Mind & Life XIII--Day 2/Sessin 3 Depression and "No Self"

As I continue to digest the Mind & Life conference, I realize the discussions about depression provided some of the most striking actual content. (I learned a great deal at the conference, but most of it was subtle, implicit information.)

When asked to comment, Chozen Roshi stated that “skeptical doubt”—a Buddhist term for corrosive negativity and pessimism -- fuels depression and destroys spiritual practice. People who are stuck in depression are buried by the First Noble Truth, and intervention of some sort may be required to move them out of it. But the fact of the deep suffering of the world, is incontrovertible. And the human critical capacity has its uses: depressed people, she said, do better in games of chance. The Buddha himself, in the time leading up to his enlightenment, endured visits from Mara as Inner Critic, who chided him both for being lazy in practice and for driving himself too hard. Feeding a hypercritical sensibility gives rise to a neuroticized realism that drives us to despair.

His Holiness the Dalai Lama pointed out that although the benefits of meditation practice have been common knowledge (in some circles!) for thousands of years, in secularizing aspects of meditation into a psychological therapy there is a risk of veering toward the religious aspects of Buddhism. The doctrine of “no self” is, after all, a doctrine, and one that is unique to Buddhism. Funny, but when I think of religion being forced on people, I imagine being pressured to believe in a deity. In Buddhism, philosophies can be deities, too—helpful to a point, but subject to experiential verification and rejection. Later, HH pointed out, quite distinctly, that a theistic approach may really be best for some people. Shaken again, I realized a latent absolutist impulse lies within: I assume that doctrines are not only the absolute truth, but should be presented as such, even if others may not be able to relate.

Later on, His Holiness said that “no self” is emphasized as a doctrine because it is an antidote to a very serious malady: the multifarious modes of suffering wrought by an undisciplined mind are rooted in the grasping of a false self. (There are two aspects of self-grasping: one is evaluating self and others in a relative framework, deciding that I am better or worse than others. The other mistake is in imputing a self onto things in the first place, seeing them as concrete entities.) The mechanisms by which afflictions are generated by a restless undisciplined mind are complex, but they involve a dysfunctional intelligence rooted in a sense of self, as well as a predisposition to function in the gross, “physical” realm of reality.

He went on to say that coming to an understanding of “no self” involves a prolonged and gradual process, which may or may not ( emphasis on “may not”) include episodes of profound insight – presumably meaning “openings” or kensho. Even a person of great understanding will continue to experience self-and-other and to have experiences based on that misconception.

It was wonderful to hear all this. Even simple points of dharma had a particular punch when delivered by His Holiness. Hearing him say--carefully, and with complete confidence-- “There is no fixed, permanent ‘I’,” made my blood quiver.