Exploring the nature of the ego.
Seeing the connection between suffering and self-image.
Being free of suffering.
Deconstructive contemplation dismantles the ego-fixations (atmagraha) that cause suffering and conflict. This is accomplished by revealing the acquired and transparent beliefs that freeze our experience by interpreting it in dualistic categories. Deconstructive contemplation traces and discloses that our everyday and professionally informed interpretations of reality are self-referencing mechanisms for deceptively validating the core fixations that:
These fixations have us oscillate between elation and depression, excitement and resignation. They lock us into habitual ways of living life and interpreting the world and reduce our repertoire of balanced and sensitive emotions. Deconstructive contemplation reveals these core fixations as groundless and arbitrary by disclosing the open and liberating texture of reality.
This presentation will:
We are very ambivalent about "the end of suffering".
Can the process of intensive psychotherapy create this longing?
Or is it only through the encounter with the living Enlightened Master, the Sat-Guru, that this longing is really stirred.
What does role psychotherapy play in this process?
Straightening out one's life, paving the way so that the longing can become strong, one-pointed.
1- We can stop playing ostrich.
We can raise our heads from the sand of wishful thinking and pretending all's well, or' that our troubles will somehow blow over. They won't. Or, for one that does, we're pretty sure to find a new one or two darkening our horizon. And even if man's self-created disasters - present or in the - making - were miraculously avoided, plenty of the other sort would remain to polish him off. Natural calamities are - natural. No less than individuals, Humanity itself - in common with all else - is on Life's hit list. Everything perishes. Wholeheartedly acknowledging and saying YES! to this self-evident fact is already to start undermining the deep stress that comes of turning a blind eye to it. What's more, having anticipated and endorsed our death as things in the world, we don't have to pile on the agony by speculating about the time and the manner of our manifest dying, individually or collectively. Looked at steadily and accepted, universal mortality is no reason for going into permanent mourning or wearing the long face of its funeral furnisher. See whether it doesn't give rise to a tenderness, and take on a marvelous beauty, that take us by surprise. And dissipate our fear - our fear of death and of life.
2- Yet it's no bad thing to be fearful, provided we're driven to the one refuge from all danger and stress and fear - to this incomparable Safety, to the Place or No-place we have all along been at.
By pointing a finger - or simply looking at What we're looking out of at this moment, or by any other means that works for us - let's-get Home to What we are. Let's stay with and live from this absolutely safe Reality instead of that accident-prone appearance in our mirror, and see what comes of it, what happens to our stress.
3- But let's not get stuck on the Container here, at the expense of its contents, of the world.
We can't too often remind ourselves that it's not a case of balancing one against the other, of compromise or moderation, but of extremism. We have to see and to live the strange truth that we are forever free from the stress and pain and tragedy of the world, and we are forever caught up in them, as well as in the joy and love of the world. Then let us go on to discover what is our special role, what is our unique and unpredictable work for the good of the world which is ourself. Maybe it's a humble and hidden job, maybe little more than setting an example of stress-free personal happiness plus a vivid appreciation of people' and things for what they are. (Only this No-body extends the perfect welcome to everybody, letting them all in and letting them all be). But rest assured that one moment of seeing yourself as Empty-for-all affects all profoundly. Your best contribution to the future isn't what you say, or even what you work for, but what you are now. Nothing is so catching as this well-founded freedom from stress, this impersonal serenity that must embrace all persons.
So this is our threefold practice - our thoroughly practical discipline. There's no occasion in our working or leisure life when it's inappropriate or inefficient to live from the truth. Agreed that the truth, so easy to see, is so hard to keep on seeing. But is life without it less hard? Is life lived from a many-sided lie a practical proposition? Let's remember, let's take courage from the fact that our practice isn't changing our lifestyle, but noticing how we're living in any case - as this Empty Fullness, as this truly amazing union of perfect freedom and total involvement.
And let us remember that lying thus, consciously, is the very best thing we can do for our disaster-prone world.
