This is that old picture of the author of this blog trying to look philosophical. I was told by a friend it looks like a mug shot after an arrest. You decide.I'm busy working away at some things that I've been wanting to do for awhile about "double consciousness" but can't get to it at the moment as I'm doing my homework. I don't like to keep the readers of this blog waiting a long time for a post so I thought that I might offer a couple of little bits of the first paper I wrote as a doctoral student. It was entitled, "Divine Possibilities: A Baha'i Philosophy of Therapeutic Transformation." Here are a few quotes:
“ It is the integrated and dynamic interplay of soul and body that constitutes “the self”. “Self” is the word that will be used from this point on to refer to the individual. Because the self is essentially spiritual in nature, the potential for the development of its divine possibilities is unlimited. When the development of these possibilities is constrained or not adequately encouraged, it results in disorders of the self that can take on spiritual, psychological and biological forms. However, in Baha’i teaching the inherent capacities of the soul are not diminished by illness. Illness is viewed as being analogous to clouds that obscure the light of the sun. Behind the clouds, the sun shines as brightly as ever, but its full brilliance and warmth is hidden. Disorders of the self require healing through means that are both spiritual and material in order to harmonize with its true nature and have the greatest effect.”
“For a Baha’i the most significant relationship of the self is with God. Through prayer, meditation, study of scripture and investigation of physical phenomena through reason and science, the self strives to know more and more about its Creator. Meditation in particular leads to intuitive knowing:
...while you meditate you are speaking with your own spirit. In that state of mind you put certain questions to your spirit and the spirit answers: the light breaks forth and the reality is revealed...Through the faculty of meditation man attains to eternal life; through it he receives the breath of the Holy Spirit -- the bestowal of the Spirit is given in reflection and meditation. The spirit of man is itself informed and strengthened during meditation; through it affairs of which man knew nothing are unfolded before his view. Through it he receives Divine inspiration; through it he receives heavenly food. Meditation is the key for opening the doors of mysteries. (Abdu'l-Baha,)
This kind of intuitive knowing could be understood as a form of “attunement”. Self psychology, object-relations theories and contemporary neuroscience each emphasize the contribution attuning empathically to the emotional state of another has to positive development of the self.”
“Because love is a force of attraction, it sets things in motion. Love motivates individual, communal and institutional behavior, expressions of the third power of the self, “will”. The exercise of will motivated by love and guided by knowledge is how this author defines “choice”. It is this capacity for choice, transcending biological, psychological, and social conditions, that distinguishes human beings from other forms of life. One of the dehumanizing aspects of the distress that may bring clients to therapy is the degree to which it has caused them to lose faith in the possibility of choice. Without recognition of the power of will, the power of choice, there is no ground for hope for our clients or for the therapeutic process itself. What practitioners sometimes refer to as client “strengths” often are examples of the clients exercising “will” making the best choices they could under the worst of circumstances. In transformative therapeutic encounters a significant task is for the client and clinician learn together how to exercise their will, in order to create a relationship motivated by love and guided by the knowledge they discover together in a cyclical and dynamic process similar to what the self experiences over the course of life.”
Phillipe, I want to warmly thank you for this post, which very clearly and eloquently touches on some key issues of "being human" and the spiritual journey of the individual. It connects up for me with an attempt I recently made to write about the Baha'i idea of "salvation", in response to questioning from a Christian blogger. Best wishes for a good reception from your professor!
ReplyDeleteThanks for the encouragement from far across the sea brother! Glad to know that it is helpful to someone.
ReplyDeleteWhat rich and inspiring reading The Psychodynamics of Self was this morning, Phillipe. We've got some friends coming to a study circle in our home on Reflections on the Life of the Spirit and there'll be a copy of this waiting for each of them next time. Wonderfully thoughtful stuff -- and best of luck with the assignment. Very nice reflection on science and spirituality here.
ReplyDeleteWith love,
Phyllis
Thanks Phyllis I consider it an honor that you took the time to share your thoughts and hope my humble notions are helpful to your friends.
