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Forces
acting in the mind that affect reason and outlook
“It
is essential to find out what forces are acting in the mind
and affect its reasoning and its outlook. Once the student
unearths the real basis of his actions and attitudes he can
philosophize freely and fearlessly, but not before. He must
ruthlessly unmask by searching criticism his hidden motives,
his unconscious desires, his darkly-covered bias. The
complexes which fill the subconscious layer of the human
mind and which he neither recognizes nor names are partly
responsible for his inability to apprehend truth. A most
important department of preliminary activity is therefore to
dig out these mental weeds and present them to the clear
light of consciousness.
Once he becomes aware of the secret processes of his
mind and the secret workings of his wishes, he will discover
that many false beliefs, many emotional distortations cling
to it out of his long past, acting as powerful detriments of
right conduct and preventing the clear insight into truth.
He will find that he carries a heavy burden of illusions and
rationalizations which resist the entry of real knowledge.
Only through such a thorough psychological understanding
into what is going on behind the scenes of his conscious
personal life can liberation come and prepare the way for
further steps on the ultimate path. He must strip naked his
innermost characteristics taking and making no excuses, but
boldly seeking to understand the bitterest truths about
himself. He must see himself as he really is, exposing self
to self. Such is the delicate psychological operation needed
to detect for removal from the process of thought and action
all those tendencies, complexes, hallucinations and
rationalizations which prevent the entry of truth into the
mind or drive it along wrong roads. Until these influences
are detected by analysis and exposed by interrogation, they
will not cease their maleficent operation. These complexes
come to dominate the man and retard his free use of reason.
He has to humble himself from the beginning by not
hesitating to admit that his character, both in its open and
concealed phases, is a deformed, crippled, and unbalanced
thing. . . .
When a particular idea, for instance, recurs
constantly and irresistibly to the mind and finally becomes
a deep-seated obsession it interferes with the free play of
thinking and thus renders accurate philosophical reflection
impossible. Or when a man makes a mental reservation in
favour of certain beliefs in a particular subject or field
of interest and will not allow his faculties to work fully
therein, his mind is then divided into two or more insulated
departments which are never permitted to interact logically
on each other. We may then have the spectacle of complete
credulity in one department and critical reasoning in the
other. He is really unbalanced in one department and yet
quite balanced in the other. The excellence of the latter
hides the defect of the former. The fault does not lie in
the ability to think properly but in a particular complex
which interferes at a certain point. Again when a concession
must be made to reason for the sake of self-respect or for
the respect of others, we witness the peculiar process of
the person finding a conscious basis for his conclusions
which is quite other than the real one. Thus he deceives
himself and perhaps others by such rationalizations of
egoistic wishes and unjustifiable prejudices. Other
difficulties are delusions which assume such a fixed
character as to afford an impregnable front to reason. . . .
All these may be classed as diseases of the mind and
until they are cured they prevent a healthy working of those
faculties which are called into play when we seek truth. For
they determine the processes of thinking and action.
Such is the self-revelation which awaits the student.
It will not be pleasant but if he will have the courage to
accept it like a medicine it will be purifying. There can be
no cure as long as he is not aware that he is diseased.”
R.W.S, 1993
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