classes to better support me.
[03:02:03] Thank you, Mom. Thank you. Okay. Okay. This is like a little speech sort of deal. So I’m
[03:02:14] going to talk about the crossroads of mental illness and spirituality. Okay. So who has
[03:02:23] struggled with mental illness? Okay. Thank you for your candidness. And who has done
[03:02:32] some spiritual exploration? Awesome. Who has done some spiritual exploration while struggling
[03:02:44] with mental illness? Okay. So I’m going to talk about the crossroads of mental illness
[03:02:44] mental illness. It’s fun, right? It’s a good time. So I’m gonna share my
[03:02:52] experience. I’m gonna do it as respectfully as possible. I’m gonna talk
[03:02:55] about some religious stuff and how it affected me. I’m gonna try to be as
[03:03:01] respectful as possible. Okay. So the beginnings of my spiritual curiosity
[03:03:07] came through athletes. Remember, you know, Ray Lewis. Can someone do the dance? Yeah.
[03:03:13] Yeah. It was 2012 and, you know, he was always very passionate about his faith
[03:03:24] and he announced it would be his year of retirement and he leaned, he prayed so
[03:03:29] hard before every game and he took us and won our city a Super Bowl and it was
[03:03:34] incredible. And I was like, what’s this, what’s this spirituality thing? Steph
[03:03:39] Curry. Every time he makes a three-pointer, what does he do?
[03:03:43] …
[03:03:43] , something like that. So then, of course, the guys like Gandhi, Martin Luther King,
[03:03:51] people like Harriet Tubman, all, you know, they attribute their success to a higher
[03:04:00] power and, you know, that got my, that got my attention. So I saw people
[03:04:09] leaning on a higher power to achieve great things and I wanted to see what
[03:04:13] that was like. And that started kind of late high school, early college, trying to
[03:04:19] figure out what I want to do, who I wanted to be, what the heck is going on
[03:04:23] in, like, life and existence and… So naturally, I tried to attend, like, a
[03:04:31] couple different religious services, had a lot of conversations, you know, tried
[03:04:37] the Buddhist thing, tried the Hindu thing, tried Christianity, Islam, you know, all of that.
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[03:04:55] And all this was happening at the onset of mental health symptoms. So long bouts
[03:05:02] of depression, mood swings, erratic and impulsive behavior
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[03:05:13] and a spiritual exploration coupled with the onset of mental illness
[03:05:20] looked like walking around in the middle of the night
[03:05:23] asking God for answers in neighborhoods that I probably shouldn’t have been in.
[03:05:32] Being very impulsive, I visited a mosque to learn more about Islam
[03:05:38] and came home Muslim.
[03:05:43] I, you know, I have so much respect for the people I met.
[03:05:48] The decision was a little impulsive, I must say.
[03:05:54] Judging friends and family for not being on the path that I thought I was on.
[03:06:03] You know, when these mental health crises came and I had these racing thoughts
[03:06:09] and before I thought, you know, maybe I need more sleep,
[03:06:12] maybe I need to sleep.
[03:06:13] Maybe I need to sleep.
[03:06:13] I thought, I need a fucking exorcism right now.
[03:06:19] Yeah.
[03:06:22] I’d walk around interpreting everything I saw as communication from God.
[03:06:27] I would see birds fly and go, oh, I’m going to go this way.
[03:06:31] I’d walk and see a stop sign and I’m walking and I’m like, God wants me to stop.
[03:06:38] And I’d be 45 minutes late to work.
[03:06:40] And, you know, so many self-help books and spiritual guidance books,
[03:06:52] they’ll toss out this phrase, faith or fear.
[03:06:57] In any moment, you can either have faith or you can have fear.
[03:07:01] I was like, hell yeah.
[03:07:04] Ah, shit.
[03:07:05] Okay.
[03:07:05] And believing that statement, everything that I’ve done,
[03:07:10] I’ve done, I’ve done, I’ve done, I’ve done.
[03:07:10] And if I saw and was terrified of, I’d take it as a test of faith and try to do it.
