assimilation from the east and the spectrum of consciousness

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Journal of Psychotherapy Integration [jopi] PP020-291451 December 7, 2000 14:6 Style file version Nov. 19th, 1999

Journal of Psychotherapy Integration, Vol. 11, No. 1, 2001

Assimilation from the East and the Spectrumof Consciousness

Donald Morgan1,2

Beginning with an eastern concept of human beings rooted in the Buddhistand Yogic traditions, this paper describes a theoretical assimilation of westernmodels and therapies into the eastern paradigm. It traces the beginning of theeast–west psychotherapy dialogue in the United States, citing early examplesof Buddhist and yogic practices in the west. Ken Wilber’s “spectrum of con-sciousness” model is presented and its unifying value for psychotherapy isexplored. An integrative model of wholistic therapy, developed by a group ofeastern and western practitioners, is then described. The paper concludes withan exploration of the issues and implications for psychotherapy integrationraised by this model.

KEY WORDS: psychotherapy integration; yoga; Buddhism; psychotherapy; spectrum of con-sciousness; wholistic; eastern; assimilation.

Norcross and Thomas’s survey of the members of the Society for theExploration of Psychotherapy Integration (Norcross & Thomas, 1988) iden-tified five main obstacles to psychotherapy integration: Partisan zealotry,parochial training programs, absence of a common language, inadequateresearch, and the obstacle of “divergent assumptions about psychopathol-ogy and health” (italics added). The latter is of particular interest becausethe rest hinge upon it or can be more or less remedied. But the differentlanguages, metaphysics, and worldviews to which theorists adhere deter-mine much of the discourse, research, and practice. The result has been

1Department of Clinical Psychology, Rutgers University, Piscataway, New Jersey.2Correspondence should be addressed to Donald Morgan, Department of Clinical Psycho-logy, Rutgers University Graduate School of Applied and Professional Psychology, 152Frelinghuysen Rd., Piscataway, New Jersey 08854-8085.

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psychotherapy’s tradition of atomistic fiefdoms, a globe of nonoverlappingborders with essentially separate methodologies and values. It is, then, of-ten stated that psychology and psychotherapy need greater integration andcooperation, but we have been consistently stumped by dilemmas related toconceptual chauvinism. The majority of practicing psychotherapists, how-ever, find parochialism unacceptable and do not adhere to one particularapproach, but identify themselves as “eclectic” or “integrative” (Norcross& Prochaska, 1982, 1983, 1988). They do not wish to work from one limitedtheoretical system and its exclusive application because it would not honorthe richness of human experience, the wisdom of many thinkers, and themyriad therapeutic techniques that have accrued in the field over the past100 years.

The best that many of us clinicians have done so far has been to beginfrom a more or less narrow “home base” of the theoretical orientation inwhich we were trained, and then to assimilate aspects of “otherness” intoourselves, complete with all the attendant epistemological and theoreticalchallenges. Messer recognized this de facto tendency of many therapists andintroduced the concept of “assimilative theoretical integration” as one that“. . . favors strong grounding in any one system of psychotherapy, but [with]a willingness to incorporate or assimilate, in a considered fashion, perspec-tives or practices from other schools” (Messer, 1992, p. 150). Probably themost well-known and well-executed example related to this kind of inte-gration is that of Wachtel (1977, 1997). In this instance, an interpersonallyoriented psychoanalyst showed that he truly valued and employed conceptsand techniques of the behavioral tradition in his work and, thus, began ascholarly dialogue about this process. With the benefit of the ensuing dialec-tical, evolutionary, and synthetic dialogue, there has been the advent of amore cognitive behaviorism and a more relational psychoanalysis that haveallowed increasing numbers of scholars across these two orientations to en-gage in assimilative integration (e.g., Lazarus, 1992; Linehan, 1993; Safran& Segal, 1990; Weiss & Sampson, 1986; Young, 1994).

The present work moves out of the exclusive history and province ofwestern psychology and psychotherapy, and starts from a conceptual struc-ture derived from Buddhist and Yogic traditions. I will present the integrativecontributions of some theorists and practitioners whose tradition and bodyof work lie apart from the prevailing mainstream. Through their work, itis possible to see a new context or paradigm that is a reversal of our usualEurocentric starting point. That is, beginning with a generally eastern con-cept of the human being, and viewing the causes of and solutions for oursufferings through teachings rooted in the ancient traditions of yoga andBuddhist psychology, we find that most of the western therapeutic forms fit

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coherently within this structure as methods to address distress at the vari-ous levels of body, energy, mind, emotions, and spirit. I will build upon thework of Ajaya (1983) and use the “spectrum” model of Wilber (1977) inplacing the western therapeutic traditions within an eastern worldview thatvalues their contributions and utility while providing an organizing principlefor the whole enterprise of psychotherapy. Here the assimilation is not onlyon the level of techniques brought across borders, but in understanding, ina “meta-assimilative” way, how whole therapeutic traditions might fit use-fully within an eastern vision of the human being because each addresses, ina useful way, certain major aspects of human suffering. I will then exploresome important and familiar unresolved issues that have been discussed inthe literature on assimilation and technical eclecticism. Among them arevalidating the choice of techniques or, in this case, of various whole ther-apeutic systems that might address these different levels. These and otherchallenges will be discussed after examining the evolution of the east–westinterface, the development of the unifying notion of the spectrum of con-sciousness, and the characteristics of therapy from the Buddhist and yogicviewpoints.

