9 November 2022

Psychology and Spirituality

The other day I listened to a youtube post about Freud’s relationship to a contemporary mystic, Romain Roland.  It was a well done post with a lot of information about Freud’s hostility to religion and spirituality that I had not been aware of before.  This brought to mind some thoughts I have had about the role of psychology in contemporary spirituality that I have considered for a long time, but have never brought them together in a way that would make an essay or small book.  Here are a few of those thoughts:

1. Psychology has positioned itself as the arbiter of what counts for legitimate spirituality; in a sense Western Psychology has redefined spirituality to be a therapeutic process and that is why Psychology feels confident in its critiques of religion and spirituality.

2. For about thirty years I was involved with Western Buddhism in the U.S. (I don’t know what is happening in Western Europe.)  What I observed over those thirty years is that Western Buddhism gradually dropped, or perhaps we can say carefully ejected, anything in Buddhism that could be construed as transcendental or as relying on non-sensory experience.  In addition, Western Buddhism was gradually transformed into a therapeutic modality, or an adjunct to Western therapeutic modalities; so much so that in many Western Buddhist groups even the ideas of enlightenment and Nirvana no longer function.

3. Freud reinterpreted religious experience by imposing on those experiences psychological categories and explanations.  For example, the unitive experience reported by numerous mystics, from various traditions, was interpreted by Freud as a longing to return to an infantile state where the infant does not distinguish between their own experience and the mother’s presence; that is to say the feeling that mother and infant are merged. 

This set the tone, and provided the specific strategy, that psychology has taken towards spirituality ever since.  From this perspective the yearning for transcendence, for a return to The Good, The One, and The Beautiful is simply the imprint of infantile longings asserting themselves. 

4. One reinterpretation offered by Western Psychology is to understand enlightenment, realization, etc., in therapeutic terms.  Specifically, this means operating from the assumption that realization means being free from psychological afflictions such as neurosis or obsessions. 

What I want to suggest is that there is no reason to think that spiritual realization means having no neuroses or obsessions.  I look at it this way: if someone experiences a broken bone early in life, I mean a serious brake, it is likely that there will always remain a weakness in the bone for the rest of their life.  Some healing can take place, of course, but there are consequences for such deformation and they are lasting.  In a similar way, experiencing psychological difficulties early in life will likely leave as a residue similar weakness.  This is not a bad thing for someone on the spiritual path.  Having physical difficulties is not a barrier to transcendence and, I would argue, being neurotic is not a barrier either.  (I’m leaving aside the issue of what neurosis means because it would take me too far afield.) 

5. Another trend I noticed over my thirty years of Western Buddhist involvement is how ethical commitments have been sidelined.  Partly this is due to Western hyper-individualism and consequent strong resistance to being told how to behave.  But recently I have been thinking along the lines that the reason ethical commitments have been sidelined is because therapy has taken the place of ethical commitments.  Partly this is due to the fact that going into therapy is very common today and is seen by many as praiseworthy.  In contrast, taking on ethical commitments, particularly if they are traditional ones, is seen as backward, and, I would add, neurotic; that is to say if someone takes on commitments, for example, regarding sexual restraint this is interpreted by Western Psychology as a negative, as something that will lead to suppression of natural impulses, things like that.  In this way, for example, Western Buddhists can cheerfully ignore the basic ethical commitments of the Buddhadharma resulting in a behavioral profile that is no different from that of ordinary secular Western society.

In a Platonic context this appears as not seeing the practices of purification, such as vegetarianism, abstaining from alcohol, and sexual restraint, as foundational. 

6. There’s nothing that can be done about the place that Western Psychology holds in our culture at this time.  I mean there is nothing that can be done to displace its grip; at least from my observation it seems to be getting stronger and its assumptions have become almost entirely unchallenged.  For example, many Western Buddhist organizations are run by therapists who see nothing wrong with imposing Western Psychological categories on Eastern Spiritualities. 

But it is possible for individual practitioners to see through the distortions of Western Psychology’s reinterpretation of spirituality.  But there are consequences for this; the main one is that seeing through the strategy of Western Psychology will likely leave the individual who does so feeling alienated, to a greater or lesser degree, from fellow practitioners who operate under these assumptions; and this includes many spiritual leaders.  In my own case, this meant striking out on my own.  When I did so I found many others who had gone through the same process already walking on the Way to Transcendence and Eternity.