Your mental health immune system

- and how to nourish it

I originally published this blog post on LinkedIn on October 10th, 2022. As we are about to celebrate many religious festivities around the world – Easter, Passover, and Eid al-Fitr – I thought it’s a good time to publish it again here on Substack, as I believe faith is one of the key pillars of good mental health.

Also, those religious festivities often intersect with discussions on the potential of psychedelics, sharing similar themes of renewal, transformation, and spiritual awakening. In this context I also want to highlight the importance psychedelics have played in the creation of many religions (please read “The Immortality Key” by Brian Muraresku if you want to explore this topic further), and that in my opinion and belief they offer the opportunity to re-establish a connection to the divine, something which seems to be essential for us humans. 

Wishing you and your families a Happy Easter & Happy Holidays. 

One of the topics within the broad area of mental health research which interests me the most is resilience.

Why is it that we’re all faced with similar negative core experiences throughout our lives – the death of a loved one, a tough time at work, the loss of a relationship, poor health issues, and so on – but while many seem to take those adversities in their stride, for some, they lead to long lasting mental health issues?

With this blog post, I’d like to present my personal opinion based on the insights I’ve gained through all the work and investments we've done in mental health at my investment firm Apeiron Investment Group, as well as based on the numerous conversations I’ve had over the last years with leading scientists, real-life patients and spiritual leaders.

The “formula” I want to present is not yet scientifically validated, and maybe it never will be, but I am convinced it has substance to it and most importantly has a very practical value: You can start applying it today. I also intend to fund much more research in the resilience space in the future, to hopefully learn more and validate my thoughts.

In short: I believe that in the same way as our bodies have an immune system, which helps us to fight bad things like a viral infection, we also have a “mental immune system”. Making sure that this mental health immune system is intact should be high up on everybody’s priority list.

Allow me to explain:

The mental health immune system: Faith, Purpose, and Love

1. Faith

One of the biggest fears we humans have, if not the biggest one, is the existential fear of aging and death. I’m talking about your own life, of course, but also – and often this is even worse - those of people you love. Even if you don’t realize it, this fear is with us every second of our life, beginning the day on when you discover what death really means. It’s a nagging trauma which darkens our existence.

Faith – whether that lies within the framework of an organized religion or a more spiritual view on the universe – eases this pain. Faith tells you that everything about your existence, including death, has a reason, that there is a bigger plan at work, and that in the end you will be okay. It gives you the soothing promise that you/your soul will continue to exist after death, and even see your loved ones again. Whether you’re a firm believer or a loose one, and even if this is all complete nonsense in the end, it goes a long way towards easing the fear and pain of death and makes this life more tolerable.

To put it simply: Faith – in the right dose - has far more upside than downside.

2. Purpose

I believe we are all hard-wired to longing to be a valuable part of society. We want to work, produce, create, and find our place in the world. And we want to be appreciated for that – we all need validation in our existence.

3. Love

Whatever hard-shell people develop throughout their life, at the very end each one of us wants and needs to be loved. We are pack animals, and we need to feel this close connection on many levels: your partner, close family, (close) friends, community. It’s hard to explain why, but in a similar way to faith, I believe we are deeply wired to long for love and connection.

I believe that the sum of the parts of those three elements needs to be above a certain threshold. Thinking of it as formula, if you have little or maybe none of one of the three – let’s say faith – you can balance this out and compensate with more of the other two. I think this is why for example many older people, who might feel they lack purpose and/or love/family, find their stronghold in faith.

Having too little of all three of those ingredients doesn’t automatically trigger a mental health issue. However, when negative things strike while your mental health immune system is at a low, you are much more at risk, the same way you are much more at risk of getting a severe cold when your immune system is weak.

All three pillars of our mental immune system are under constant attack in our times

Unfortunately, our modern world is weakening our mental immune system.

We are living in a world where faith is in constant decline. Science seems to tell us that there is neither need nor space for The Divine. But I believe that science and faith are not at war at all. I just came across the fascinating story of Friedrich Gödel when writing this piece, which is worth a blog post in itself, but for now please read it HERE.

Gödel was logician, mathematician, and philosopher, considered to be one of the most significant logicians in history. He delivered an ontological proof for the existence of God…

We are also living in a world where most people either actively or subconsciously know that their current job simply won’t exist in the future, so they might be robbed of purpose. Robots, AI, and other technological innovations will make the vast majority of jobs redundant. For example, around 30% of civilian jobs in 2016 entailed driving a passenger vehicle or some other type of vehicle while on the job… These kind of jobs will inevitably decrease or even completely vanish over the next decade.

This is leading to feelings of being stripped of purpose and value for many of us. The bus driver might not fully understand what AI is, but they have a strong gut feeling that their profession won’t exist in 10 years.

Additionally, our capitalistic world has limited the view of purpose. Too often we blindly accept that the most ‘valuable’ jobs are those which are paid very well or create financial value. In reality, purpose can be found in many places: raising a family, creating art, or simply making other people happy, just to name a few.

And finally, despite all the technology we now have at our fingertips, and which in theory should be connecting us more with each other, we are becoming more lonely, isolated, and disconnected from others. Social media can be extremely toxic.

And beyond the negative effects of social media, because of societal changes, traditional family structures, community structures and even entire countries are eroding or disappearing without anything comparable to replace them – at least nothing as strong, deep, or meaningful. We are stripping ourselves of the chances to experience love in all its wonderful dimensions.

Ways to boost your mental immune system

In addition to all the scientific evidence atai Life Sciences and Compass Pathways are producing, I personally believe that my “formula” is one of the reasons why psychedelics work: I believe psychedelics can provide a booster for all three pillars:

Rarely does anyone come out of a trip who hasn’t had a deeply spiritual or meaningful experience in one way or another. Many realize their true purpose and embark on new adventures. And almost all have the simple take away that in the end, everything is all about love.

But there are also other ways to give your mental health immune system a boost. You can start today. Maybe pick up a religious book – I recommend checking out mystical branches like Kabbala, the writings of Rumi, or a book like “Siddhartha” from Hermann Hesse. Through reading these with an open mind you’re guaranteed to expand your consciousness in ways that will enhance how you view life and love.

And think about your passions and your talents and realize you have so many options and routes to express them. Understand that the need to change regularly in a world which is ever changing is not a burden, but re-inventing yourself every couple of years can bring tremendous joy. Personal evolution and growth should be a lifelong pursuit. And ‘lifelong’ could be really long, because as you might know, I also believe we will be able to push life expectancy well beyond 100 years – combined with extending health spans too. I plan to play an active role in making this happen with the two companies I have co-founded Cambrian Biopharma and Rejuveron Life Sciences.

And finally, and possibly most importantly, call one person you love, today, and tell them exactly that. It makes a powerful opening for a great, deep, and replenishing conversion. I promise.

We should continuously remind ourselves and the people around us that in the end, we all deserve to be happy. Actually, in my opinion, the entire purpose of life is to be happy and make others happy.

Start today.