THE EAST–WEST PSYCHOTHERAPY INTERFACE

A body of work was begun in the 1950s that established a dialogue be-tween spiritual disciplines of the east and western psychotherapy as it thenexisted. D. T. Suzuki, the Japanese Zen master took up residence in the USand began teaching Zen Buddhism in New York, and Eric Fromm, KarenHorney, and other more progressive analysts became interested in the ap-plication of Zen to psychoanalytic thought, and vice versa. A conference onZen Buddhism and Psychoanalysis was organized in Mexico City in 1957,which attracted interested psychoanalysts and psychologists from the USand Mexico, resulting in the first scholarly work on the subject (Fromm,Suzuki, & DeMartino, 1960). Although these authors pointed to affinitiesbetween the two traditions, this was not so much an integrative work as awindow through which western psychotherapists could begin to see relevanteastern ways of understanding and helping problems in living. It was thenpossible for methods of intervention that made use of the ancient wisdomto be developed. Throughout the 1960s and 1970s many western psychol-ogists and psychiatrists became interested in meditation, yogic practices,and other aspects of eastern thought (e.g., Assagioli, 1965; Grof, 1975; Lilly,1972; Maslow, 1968; Murphy & Murphy, 1968; Naranjo & Ornstein, 1973;Ornstein, 1972; Tart, 1969; Watts, 1969) and did introduce eastern aspects

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into their work, but none offered a systematized eastern approach to psy-chotherapy.3

Fromm noted the need for such expansion, but the field was not yetready to be developed, probably because of psychiatry’s infatuation withpsychoanalysis. Fromm did recognize that if one were only aiming to rid apatient of a circumscribed symptom, analysis could work, as would otherapproaches. He also saw, however, an increasing number of people comingto therapy who functioned well socially and in their careers, but who hadwhat he then referred to as the “maladie du siecle,”—the more amorphousdissatisfactions in establishing an identity in the world, relating, and findingmeaning and happiness. This is even truer today at the fin du siecle. For suchpeople, Fromm posited that their “cure” “. . . does not consist in the absenceof illness, but in the presence of well being.” Finding such well being requiresgoing well beyond the frame of reference of most of western healing andpsychotherapy, and necessitates an exploration of ontological, existential,and spiritual realities. For this, most major western scientific psychologiesare limited because their field of discourse does not include these realms.

The Buddhist and yogic traditions, by contrast, offer a system thousandsof years old that subsumes many of these useful western therapies. Sollod(1993) described how a large part of our therapeutics can be shown to bederived from spiritual traditions, and many therapists agree that there isgreat value in orienting treatment to spiritual realms. As I will describelater, the ancient sutras (written compilations of oral psychological andspiritual teachings) often contain practices that we can recognize as partsof contemporary western psychotherapies. They also contain a languageand methodology to address human suffering on these spiritual levelsby means of a set of active therapeutic prescriptions for thought, word,and deed.

Fromm discusses our predicament in Buddhist terms as one of sepa-rateness. He looks at how solutions to separateness basically fall into twocategories: one, a more pathological regression to infantile oneness, and theother, a move past egocentric separateness, arriving at a new oneness withthe world. He saw that psychotherapy might be influenced by incorporatingmore of what Suzuki (Fromm et al., 1960, p. 117) was presenting as the eastern

3In recent years, a number of authors have presented excellent discussions of many aspects ofeastern traditions. The following are among the best guides to the practice of mindfulness, med-itation, breathing, cultivation of nonattachment, development of compassion, and cultivationof equanimity. As such, they are not therapeutic systems, but are relevant to therapists’ owndevelopment as well as good guides to give to clients (see Kabat-Zinn, 1990, 1994; Goldstein& Kornfield, 1987; Kornfield, 1993; Hanh, 1992; Beck, 1989, 1993. For later, more systematicapplications of Buddhist practice to psychotherapy, see Brazier (1995), Epstein (1995, 1998),Rosenbaum (1999), Rubin (1996), and Suler (1993). For an excellent history of the migrationof Buddhist teachings to the west, see Fields (1981).