In fact, theories that deal with suffering are directly linked to their central conception of human nature and human essence.
Man is perceived by some as a "chromosomal robot, a game in the hands of the unconscious", or "a mechanism for social determinism". On the other hand, conceptions such as the "Perennial Philosophy", and the major spiritual traditions consider man as the holy casket of divine spark - "Son of God, God, as He and I are one" - ("La Trinosophie de L'Etoile Polaire", François Brousse, La Licorne Ailée).
Around these visions of man, paradigms and models attempt to encompass the concepts of the "ego", and of "suffering".
Freud's definition of the goal of psycho-analysis was "to transform neurotic distress into common unhappiness", to relieve pathological suffering while remaining powerless when faced with the inherent pain afflicted upon the human condition.
The Perennial Philosophy, spiritual traditions, and more recently, Transpersonal Psychology all claim the possibility of overcoming "common unhappiness" in order to attain an optimal human development.
The human models known as saintly, just, wise or enlightened are amongst those who have realized that optimal development.
Likewise, Buddha said that he had come to speak of suffering, its origins, and its end.
As we shall see, this implies a "sacrifice of the common human ego", which will lead to the eternal Self.
Yet the idea of such a sacrifice terrorizes the mind of those who are used to clutch at reason.
As Soygal Rinpoché writes in his book "The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying", "when we hear of expressions such as 'ego-less' or 'vacuity', we think that experiencing these states would equate with being ejected out of a spaceship to float endlessly in dark, frozen space".
Therefore, before dealing with the suppression of the ego, we shall grant it the position it deserves, considering its all-encompassing power , amidst its multiple reflections.
These reflections will be followed, for example, through the dialogue of the different "inner voices" or "sub-personalities", in the near-death experience (N.D.E.), and in the chain of transmigrations of the soul as they are dealt with by the therapies that take them into consideration.
Slowly yet surely, the eternal Self will emerge like the most secretive room of a castle, or the diamond with countless facets, but reflecting through each of them - the unique light.
The question "Who Suffers?" causes a reflection on the nature of he who suffers.
Is the "I" who suffers in fact 'real', or is it but a mental construct?
Let us examine the way in which stored data within memory plays a role in the elaboration of the self's image. Parents, friends and society all teach us that the body that we see is "me", that this reacting personality is "me", and that the role I play in society is "me". Through this, we can deduce with conviction that each of these objects of perception represents "my" identity.
By placing aside all the acquired knowledge stored in our memory, we can ask, with the necessary intensity, the question "Who am I?". The field of answers will show that not one thought-produced answer is satisfying. We know we are not mere mental representations, such as an idea, a thought or a function. The understanding of all that we are not will bring a natural dis-identification with all that is associated with the thought-realm and mental output.
An attentive examination, such as this, will not allow the question "Who am I" to be hidden in endless mental elaboration.
The question will then remain suspended, without any answer that can be elaborated upon at a conceptual level.
The lack of an answer is accompanied by a feeling of authenticity. The conviction arises that the answer is not of the mind, and that it is known as though it were our selves. Without answering the question "Who am I", and living with this lack of an answer is a consumed art demanding a deep maturity and a refined sense of discrimination.
Let us return then to the problem of suffering.
The question "Who am I", in the context of suffering, will show the non-existence of the sufferer. This states that the "I am" who is exempt from suffering is, like any other, an object of observation. However, the "I" who recognizes the suffering is furthest from the process. A non existing "I" can not suffer.
Suffering is then, primarily, an objective reaction at a corporeal level. All suffering is a sign of refusal of the present situation. This refusal is linked to an incomprehension, or being enclosed in a system of choice and preference conditioned by memory. Once realized, a period of relaxation and appeasement follows. The I-image, constantly implicated in the mechanisms of suffering, no longer has the foundation to exist.
Without a suffering or denying "I", suffering can but dissolve in an enlarged space. This reabsorption is a prelude to its disappearance. Once suffering disappears, happiness is. A simple joy of living that is no longer associated with a situation, nor an object, nor an image. One that is left to nothing but itself.
