Advaita in Psychotherapy, based on Nisargadatta and Jean Klein.

ADVAITA IN PSYCHOTHERAPY


SUMMARY

Why some ideas from Advaita are used to underpin an English psychotherapy practice. Advaita is an important source mainly because of its approach to self-enquiry [especially as detailed by Nisargadatta and Jean Klein]. Central to Advaita is the concept of sakshin chaitanya a form of witness consciousness the uncovering of which is taken to be the ultimate psychotherapeutic, and personal, possibility.


In psychotherapy I apply established principles of psychology to what clients bring as problems. Most clients certainly move on but, in my experience, something beyond what is offered by conventional psychology is needed to guard against the gradual creeping back of difficulties.

Normal psychotherapy approaches - such as work on problematic sub-personalities - can be highly effective in producing required change, but sometimes they may provide only a partial remedy. A lasting change can be had if clients practise the skill of operating from what I call a dis-identifed consciousness - disidentification from sub-personalities.

The development of this skill is seldom recognised as coming within the scope of psychotherapy. However, it is my belief that all clients, indeed all people, can benefit from practising dis-identification skills. Therefore, in the course of psychotherapy, I offer various suggestions about consciousness-raising.

It was in studying the Advaita tradition that I became aware of the possibility, and value for psychotherapy, of disidentifed consciousness. Everyone has the possibility of that, according to Advaita, but it is screened off by the habit of false identification - something which evolves in us during the development of the powerful thinking and feeling centres that eventually can become our identity.

Access to dis-identifed consciousness is achieved by clients practising simple but profound techniques to direct their attention away from whatever may trigger their problem states. These techniques have been developed out of traditional sources, including some beyond the Advaita tradition.

I see my clients as beings equal to myself - indeed everyone is in the same boat - therefore, I take care not to appear to be an authority on Advaita [or anything else]. It is clients' own experiences in exploring what the techniques can bring that are used to consolidate their practice. In that way they can become their own expert and so stay healthily independent of the need for any other authority.

Techniques are not much found in Advaita sources. This is because the tradition is that knowledge is conveyed from teacher to student in a rather enigmatic style - a style that is far from appropriate in psychotherapy. However, I have a book in preparation: Getting Free - Staying Free, which is a practical guide to present-centred living based on Advaita.

Because clients' enhanced awareness is practised and built by them, that permits the dis-identifying aspect of Advaita to be conveyed in quite a plain and sometimes refreshing way. It also avoids the tempting and common sidetrack of students trying to learn by focusing on a teacher's process rather than concentrating on their own. Accordingly I aim to convert any interest about my journey into an enhanced interest about theirs.

The most I disclose about my learning is to offer a reading list to anyone who wants to explore what lies beyond psychotherapy in the direction of Advaita and similar orientations. Such understanding as I have comes mainly from the work of Nisargadatta and Jean Klein, both outstanding teachers of Advaita, the latter more intelligible to westerners. There are various living teachers of Advaita, the only one I am familiar with, and therefore can recommend, is Francis Lucille. He has in preparation, links to other teachers and organisations. See also Francis Lucille: A Talk in Napa, California

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