lotusinthemud

on spiritual bypassing and relationship

:: by John Welwood

Spiritual bypassing is a term I coined to describe a process I saw happening in the Buddhist community I was in, and also in myself. Although most of us were sincerely trying to work on ourselves, I noticed a widespread tendency to use spiritual ideas and practices to sidestep or avoid facing unresolved emotional issues, psychological wounds, and unfinished developmental tasks.

When we are spiritually bypassing, we often use the goal of awakening or liberation to rationalize what I call premature transcendence: trying to rise above the raw and messy side of our humanness before we have fully faced and made peace with it. And then we tend to use absolute truth to disparage or dismiss relative human needs, feelings, psychological problems, relational difficulties, and developmental deficits. I see this as an “occupational hazard” of the spiritual path, in that spirituality does involve a vision of going beyond our current karmic situation.

Trying to move beyond our psychological and emotional issues by sidestepping them is dangerous. It sets up a debilitating split between the buddha and the human within us. And it leads to a conceptual, one-sided kind of spirituality where one pole of life is elevated at the expense of its opposite: Absolute truth is favored over relative truth, the impersonal over the personal, emptiness over form, transcendence over embodiment, and detachment over feeling. One might, for example, try to practice nonattachment by dismissing one’s need for love, but this only drives the need underground, so that it often becomes unconsciously acted out in covert and possibly harmful ways instead.

I’m interested in how spiritual bypassing plays out in relationships, where it often wreaks its worst havoc. If you were a yogi in a cave doing years of solo retreat, your psychological wounding might not show up so much because your focus would be entirely on your practice, in an environment that may not aggravate your relational wounds. It’s in relationships that our unresolved psychological issues tend to show up most intensely. That’s because psychological wounds are always relational — they form in and through our relationships with our early caretakers.

an open letter calling for peace ~ plum village

Dear Human Family,

Watching the tragedy of war continue to unfold daily in Ukraine, we open our hearts to the suffering of people young and old. As an international community of Engaged Buddhism in the Plum Village tradition, we observe the war with pain and alarm.

In our Buddhist community, every Christmas we listen with great joy to the sound of Russian church bells, and we open our hearts to the rich spiritual heritage of Russia and Europe. Our teacher, the venerable Vietnamese monk Thich Nhat Hanh, has said that “A bell is always a bell; whether it’s Catholic, Protestant, Orthodox, or Buddhist, it is still a bell.” Listening to the bell, no matter what our cultural or religious roots are, we can have a deep encounter where we touch peace and a shared spiritual dimension. We all yearn for peace. We all need peace.

Our community’s own roots lie in the tradition of Engaged Buddhism in Vietnam, where more than three million people died in a war that lasted nearly 20 years and some two million fled as refugees. We know from our teacher that war is never a solution. It leads only to division and hatred that can last for generations.

Our teacher worked tirelessly for peace in Vietnam by never choosing sides. Instead, he appealed to adversaries to look deeply into each other’s pain, anxiety, and existential fear, and to consider the war’s horrific toll on all victims. Forced into exile, he became a spiritual leader of a global movement for peace, reconciliation, and disarmament.

"A Cloud Never Dies" biographical documentary of Zen Master Thich Nhat Hanh

 

 

Teachings on Mindfulness & Gratefulness ♡ Zen Master Thich Nhat Hanh & Brother David Steindl-Rast ♡

 

 

Finding Forgiveness

 

We teach what we have learned. We act as we have been acted upon. A person who is not loving has not experienced love. It is not his fault. Realizing this gives rise to forgiveness.

~ Guo Jun, “A Special Transmission”

Your Fluid Sense of Self

 

When we look carefully, we discover that the sense of self is not a particle that never changes, but rather a flow, a wave of thought and feeling that can increase and decrease and is therefore not permanent.

~ Shinzen Young, “Brief Teachings”

Respecting Others

 

Everyone wants love and care, but, more than these, human beings want respect for who they are.

~ Dzigar Kongtrul Rinpoche, “Old Relationships, New Possibilities”

Applying the Teachings

 

It’s not enough to simply hear the teachings of the Buddha, even if they resonate with you.

There’s still a requirement to apply those teachings in your actual, ordinary life.

~ Tuere Sala, “Brief Teachings”

Connect to the Buddha inside you

 

You lack nothing of the wisdom and perfection of the Buddha, right at this moment.

~ Elihu Genmyo Smith, “No Need to Do Zazen, Therefore Must Do Zazen”

Investigate the Living Present

 

Our mind wanders incessantly, but our body and senses are always in the present.

To investigate our embodied experience is to investigate the living present.

~ Anne C. Klein, “Revisiting Ritual”