Translated from French by Michael Smith
Yet who is speaking of change? What is it that we want to change? Suffering? What suffering?
Perhaps by changing the practice of asking questions we can discover a form of question that does not demand an answer. This would enable further progress and open more opportunities; namely one towards a self realization.
What then is self realization?
Again, another question.
I would like to take this opportunity to recount an ancient and classic dialogue between student and teacher from the world of Zen. It consists of self realization, not in an intellectual way, but a concrete one. By asking, the student seeks out self realization while the master, in response, helps to find the students' own path so as to draw nearer to this realization.
For someone who is seeking his or her own personal path of self realization, a close look at this dialogue can have the same function as the master's answer: to show us direction in our own spiritual practice. This Zen dialogue provokes a dialogue from within by conjuring up the student and the master within us. With the help of this contact, we can approach the "self realization" encounter.
During this encounter, our self-understanding, reflecting an uncertain identity, is broken, and we are touched by the experience of a true and eternal identity. For those with no recollection of the taste of this experience these are but mere theories. In this case, the criterion of suffering is entirely transformed. A headache will always be a headache. Do we hope for something else? Are we searching for self realization in order to avoid pain? An end to suffering?
The pain is not the same anymore, even if it is similar. Once the taste of the essential is revived, everything changes; a taste that is unrestrained by limits and sensation.
The criterion of suffering will then have to change; that which really makes us suffer is falling into the depths of the ego's habits. To suffer from not being able to feel, and seizing the quality that we know exists; to suffer from not witnessing or listening to what it demands of us. That is to say "become that which we have always been in the eyes of God" (Eckhart).
It is obvious that without this suffering, we remain in a state of self pity, and with the illusion of a "spiritual reality" that is nothing but better conditions for the ego.
Suffering can be an indication that encourages us to continue our daily quest for self realization - the single means of hope for those who suffer.
It is therefore possible that a number of patients who suffer in this manner are closer to attaining self realization than doctors and therapists who have discovered methods to annihilate the initial wounds of the soul.
I will attempt to give you a concrete example of these allusions.
And I will undoubtedly speak of the Zen spiritual exercise, that is to say, that of Zazen.
Translated from French by Michael Smith
How is it that a same cause will not provoke the same effects in different people? Some are bedridden with a migraine while Ramana Maharshi or Sigmund Freud dying of cancer led a slow but normal live without tranquilizers.
Childbirth can be experienced with little pain and is generally free of suffering yet for other women the physical depth of the sensations are sometimes compared to the pain caused by some cancers. Where does the difference lie?: In the meaning granted to these sensations.
What if suffering does not exist by "itself"? In fact, it resembles a concept: formless, colorless, soundless and odorless, we cannot touch it, we cannot taste it, we only can think of it and feel... its effects.
The Lankâvatârasûtra says: "The lower systems of sense-mind and the discriminating-mind do not really suffer and feel pain, they only imagine they do, pleasure and pain are the deceptive reactions of the mortal-mind as it grasps an imaginary objective world".
Intellectually theses assertions are satisfactory, yet we do suffer, so how are we going to free ourselves from sufferings?
We should probably try first to find out the cause of our sufferings rather than the appropriate actions to get rid of them.
Psychotherapists would probably come up with the following words: dissatisfied libido, conflict, projection, culpability, super-ego, unconscious, seeking reality (Lacan), Oedipus complex, grief over separation, impaired creativity... Here I shall stop, before producing a dictionary list.
We have to feel the main ideas linking these disorders.
The main ideas are: desires exist but they cannot be satisfied for different reasons - innate, individual, familial or social. There is a relative conflict, that is "in the relation": between what we want and what we get, between what we appear to be and what we are, between what we want to be and what we can be, between what is and what we see, between what we feel "inside" and what we do "outside".
The word "libido" as used by S. Freud points to much more than only "sexual desire", it relates to desire, need, impulse, a compulsion like an ardent thirst.