ReplyDeleteWell, Phillipe, I can see how the look in your eyes would have provoked your friend's comment:
ReplyDeleteCould this be a photo of you trying to look philosophical about having been arrested?
Joking aside:
You have once again come right to the point. Among other things, the excerpts seems to clarify prerequisite knowledge and attributes a therapist should have, from the Baha'i perspective, to be optimally effective.
With some modifications, I think it could also apply to Baha'i teaching: accompanying a soul on his or her spiritual journey.
The only part I am a little unclear of is your final paragraph: How it lines up with Baha'i teachings that, once we have conscious knowledge it can be exercised either for good or evil. (Perhaps related to Baha'u'llah's statements about the twin obligations he has placed on every soul, recognition and obedience). Maybe other parts of your paper cleared this up.
I definitely agree that the feeling of powerlessness, or lack of choice in one's life, based on discouraging or traumatic experience, is the cause of many if not most disorders. I have always thought of strengths as tools, whose effectiveness can be honed, transformed, applied more widely or to another arena, to goals of self-actualization, so I'll have to think about your perspective here.
As for not being sure you know what you are talking about: what therapist can honestly say he or she understands why or how one has been effective, or ineffective, in the dynamic interplay between souls? So stay humble!
Ah Judith I am laughing out loud. I'd have to say that if I was arrested I would be very philosophical about it. It would make for some good blogging depending on how long I was incarcerated. The point you make about how I understand choice is a good one. The capacity for choice does not imply that we will make good choices, but even bad choices involve knowing and loving even if our knowledge is really ingorance or our the object of our love is unhealthy. Remember that earlier on I talk about "disorders of the self" which would involve the kinds of choices that you might be describing. Also how I'm defining choice is about understanding that choice and behavior are not the same thing (though I may not have made this clear). A person can engage in behaviors that are expressions of unconscious or biological processes, but I would not consider these "choices" though they do involve "will". For example much of the behaviors of infants are instinctual initially because they have not become self-conscious in the way that an older child would be. As such they are beginning to exercise will (I want this object, I try to grasp it), but not "choice". This gets into a related topic which is about the development or moral reasoning across the lifespan which I did not address explicitly in this paper but has been addressed by Baha'i scholars like Elena Mustakova-Possardt and Rhett Diessner. You've given me some things to think about though. I guess I'll have to find a different photo, perhaps of my smiling that will work better.
ReplyDeleteDear Phillipe
ReplyDeleteWow! This is the sort of thing I have been hoping to find online. It joins up several references in the writings I have been milling over in my mind but didn't quite make the intellectual jump of joining up. You also start to bridge the gap between the abstract ideas and the concrete use of those very powerful ideas. I liked the fact that you didn't over indulge in jargon, so that I could still understand what you were saying without a PHD in psychology.
Are you willing to share that whole paper?
It leaves me reflecting on how I can better understand these issues and use them as a high school teacher dealing with teenagers and also in my personal life as a friend.
Pauline
Hi Pauline, I'm not ready to give out the whole paper yet as I'm hoping that I might get it published somewhere. We shall see. Glad to know that it is helpful to you, that's the goal anyway.
ReplyDeletePhillipe,
ReplyDeleteThis paragraph is of particular significance to me:
“For a Baha’i, love is more than a feeling. Love is the force of attraction that holds the whole universe together, that makes all things possible. The self owes its very existence to love. This Baha’i scholar defines “therapeutic love” as the force of attraction that occurs between therapist and the client, based on consciousness of their common humanity and the beauty of God’s image that each recognizes in the other. This kind of love feeds and is fed by the love of both clinician and client for themselves as individuals. Assisting clients to experience giving and receiving this kind of love is another significant task of the transformative therapeutic relationship. The developing bond of mutual attraction and attraction to self described here could be understood as “attachment”. Like knowing, the generative potential of love is experienced early in life in the caregiver-infant relationship.”
I don't know if I practice therapeutic love, but I hope I practice Baha'i love in my daily life. But then again, I'm not a therapist. At any rate, I'm trying to understand something about myself, and I think this is a something many Baha'is experience, which is balancing between being very loving to others, but not very loving to one's self.
Many friends have recently told me that I treat them much better than I treat myself. Baha'u'llah asks us to love mankind more than ourselves and detach ourselves from the material world. Yet, we have been created noble, and we shouldn't abase ourselves. Quite frankly, I'm confused, but I also realize that this is a period of rapid transformation for me, and the answer will probably come in time.
This has been a time of huge tests for me, hence my comments. In spite of everything, I am amused by my confusion!
Angela, this is a very confusing and somewhat mystical issue that you are raising. Much of what we see in the Baha'i scriptures emphasizes sacrifice of self as an ideal. It would make one wonder if self-love is even something that should be aspired to. However there are other things in the writings that talk about the self as being loved by God, such as in the 4 Valleys and Baha'u'llah said, "Be fair to yourselves and to others that the evidences of justice may be revealed by your deeds among our faithful servants." Thus fairness to oneself is about justice and is very significant. You could say that the Baha'i Faith is inviting us to reconsider what self-love and self-care mean, which is probably very different than the kind of ego-driven, narcissistic and individuality focused notion of these things in our seriously unbalanced and unspiritual society.
ReplyDeleteThis is why getting some understanding of what the self is, is a useful thing to try and do in order to distinguish our true self and help it to thrive and grow.
Peter Tosh sings in one of his Reggae ballads:
ReplyDelete"Everybody wants to go to heaven, but nobody wants to die!"
which always makes me smile. And I relate it to the following quotes:
"Kindle the fire of love, and burn away all things. Then set thy foot into the Land of the Lovers." (Baha'u'llah).
"Behold the candle, how it weeps it life away" ('Abdu'l-Baha) is something to be meditated on.
We would like to transform ourselves into a brilliant light (true self) rather than remain a piece of wax. That is the very purpose of our creation and existence. But it seems that our very limited view of self, and of life itself, must be sacrified to acheive this. That's where most of us usually hem and haw.
And notice the unusual use of the word "weep" to describe the process of a melting candle.
Your doctorate sounds so fun! This post is so relevant right now - I just got back from the BNASAA Conference and feel like I got to witness and experience exactly what you've written about: the healing power of prayer and meditation, the self-esteem that stems from empathising with another soul and a whole lotta therapeutic love with a roomful of gifted clinicians. You're definately onto something...
ReplyDeleteGood luck with your paper, dear brother.
I just realised you've changed your profile picture to that dodgy mug-shot. I am on the floor. My sides. Splitting.
ReplyDeletePearl, I'd love to hear more about the conference, perhaps you will blog about it. Glad to know my "mug" has such therapeutic power. I think more bloggers should have their pictures on for the same reason. So I'm assuming you are on the West Coast? Did you connect with Angela, Hi Angela!!
ReplyDeleteWell, your wish is granted; there's a juicy post on my page all about it.
ReplyDeleteI'll be on here on the West Coast til mid-November. Right now I'm housesitting the cutest apartment in the heart of San Fransisco for the next fortnight. God really loves me. As for Ms Angela, we are playing phone tag and hoping to hook up in the coming weeks. Hi Angela!!
Hi Pearl! Hi Phillipe!
ReplyDeleteYes, I'm hoping we can connect this weekend, as a matter of fact! I'll keep you posted!
Wooo-Hooooo
ReplyDeleteI'm so jealous.
I think it's the plain white background that is making it look like a mugshot. For a philosophy shot you need a bookcase full of books in the background!
ReplyDeleteSister Yasmin, that is an excellent idea I will need to get a different shot for the blog! Very funny observation.
ReplyDeleteWonderful to see the books in the picture - definitely more philosophical!!!!
ReplyDelete