1
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Scott, is it possible for someone with a mental illness such as bipolar disorder or schizophrenia to come on a meditation course with you in Sri Lanka?

2
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Yeah, for sure.

3
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That's certainly possible.

4
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I wouldn't stop such a person.

5
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The one issue that I would have is whether the person has to take medication.

6
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Because we have had people take, I've watched people taking anti-depression medication.

7
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And medication in general is not advised during a meditation course.

8
00:00:44,108 --> 00:00:48,758
whether it be medication for physical ailments or medication for mental ailments.

9
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Now, if it's a physical ailment that requires medicine, for example, we have people who had

10
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had some sort of condition.

11
00:01:03,280 --> 00:01:04,563
Was it diabetes?

12
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I can't remember.

13
00:01:05,385 --> 00:01:05,807
No, it wasn't.

14
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It was something horrible where they had to do dialysis treatment.

15
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And so they had this portable dialysis machine.

16
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And they came and did a meditation course and did dialysis every day.

17
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It was crazy.

18
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In that case it was actually no problem and they were able to finish the course while undergoing dialysis treatment.

19
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But medication for the mind is certainly a problem.

20
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And if it's to the point where you have to take some sort of antidepressant or antipsychotic or something, then we would have to discuss that.

21
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I think in general we'd have a rule that people shouldn't take antipsychotic, antidepressant or whatever medications during the meditation course.

22
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But otherwise, bipolar I think is really quite...

23
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quite workable from our point of view.

24
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Schizophrenia, I think it depends on the person.

25
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If they're having psychotic ideations, like they want to kill people or so on, then it may be difficult.

26
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But it's worth talking about it, and it's something that we'd have to discuss before the person came.