One out of every five human beings in the world, from East to West and North to South, will go through a severe nervous breakdown endangering mental and physical life.
But nervous breakdowns don't only happen to people who are sick, bedridden, jobless or loveless. They also happen to healthy, rich, beautiful, sexually active people who "have made it" as we say today. And there, from the pinnacle of their worldly happiness, they feel empty, lost. They know and believe that their life is as good as life can be, yet they think: "it is not That", "it is not what I am longing for".
We can be pitiable, even if we are miserable by "mistake" just as the man who is frightened by mistaking a rope for a snake in the dark. He is terrified and runs, and his heart races, and cold sweat dampens his back!
What if there was only a thought born from fear, desire, refusal and ignorance?
We are afraid of whatever is unknown, afraid of pain, afraid of suffering, afraid of changes, afraid of solitude, and even "afraid to be afraid". We decline natural life, and do not want to expose ourselves, we delude ourselves into thinking that as individuals we can escape the laws of Life.
We are attached to "me" and "mine", and this attachment triggers off our sufferings because "me" will take leave in dying and "mine" is constantly dissolving in the world's impermanence.
Attachment is a reaction, the bitter fruit of likes and dislikes, of desires and refusals.
We could stop interpreting, imagining, hoping, and only see the perception, understanding the type of reaction and its origin. Then there would be only a sensation, strong enough sometimes to be called pain, but never suffering which is psychical, mental. There would be sensation, vision, and "under-standing". There would be knowledge, end of ignorance and emotional storms.
For this, we need a kind of relaxation, a "metanoïa": that is a turning "outside in" of our gaze, and a direct perception of physical or mental realities, the vision without judgment, conceptualization or delay of "What Is, Here and Now".
In spite of some traditions, suffering is not a natural way towards the Absolute, but it can be a warning signal just as the tiger in the dream frightens us so much that we wake up urgently out of this terrible illusion.
Suffering will not disappear due to the activity of the mind. When all corporal and mental potentialities have been explored, when we see no hope worthy of holding us back, when we at last reach the "happy-despair" advocated by A. Comte-Sponville, the complete realization that "I" is nothing, "I" knows nothing, "I" can nothing, and that we accept the being of "What Is", then suffering will disappear, along with the illusion creating it, as will dissolve simultaneously the relative problems of this world and the veil preventing us from living the Absolute.
Many of you will be introduced to the discipline of Ayurvedic medicine at this conference. Ayurveda is the parent of all medical systems, and psychiatry is considered to be one of its eight main branches. A large body of vedic and classical Sanskrit medical literature, dating from at least 5000 years ago, still exists and forms a solid theoretical base for this type of holistic approach to healing.
Since this is the first time I have been afforded the privilege of talking with you, I have decided to focus on the most basic questions that a psychiatrist must address in the course of a healthy career. What is the pathology of insanity? The Ayurvedic answers to these questions are found in the "Charaka Samhita" or Ayurvedic text on general medicine. This text defines the mind as that organ which is essential for cognition.
The Sanhka system of Indian philosophy defines the mind as one of 25 essential elements which make up the universe: as follows Purusha (Godhead), Prakriti (nature) intellect, ego, mind, sound, touch, light, taste, smell, ears, skin, eyes, tongue, nose, hands, feet, sex organs, anus, larynx, solids, liquids, gases, energy and space.
An ideal mind is an enlightened or Self-Realized mind, which exhibits the following characteristics: timelessness, contentment, security, self-esteem, confidence, lovingness, insight, harmony, flexibility, stability, fortitude, intelligence, creativity, conscience, control, respect, truth, humility and compassion. Now that we have seen the ideal mind, we shall examine the pathology of the diseased or insane mind.