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emphasis on immediate experience:

The average person, driven by insecurity, greed and fear is constantly enmeshed ina world of phantasies (not necessarily aware of it) in which he clothes the world inqualities which he projects onto it, but which are not there . . . Almost everybodysees, hears, feels and tastes with his thoughts, rather than with those powers withinhimself which can see, hear and taste.

Psychoanalysis approaches the problem of separateness with more mod-est yet related goals. It begins with the idea that the presence of unconsciousneeds/fears/wishes alienates us from more immediate nondualistic involvedexperience. Such tendencies must be cleared away via their evocation andconscious understanding in therapeutic dialogue and relationship. The ul-timate goal, according to Fromm, is “. . . insight into one’s own nature,achievement of freedom, happiness and love, liberation of energy, and sal-vation from being insane or crippled” (Fromm et al., 1960, p. 122). Thesegoals are part of what was articulated by Suzuki for Zen Buddhism, where itis called enlightenment. In the east, the “achievement of freedom” involvesmaking one’s self empty of identifications, cravings, emotional and physicalattachments, and with cultivating more and more capacity for compassionbased on the breaking down of subject–object and other dualisms. This, ofcourse, is a tall order—one that goes along a similar path as psychoanalysis’goals, but then pushes further. Suzuki and others have recognized this to bea complex developmental process, like that of psychoanalysis, and one thatalso takes place over years of practice.

THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE “SPECTRUM” MODEL

In a quantum leap for psychology, the conceptual assimilation from theeast began in 1977 when Ken Wilber published The Spectrum of Conscious-ness and brought together in a major way the Vedantic and Buddhist tradi-tions, yoga, and western ideas of development and psychotherapy. His workbecame the conceptual organizing principle that has been a kind of bedrockfor much progress in this area. His thesis was that consciousness is “pluridi-mensional” and that each school of healing, psychology, psychotherapy, andreligion is addressing something of meaning, but something incomplete. Byusing an analogy from physics of the electromagnetic spectrum, Wilber un-derstood many of the psychotherapies to be like different wavelengths of thespectrum, each using language and methods suitable for phenomena at thatlevel, and that our human distress and dysfunction can be understood to existon various levels or frequencies. In the 1950s, just as it was when only the vis-ible light spectrum was known, and any discussion of X-rays, gamma rays, orinfrared frequencies would have been impossible, the field of psychotherapy

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had a very limited view of how to intervene in human emotional distress.As new therapies were developed, the field became more truly analogous tothe electromagnetic spectrum with numerous approaches and methods, eachreflecting a consciousness originating from a set of metaphysical, epistemo-logical, and moral/ethical beliefs. (For a discussion of philosophical issues,belief systems, and worldviews as they relate to psychotherapy integration,see Messer, 1992; Messer & Winokur, 1984.)

Wilber’s contribution was to spread each kind of therapy before usrespectfully, and describe the parts of the spectrum that each reflected, allseen as parts of a thoroughly eastern monistic and unified paradigm. Theassimilation of western psychotherapies into the eastern unifying vision wasoffered as a way for us to see prescriptively what kinds of interventions mightbe most fruitful for those with particular needs, as well as a way to organizetherapeutic work, and understand spiritual needs and evolution across thespectrum.

That we are talking about spiritual evolution can’t be doubted if we areto work in the eastern assimilative model because there, all phenomena areseen as manifestations of the absolute, by whatever name one wishes to callit. The teachings of the Buddha recognize all the aspects of our being asimportant, but make clear that, “You are not the four elements (that makeup your body). You are that which makes use of the four elements” (cited inFromm et al., 1960). Consciousness is seen as the monistic essence, and allelse—external world, body, breath, emotions, thoughts, desires—is the envi-ronment in which consciousness is embedded. There are differences betweenthe yogic and Buddhist concepts that are of major importance, but for thepurposes of the present discussion relating to psychotherapy, they will not bedistinguished. So if one finds truth in this nonmaterialistic metaphysic, thenthe Buddhist/Yogic paradigm can be used metatheoretically to allow for anassimilation of the western methods and theoretical systems into the easternstructure, and to do so in a scientifically acceptable and yet pragmatic way (tobe discussed later). This opens an entire discussion of the nature of science,prevailing scientific paradigms in psychology, and their limitations. For ananalysis of this problem that is relevant to the present discussion of spiritualrealms in psychotherapy, see Wilber (1998). For a comprehensive review ofthe overall issue of science and paradigm in psychology, see Fishman (1999)and Messer, Sass, and Woolfolk (1988).

