This is in interesting observation. I have never considered that this myth of the three-day meditation could be an allegory of mania. This is extremely dangerous advice. It makes a massive difference, if you have a good life with support and people who love you unconditionally, and you want to know the truth about the universe like Yogananda or if your life is shit, the people in your life are toxic, and you want to know the truth about your suffering. If you are depressed, there is likely some giant elephant in the room that you need to become aware of. This metaphor has way more depth than you think. Let's break down its symbolism. The Miracle of Symbiosis Life is symbiosis which is the space that is created by the dance (the couple dance symbolizes the harmony between the hug and the handshake) between love (unity, symbolized by the hug) and partnership (creating space, symbolized by the handshake).  Symbiosis is a fundamental law of nature and of life. You can be in a symbiotic relationship with any entity. It can also be a career, an identity, an ideology, a pet, a hobby for example. A large part of this space that is your life is created in a dance with the people who are closest to you like your parents. The Elephant So what is the Elephant? let's say, one of these people closest to you are mainly in this dance with you to exploit you and feed their void which is their self-hatred, you have an elephant in your room which is suffocating you. This metaphor does, again, not just apply to personal relationships. Living in a space for a long time makes you blind to what is really going on in it since you are so used to it. This is the reason why there can be something as massive as an elephant that you have not noticed yet. This blindness (blindfold in the metaphor) is a necessity for peace. The blindfold is trust. If you didn't have it, you would be paranoid. Being depressed in this metaphor means being forced to exist in this space with lowered ability to leave with distraction. What you can do about the Elephant So you are lying in your bed with a blindfold on with an elephant that you are not aware of sharing this room with you. If you are in this situation you have three options: Distract yourself anyway which would be symbolized by staying in bed. Stop distracting and start mind wandering in a healthy way while taking care of your needs and nurturing your body, which would be symbolized by standing up and start the process of touching the elephant and slowly start to identify it over the course of weeks. Entering obsessive thought spirals, obsessive meditation, use of psychedelics while not nurturing your body would be symbolized by standing up, ripping off your blindfold and then FREAKING THE FUCK OUT BECAUSE WHAT THE FUCK DO YOU MEAN THERE HAS BEEN AN ELEPHANT THE WHOLE TIME????????????? If you become aware of this elephant in a sudden, violent way, you have a massive problem. Remember, since you bypassed option 2 and you therefore have not investigated the elephant prior, you see it, but you don't know what it is and where it came from.  Schizophrenia explained If you have the disposition for schizophrenia and you engage in option 3, what your body will now do is violently (often literally violently) end all partnerships with all entities you were in partnership with. The mechanisms that drive this process are hallucination, paranoia, mania, etc.  Going back to the partnership metaphor, when you are in a handshake (partnership) with somebody, the contact of your palms is making the space stable, but it also makes you vulnerable. Pushing away somebody you are in a partnership with is the best thing you can do if they infect you with their self-hatred. What you need to know though is that there exists no life outside symbiosis, therefore there exists no life outside of partnership. What this means is that when you push someone away, the space between you two becomes unstable and therefore turns into void/abyss.  This is why people enjoy things like cosmic horror even though it is scary. If you get desensitized to the void, you will gain massive amounts of independence. Just because you end one relationship does not mean your whole life is a void since you still have your other relationships. So if you commit to option 2 and do what's necessary, you will face existential void, but it will be good on the long run. If, however, you decide to do option 3, and you become so paranoid that you self-isolate completely, your whole life will be nothing but void. You will get rid of the problem like this, but the abyss is the price of your body pressing the nuclear button. A nuclear bomb is actually a good metaphor for schizophrenic psychosis. The event of the psychosis is the bomb detonating that is destroying everything with substance in your life. This will allow you to start from scratch and build something different, but there will be a fallout. If you suffer a psychosis, you will become radically aware, but it can leave lasting damage to your brain.