The Ayurvedic literature divides the causes and symptoms of insanity into two main groups, physiological and exogenous. Insanity based on physiological causes occurs due to the following conditions: mental shock, weak-heartedness, toxicity in the body, unclean and improper diet and living habits, indulgence in bodily perversions, extreme emaciation, repeated experiences of fear, greed, anger, excitement, fatigue, lust, grief, anxiety, regret and trauma. Thus, the center of intelligence, (said by Ayurvedists to reside in the heart chakra) becomes blocked and cannot communicate with the sensory apparatus and the brain, and insanity ensues. Insanity is thus defined as an unsettled and unbalanced condition of the entire physiology which affects the subtle organ of mind, including understanding, consciousness, perception, inclination, memory, perception, and character, behavior and conduct.
The exogenous type of insanity, which has no visible physiological causes of imbalance is said to be attributable to reprehensible actions done in a former existence. According to its pathogenesis, both types can be curable or not, according to the degree and type of derangement. The primary treatment in both types of insanity remains essentially the same, the standard Ayurvedic therapeutic measures plus, most importantly the introduction of healing measures antagonistic to the intimate nature of the disease. Consciousness raising by the practitioner is thought to be paramount to affect cure, since it is said that the insane render themselves their own assailants, and they should be taught to regard themselves as the "author of their own pain and pleasure."
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A fundamental principle has become evident: the way we live reality is related to the state of consciousness we are in. Four main states can be distinguished: the awake state, the sleeping state, the dreaming state, and the transpersonal state. In each one of these states, a different reality is experienced by the subject, in the following way:
The transpersonal experience has a great therapeutic value, for it dissolves the dualistic illusion and awakens the repressed functions of love and wisdom.
The transpersonal experience and state, through questioning the nature of truth, lays down the problem of the origin of psychosis and hallucinations, and even of the normality and reality of what is called the "I".
There are two opposing (contradictory) thesis on this topic: the evolutionary thesis and the regressive one. According to the first one, each normal human being goes or must go through different periods (phases) in his existence: a first undifferentiated one where there is a total confusion between the internal and the external world; a formative period of an ego differentiated from the external world - it is a personal and relative period -; the transpersonal period which is composed of a living, differentiated unity, of an holistic and hologrammatic view of the universe, cosmos or part of them.
According to the regressive thesis, especially developed by Stanislas Grof, the transpersonal experience and state is a regression toward a fusional and undifferentiated state of an intra- and even pre-uterine nature. The explanation for hallucinations and psychosis is found through a regressive position along a regressive cartography of consciousness.
In our book "L'Homme sans frontières" - 'Man without boundaries' - (Pierre Weil, L'Espace Bleu, Paris, 1992), we examine both these theses and propose a plausible hypothesis: the transpersonal state would be neither a regression, nor an evolution, but an immediate and spontaneous exit from the usual space-time of the awake state. As the concepts of evolution and regression are temporal concepts, involving a past (regression) and a future (evolution), these concepts loose their meaning in a non-temporal perspective.
From this perspective, the true nature of the mind is atemporal and is veiled by a dualistic and temporal mirage, specific to the awake state (Pierre Weil, "Anthologie de l'extase" - 'anthology of ecstasy' -, Albin Michel, Paris, 1993).
Translated from French by Avigail Gilboa and Jean-Marc Mantel
However, what can evolve during our spiritual adventure or even radically change is:
According to the teachings of my spiritual master, Shri P. Rajagopalachari, an adaptive growth of the ego takes place normally in the aspirant (saddhak then bhakta) as long as he progresses on the spiritual path. The ego is not broken, nor does it disappear, rather it is alleviated or refined in stages of maturation. If the aspirant is willing to collaborate this process of transformation it results in a "nobleness of personality".
This teaching has been confirmed by my experience as a spiritual aspirant and as spiritual instructor ("tutor") of the Shri Ram Chandra Mission. As a psychotherapist I shall of course add that human beings are also prone to use their experiences of suffering to strengthen defense mechanisms, hence their character traits. These observations do not only include my so-called patients but also the spiritual aspirants who do not really collaborate and who cheat more or less unconsciously by means of ruse and trickery.
The inner changes, or "refinement of the ego" that one can observe, and determine our ability to evolve (which includes our capacity to deal with new levels of suffering by means of "absorption") seem to be correlated with: