TODAY’S CONSIDERATIONS
From Instability / Insanity: What the Advaita teachings Can (and Cannot Address)
NON-DUALITY AS OPPOSED TO THE DUALITY OF PSYCHOLOGICAL SPLITTING,
Part Two
Even a partially-versed Advaitin seeker could not look at the examples and traits of unstable persons that were provided earlier and fail to see how those beliefs and traits are steeped in duality; however, such instability can be rooted in psychological problems that are so serious that Advaita's Ultimate Medicine cannot even begin to address the issues that are driving some persons.
Moreover, instability / insanity is usually multi-dimensional in its causes, rooted in numerous sources, so a holistic method of treatment (rather than any one single approach) is most often indicated.
That inspires this disclaimer: there are some highly arrogant and highly dangerous persons (relatively speaking) who believe that whatever they are attached to can address anything and everything that can arise during the relative existence.
Some will claim that their religion has all the answers; some will claim that their "program" has all the answers; some will claim that their philosophy or ideology has all the answers; some will claim that their analyst or psychologist or psychiatrist or doctor or pharmacist / chemist or some other drug dealer has all the answers; however, it is rare that any one single approach can address all of the facets at play when instability / insanity reaches a full-blown stage.
[The instability which comes to the dual-minded - that is, to those with dualistic beliefs - is holistic in nature. Often what looks like a mental illness is (as Maharaj noted) actually rooted in a physical illness. It results from a chemical imbalance in the elemental plant food body which, in turn, does adversely impact the mental functioning of the sufferer. Because the causes of mental and emotional instability are numerous, so too must the treatment be holistic in its nature for all of the aspects of the condition to be addressed.]
People familiar with the approach here over the years know that persons who write to report that they are contemplating suicide are referred to the emergency room of the nearest hospital and know that it has been pointed out that the three body types all require totally different food plans if - as Maharaj noted - the body is to function optimally, allowing the functioning to happen in an optimal manner as well. So a variety of sources of instability / insanity will be discussed.
Never, though, is the Ultimate Medicine offered when it is clear that far more is required to address certain grave mental and emotional issues and disorders.
In some cases, yes, the Ultimate Medicine may go a long way in addressing the problem. In some cases, professional treatment by psychologists or psychiatrists will be indicated. In some other cases, physical and dietary needs should be addressed. In still other cases, major personality disorders are driving the instability.
Some cases are rooted in the perversity of acculturation and domestication which are typical nowadays all around the globe.
And as mentioned earlier, many cases nowadays are rooted in "psychological splitting." If instability and insanity are rooted in duality-based splitting, then these teachings can assist in addressing the issues; if actual psychological splitting is the cause of such instability, then the teachings will have little chance of treating that mental and emotional sickness.
INSTABILITY / INSANITY INDUCED BY PSYCHOLOGICAL SPLITTING
Psychological splitting occurs especially among those persons referenced earlier who - for a variety of reasons - have no ability to process and integrate whatever they are feeling. They can emote on occasion, but they seldom feel. Eventually, they can dissociate and will feel nothing and will care nothing about the way their words and actions affect the feelings of others.
Because of childhood experiences in their cold and uncaring families and cultures where such displays of affection as hugging and saying "I love you" are taboo, the children who are raised by adults who are rigid and distant and excessively formal and remote and detached and aloof become adults who are cold and uncaring and rigid and distant and excessively formal and remote and detached and aloof.
When they encounter someone who grew up in a family or culture that was just the opposite, such cold and detached adults will erect barriers, feeling threatened by those who come too close.
A friend in Amsterdam who was known worldwide as one of the most giving and caring and loving people stiffened and balked on one occasion when I put an arm around her shoulder, and that was after years of being "friends."
For her, loving and caring could be handled at a distance, but never up close, and she eventually explained that "people in our culture do not hug like that. We all keep our distance. We are more formal than people in your country."
The same happened with the family of a former wife, all of whom were German. While engaged to be married, I once greeted the mother with a hug around the shoulders. She recoiled as if I had inappropriately grabbed some private part of her anatomy. I was taken into another room and told, "Our family does not hug. We do not say 'I love you.' You need to respect our boundaries."
[Because I was still suffering from the symptoms of the Ultimate Sickness at the time, I did not reply, "Wow! Close call! Thanks for the heads up. I'm outta here." Nor was the response, ""Du bist wohl verrucktl" ("You must be crazy!") Instead, the answer amounted to, "Ja, Herr Hauptmann. Das ist gut!" "Yes, Captain. This is good"? Good to whom? The truthful answer: "To an ego-state in the making." I was not even yet "The Husband," but the agenda of "The Would-Be Husband" was strong enough to control my thoughts and words and actions and drive me to ignore all of the red flags being waved as warnings. It is not only the personality identifications which have already been assigned or assumed which generate instability and chaos and suffering; it is also the personality-identifications-in-waiting which can generate all three.]
Persons from one culture to the next have spheres about them that are of varying radiuses, and to move inside one's sphere is unacceptable among those raised in such cold and often "northern" cultures.
In addition to childhood experiences, certain traumatic events throughout one's adult years can inspire the wearing of a shield by those who may have once had an ability to integrate difficult feelings but who later mobilized certain defenses to avoid what those individuals now perceive as intolerable or unbearable situations. The dualistic instability / insanity is that they long for closeness while hating closeness.
They are doomed to misery, trapped as they are in such insane duality.
Consider the level of insanity when one has been robbed of those things that mark the nisarga (natural) mode of functioning which animals display when in their natural habitat. The deer here touch, nestle against each other, display affection and closeness, and yes, even care.
Among persons who are trapped in psychological splitting, hugging becomes anathema; hugging or saying "I love you" is never even considered; an inability to trust on even the slightest level is absent; and paranoia sets in when persons feel sure that everyone wants only to use or abuse them.
If persons suffer from what is called here a "broken picker" (which inspires them to pick, over and over, the very worst mates imaginable) or from a sense of entitlement or from a desire to use others, then they will attract - time and time again - the types who do want to use them and / or abuse them; in their backwards world of splitting, they are often attracted to abusive, possessive, jealous, controlling (a.k.a., supposedly "strong" and "protective") types;
thus, after they have been driven blindly to enter into one such senseless entanglement after another, the conclusion that they must keep their distance and must wear armor to protect themselves can become entrenched.
To be continued.
Please enter into the silence of contemplation.
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