RE: A Psychologist and a Monk... :-)

[Guest guest]

salaamz:-)I lost count of how many times i watched the videos today. I LOOOOOVED EM. jazakallah khair dr. hayes:-)And heres my 2 dinars (btw this is comin from a 33yr housewife who has spent her past almost 10 yrs solely cooking, cleaning, nursing, changing poopy diapers etc. etc.) So basically not someone u would call 'well read', but everything i say right now is only based on my 33 yrs of expereince of life and just observing & learning from those around me.I know nothing about Buddism, except from what i just heard, but what i c here reminded me of 1 of the questions a muslim sister asked me that day, "why can't we have a sheikha (monk) talk about therapy?" In otherwords teach us how to cope with our suffering. The answer i gave, well these videos confirmed just that. I absoluyely do not mean to sound disrespectful at all, that Monk seemed like a very kind, humble person. But he is still a Monk. And he was not able to asnwer questions that had to do with pain and human suffering. He did marvalously in the begining part, as that was rehearsed, as he said he has done it so many times b4. But after that it felt like he really had trouble asnwering the audeinces questions and i am so glad dr. hayes came to the rescue, and did such a remarkable job answering those questions, afterall thats why we need psychologists, that's their expertise. The concept of 'karma', cause and consequence, of no-thing, emptyniess , metaphor orange seed vs watermelon seed, do soemthing nice, result might not come right away- hence don't hurt anyone, might come back to u, want something good to be done to do, hence do good to others et.c etc. , basically everything he was preaching, if u sorta try to get the

'gist' of it, instead of taking him word to word (coz if u take him word to word then there will be tons of things u and i won't agree with), then it was nothing but

'good moral standards and basically treating the world with kindness and

compassion, as you would like to be treated, and ultimately that gives a sense of peace and tranquility in your own life. 'The thing is, there is definately something about these spiritual people (or spirituality), and i strongly believe it is this sense of self as context, these mindfulness skills, this observers perspective, that makes them lead their lives the way they do. And by that i mean in peace(mentally) and to live a life of vitality. (Though they don't know the words per say, e.g. this monk was saying a 'happy life all the time', thought i felt he was referring to 'a life of vitality', and he was using the word 'suffering' instead of 'pain' sometimes) Self as Context is such an abstract concept (to me), that though these people (i feel) come closest to living in it, they cannot help a sufferer as they lack the other perspective (science) to be able to advice a sufferer. You need both sides, and both are equally beneficial. Mindfulness and spirtuality is great, but when the level of distress increases, even the most spiritual people opt for medication (coz therapy is still a taboo in a lotta cultures). My question is, well can medication be replaced by therapy, if therapy incorporates this self as context concept (without including a religious stance to it)? I feel like, YES (only my opinion). Coz i am just thinking about this monk yea...or people like him i know, like spiritual people, it's not that they don't feel pain, they are human, they too experince all painful human emotions, it's just that they have learnt how to minimze the sufferiing or perhaps 'almost' eradicate suffering from their lives. How are they doing this? I feel like they r perhaps practising all the ACT tools, and yet don't know so. That observers perspective, that self as context, they have it, which means if they have it, then they r definately accepting any pain that comes their way, expaning to make room for it, self compassion towards their expreinces, values seem to be there in their lives etc. etc. Coz these tools must alreday be inside of us, we just haven't used to to their full capacity or have misused them?I know this 1 lady, extreemly religous, pious lady. she's 60+, you see her face and she looks like a 40 yr old. Glowing face, always smiling. She is very poor, like 6 kids. 5 handicapped living in the middle -east. 3 died in the past 2 years. She works as a cleaning lady in san diego, and caters food too for people, sends her money back home to the husband to take care for the haindacp kids. husband got married to a young woman there. Her son here doesn't give her a dime. This lady is always happy, she is not in denial. she accepts her pain as it comes and says alhamdulillah and keeps going on with her life. She has no mental stress, and u can c it in her face. she is completely physically healhty (so no mental stress affecting her physically) and works 18 hours a day. mind you 60+ yr old woman. The things she says when you ask her how she is doing, well seems like she's been in ACT therapy all her life. So mentally she is at peace. how is she doing it? SAC perhaps?The gentleman who abruptly spoke up and went on, I am not sure if he was saying anything 'very diff.' from the monk, and dr. hayes. Infact even the lady who spoke up, she too didn't seem like she was completely off, they were all talking about the same thing (to me) just one person calling it "pain" , another "suffering". when the monk said , why wouldn't you want to "always be happy?", but to me the monk meant "vitality" and not necessary "feel -good happy", coz afterall these people are the ones who really practise living that 'life of vitality' by leading their lives being connected to that observers perspective more than that conceptualized-self. they do it so well trhough their mindfulenss skills. If people with actual real chronic physical pain can still continue to live their lives in joy WITH pain, then there is definately hope for people with mental suffering to live a full and rich life of vitality DESPITE the psychological pain. If i have said anything wrong and offended anyone i do sincerely apologize. I have not read much at all, so this is simply a very humble opinion. p.s. every line that came from Dr. was excellent and packed with so much information and advice. jazakallah khairwasalaam:-)