Mindsets for Mindfulness: Awakening From Crisis to Higher Consciousness

Non-ordinary states of consciousness and experiences outside of “sanity” are difficult to understand or explain. This book draws upon lessons I’ve learned throughout my awakening — the years of depression, anxiety, and psychosis, to higher states of consciousness.

First, I explain the Enchanted Worldview, an expansive map of reality. The state of enchantment is the feeling of being spellbound by life’s magic — not from a place of naivety, but a place of wisdom.

This process of re-enchantment is, I believe, the biggest antidote to depression, anxiety, and psychological and spiritual crisis. Mindsets for Mindfulness will inspire you to consider the profound transformation a change in worldview has on removing limitations while providing tools to experience this new reality.

The Enchanted Worldview isn’t a description of “the way things are,” but an invitation to explore new terrain, in your own time, at your own pace. The Mindsets are archetypes that combine a wide range of spiritual practices, psychological techniques, and philosophies. This book is about awakening to the fullness of the human spirit, beyond the mind and the ego.

As a result, these mindsets draw together a host of instruction, guidance, wisdom, and personal experience to navigate these complexities, saving you, I hope, time and effort on the journey of growth.

Praise for Mindsets for Mindfulness

“Mindsets For Mindfulness is an engaging and well-written overview, written from both a personal and wider spiritual perspective. It shows how the existing materialistic worldview can be related to depression and how normality and conformity limit of our imagination by focusing on externals.

“Ricky describes a number of important mindsets in the second half of the book, with valuable insights drawn from his own experience that readers can readily apply. I particularly liked his notions of ‘skilled solitude’ and ‘post-experience knowledge’ as well as his three h’s: humour, honesty and humility. A significant contribution to the field.”

— David Lorimer, Programme Director of the Scientific and Medical Network

“In a very down to earth account, Ricky Derisz takes us on his journey through a psychological crisis that opened his mind and heart to a new and expanded reality. He clearly describes how his crisis woke him up from a reality that many of us consider ‘normal‘ into a non-ordinary state of consciousness bursting with life and experiences that defied his previous limiting beliefs.

“After 25 years meeting and interviewing healers and visionaries in tribal and indigenous communities (often called shaman) I was surprised to learn that many were identified in their youth by having such a crisis. Later while making the documentary film CRAZYWISE, I met countless individuals in our western culture who have experienced a psychological crisis. I have been fascinated by the similarity in the stories I’ve heard from individuals, like Ricky, who have managed to successfully navigate their crisis.

“His experience like so many wasn’t an easy one. As Ricky puts it ‘I was on an obsessive journey to understand myself.’ Thankfully for the one in five of us who will experience a psychological crisis in our lifetime, his extensive search has given us a clearly and concisely written guide to much of the wisdom, both ancient and modern, that helps one understand and navigate these very challenging yet potentially enlightening and transformative experiences.”

— Phil Borges, director, Crazywise.