Given the wide-ranging, and complex issues related to issues of the mind and the arrested African/Ghanaian development, this essay by Mr. Patrick Twumasi comes in the nick of time, as the world turns.
This is an important ... read full comment
Given the wide-ranging, and complex issues related to issues of the mind and the arrested African/Ghanaian development, this essay by Mr. Patrick Twumasi comes in the nick of time, as the world turns.
This is an important topic!
It is actually bigger than mental disorders we call "mental illness".
We submit that there is nothing "cursed", but ignorance on the part of the person with that mental impression of a "cursed" person. It is in their own mind and a manifestation to lack of knowledge and lack of education. Mr. Patrick Twumasi may want to re-examine that aspect of the paper, and his belief system, if he actually believes in "tradition" he references.
Reminds us of the recent case of the professor who wrote that book that says the head is made to carry load!
That one was as well, a failure of the mental faculty, lack of knowledge, presence of ignorance, even presumably at the "highest heights" of the "educated".
Again, mental health is a wide-ranging and complex human attribute that every human being possesses. It ranges from the happy, to the sad, to the bewildered, to the traumatized, to the insane (as in the mentally-challenged on account of biological deficiency), to the suicidal at any one of those "stations" in life.
As the Canadian Mental Health Association (CMHA) says:
"We all have mental health, just as we all have physical health. Mental health is more than the absence of mental illness. It’s a state of well-being."
It is precisely for this reason that many countries, including Ghana, celebrate "Mental Heath Week." The challenge for Ghana is for leaders, educators, NGOs, and parents to understand the full scope of what is "Mental Health".
(We deliberately left our pastors and the clergy to the extent we believe they are part of the mental health problem confronting Ghana.
This essay may not garner a lot of readers from the comments that may flow therefrom. But it is an important essay, all the same. If the message could be tailored to the education and needs of teachers in Ghana, Mr. Twumasi would have achieved an important human objective for Ghana, of the kind we call "positive development of the mind".
Given the wide-ranging, and complex issues related to issues of the mind and the arrested African/Ghanaian development, this essay by Mr. Patrick Twumasi comes in the nick of time, as the world turns.
This is an important ...
read full comment