[03:07:17] In some, in like social instances, this could be very positive, you know.
[03:07:21] Oh, I don’t want to go up and sing karaoke.
[03:07:23] Okay, I’ll do it.
[03:07:24] Or the dance floor.
[03:07:25] Oh, I’m so afraid.
[03:07:26] I’ll do it.
[03:07:27] But when it’s, oh, that person is about to jump off the Bay Bridge.
[03:07:32] I’m afraid of doing that.
[03:07:34] Do I, do I need to jump off the Bay Bridge?
[03:07:36] And it was, it was, it was that example that shook me to my core and made me realize I might need
[03:07:48] to reevaluate my relationship with a higher power.
[03:07:51] And it shook me so much that it made the advice that my therapist gave me that much more powerful.
[03:08:02] She said, Carter, put, put spirituality.
[03:08:06] Take it all and just put it in a little box for now.
[03:08:10] Put it in a box.
[03:08:12] Use your reason.
[03:08:13] Use your logic.
[03:08:14] And when you’re stable, you can explore that.
[03:08:18] But just put it aside.
[03:08:20] Put it aside.
[03:08:21] So I did.
[03:08:23] And life got a lot simpler.
[03:08:28] At this point, I had been in a residential mental health facility for about a year.
[03:08:34] And after this, I kind of started making more progress.
[03:08:36] Whereas, I once, you know, surrendered my fate to a higher power.
[03:08:51] I just started making my own decisions, started using my logic, my reason.
[03:08:57] I felt more and more empowered.
[03:08:59] I started investing my time and energy in the things that I could see.
[03:09:06] My mom.
[03:09:13] Thanks, guys.
[03:09:16] No relationships with friends.
[03:09:18] My job.
[03:09:19] My health.
[03:09:19] Do I need to keep it?
[03:09:20] Okay.
[03:09:22] And after, like, months of taking these little baby steps, I’m really enjoying a quality of life that I didn’t think would be possible.
[03:09:32] Any Harry Potter fans?
[03:09:34] Harry Potter fans?
[03:09:35] All right.
[03:09:35] So, you know, there’s wizards, right?
[03:09:37] And there’s muggles.
[03:09:39] I wouldn’t be a wizard really bad,
[03:09:41] but I really found my groove in the muggle life.
[03:09:43] Yeah, in the muggle life.
[03:09:48] And, of course, really, really leaning into therapy, medicine.
[03:09:56] The next part, you know,
[03:09:59] religion is pretty prominent in society sometimes,
[03:10:02] and it can be really uplifting and inspiring,
[03:10:06] and it can also cause people with mental illness
[03:10:08] to misinterpret things and do some dangerous stuff.
[03:10:14] Do I need to?
[03:10:15] Okay.
[03:10:16] I need to keep…
[03:10:17] What?
[03:10:19] Okay, okay.
[03:10:29] I got a little bit more.
[03:10:30] I got a little bit more.
[03:10:32] Shit, okay.
[03:10:37] So, yeah, stories in the Bible about miracles are inspiring
[03:10:42] and might make people try to stop storms with their hands and words
[03:10:49] and walk on water and stuff.
[03:10:54] Yeah.
[03:10:56] Be careful what you say, like, religiously around people with mental illness
[03:10:59] because it can be distorted.
[03:11:01] And, um…
[03:11:02] And a few final words.
[03:11:04] Don’t be afraid to put God in a box.
[03:11:07] God can handle it.
[03:11:09] If taking a break from spirituality helps you become more grounded,
[03:11:13] stable, and capable of helping others in concrete ways,
[03:11:17] then it might be the holiest thing you could possibly do.
[03:11:21] And for those who are looking for truth and trying to figure it all out,
[03:11:26] from my experience, there are no beliefs required,
[03:11:30] zero beliefs,
[03:11:31] to love,
[03:11:32] and to be of service.
[03:11:34] Thank you.
[03:11:34] Thank you.
[03:11:37] That was dope.