Dharmavidya David Brazier:
Modern people often think that they can control their feelings and moods independently of their lifestyle and life events. Commonly they attempt to do so by taking medicines and this often leads to a deterioration in health.
This attitude is a result of the medicalisation of psychology. The psyche (chitta) responds to experience. Different people do respond to similar experiences differently, but this is not a manifestation of illness, it is mostly a difference of character. There is a basal temperament that a person is born with and then there are the cumulative effects of how they deal with the miscellaneous circumstances that come along. We have a tendency to repeat. If I have been a coward once, I am likely to be a coward again. If I have been brave once, I am likely to be brave again.
In life one is tested by events and the results of one's responses tend to be cumulative.. Things happen. When something happens one has to respond. This means that one exercises one’s will. Intentional action has consequences in the world and in the mind. In every moment of life something new is possible, but the drag of habit is strong. Rather than living out our creative possibilities we tend to go round in circles.
Buddhist psychotherapy provides a way of accompaniment along life’s journey considered as a spiritual quest for liberation. We could call it journey work. To be liberated means to break out. Buddhist teachings describe in detail and in principle the stages of the cycles that we pass through. They also assume a long term trajectory over many lives such that each person comes into this life with a spiritual problem. The person is not generally conscious of this vibanga. So the person is a case (koan) - a specific example of a general spiritual issue. This issue is grounded in the circumstances of impermanence & attachment but takes a unique form due to the details of circumstance on the one hand and the way that the person exercises his or her will on the other.
In samsara we are embedded in conditions, none of which can be expected to endure forever. Change comes. We struggle to survive and reproduce ourselves, physically and culturally. So we resist, deny or try to take control of change, none of which is anything more than a losing battle in the long run. Journey work, therefore, involves learning both great acceptance and also willingness to engage.
War, want & woeful times will come. They test us. A response is required. Can one choose a noble course? Can one avoid the extremes of abdication, self-pity and denial on the one hand and stubborn prejudice, conceit and aggression on the other? Can one free oneself from one’s self?
Clearly, for the self to free itself from the self is impossible. The issue has to be framed in a different way. Only something outside of oneself can free one. There has to be an other power involved or the task is hopeless. And one has to trust in that other power, even though one does not understand it. By definition, one cannot bring the other power under the control of one’s will, one can only offer to let one’s will be led by the other power.
This is where the idea of nobility arises. The other power is higher. For the sake of something higher one acts in a noble way, one gives up mean and selfish ideas, one discards petty impulses. The person who is oriented toward the higher spirit ascends upon the spiritual path. The person who is not, descends.
So, at every point in life there is the possibility of going up or down. Now the inspiration to adopt the higher path also generally comes from outside of the self. One has a teacher or guide or therapist or skilful friend. This may be an established long term relationship or it may be a fortuitous coincidence. Along the way one meets the people that one needs, even if one does not always recognise them as such.
Life is thus a series of encounters. In each meeting there is the question, What is required now? What needs to be done? This challenge can have different aspects. Sometimes the thing that is needed is to do nothing. There are many situations in which one is tempted to act, but action will only make things worse. What is required is restraint, nirodha. Sometimes, discretion is the better part of valour. On other occasions, decision is necessary and this involves choice. In every choice, something is lost or given up. One cannot have everything. Again, one tries to discern the most noble path.
In such decision making, feelings and intuition can play a part by supplying information, but they should not be the ultimate determinant. Often one is called to do things that are difficult, uncomfortable, distressing or frightening. The noble person is not deterred by such obstacles. For the sake of the higher life, s/he takes on what is required.
So Buddhist practice is much concerned with keeping the other power in mind. This is the original mindfulness. Buddhist therapy or guidance helps a person along the journey by acting as a companion and a mirror and by recognising how the higher influence is working in the life of the practitioner.
~ Dharmavidya David Brazier
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