Vedanta’s “Sheaths” and Western Psychotherapies

To develop the spectrum of consciousness as a map or model, Wilber(1977) draws from the Vedantic understanding of “sheaths” or koshas. Hisis a sophisticated conceptual analysis of the correspondence of the Vedantic

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and the psychological. Later I will summarize the more practical organizationof the koshas, offered by Rama, Ballantine, and Ajaya (1976), that is relatedmore to therapeutics than to concepts. The essence of both understandingsis that we are thought to be arranged like an onion, with our primary non-dualistic unitary consciousness at the center, and various levels of “illusion”making up the surrounding sheaths of our usual being. In the Sanskrit, eachsheath is named for a layer of our being, illusory though it may be, that isneeded for us to exist. The outermost, grossest layer is that of matter—ourbodies. The inner, more and more subtle sheaths, are those of energy, layersof mind and emotions, and then of absolute unitary consciousness. Accordingto the Vedanta psychology and the Buddhist abhidharma, our fundamentalabiding oneness with the absolute is hidden because of identifications withthese illusory sheaths, and this case of mistaken identity is the root of allsuffering (Guenther, 1974).

Wilber (1977) then goes on to locate the major currents of western psy-chology as they correspond to the koshas. The Ego, Existential, and Mindlevels are articulated, with bands between that have to do with biosocial andtranspersonal aspects. The Ego, Biosocial, and Existential aspects cover mostof the traditional western psychologies and healing systems. Transpersonalbands have been addressed by theorists such as Jung, Assagioli, Maslow, andGrof, but clearly represent the far reaches of what mainstream psychologyfinds acceptable. The level of Mind, as it is used in yogic writings, refers notto ordinary cognition, but to the most pure nondual consciousness, freedfrom identifications with “lower” koshas, and it is not addressed by west-ern psychologies, but most closely articulated, in different language, by thephenomenologists in philosophy. In fact, Wilber points out that there is acomplimentarity between the layers that the western forms have investi-gated and those more of concern to the east. The east has almost exclusivelypreoccupied itself with the attainment and articulation of what the Zen mas-ters would call “big Mind.” Their understanding that all other levels of thespectrum are illusory causes them not to bother much with the pathologiesthat are operating on the individual ego and existential levels. The westernworld, especially since the seventeenth century, has almost completely ig-nored the level of Mind in favor of the more “treatable” Ego, Existential,and Biosocial levels. Wilber (p. 177) notes that:

Taken together, then, these eastern and western approaches form an uncanny compli-mentarity, for—generally speaking—the levels that the west has heretofore ignoredhave been thoroughly investigated by the East, and vice versa. Thus the East hasextensively explored those paths leading to Absolute Noumenon, while the Westhas restricted itself to scientific investigations of phenomenal psychology. Man, asAbsolute Subjectivity, is the Godhead—this is the concern of the east; man as anobject of knowledge, is the phenomenal ego—this is the concern of the west. Takentogether they span the entire spectrum of consciousness.

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In Suler’s Contemporary Psychoanalysis and Eastern Thought (Suler,1993), he comes to a similar conclusion in seeing the contribution of east andwest as addressing fundamentally different aspects of our predicament evenif they overlap. Suler begins his work with the master’s admonition to the stu-dent, “The hunter who chases two rabbits catches neither.” There has to bevalue added in starting from the eastern viewpoint and integrating the west-ern therapies, and I think there is much. He and Wilber have both pointed outthat the eastern disciplines can learn from the more developed western psy-chologies about family-of-origin problems, individual level pathologies suchas unresolved transferences and projections, pathological narcissism and de-pendency, and the range of personality disorders rooted in our developmen-tal history. The western therapies can, and have, benefited from some of theeastern cognitive-like mindfulness practices, self-regulation techniques, theemphasis on practicing skills, as well as the generally unaddressed area ofwholistic approaches to health, the development of compassion, and waysof overcoming separateness through dissolving subject–object dualisms.

Rubin (1993) also discusses a way to appreciate the value of both tra-ditions that he calls “bifocality.” By this he means that neither eastern norwestern points of view are inherently complete when it comes to psychother-apy, and that we would be wise to use both the “wide angle” of psychoanalysisand the “microscope” of Buddhism to appreciate, respectively, both the sub-stantiality and perceived enduringness of the self, and also the discontinuityand emptiness of subjective experience.

Messer (1992) defined assimilative integration as the making of a bor-rowed technique one’s own by fitting it into a preferred theoretical orien-tation. He noted that . . . “techniques and concepts from one therapy doindeed find their way into another and get incorporated within its slowlyevolving theory and mode of practice” (p. 150). Here we are broadening outto say that one can take an entire assimilated healing method such as familytherapy, cognitive behavioral therapy, dietary intervention, hatha yoga andmindfulness training, or biofeedback (if one has the training and skillfulnessto use such) and “fit it in” to an ongoing psychotherapy, if that is indeed whatthe client needs at the time. It is about “diagnosing” on which wavelengthof the spectrum the client predominantly lies, and introducing an appro-priate mode of healing that will address the problems of that wavelengthand take the client as far as he or she wishes to go. Finally, just because theparadigm allows for issues of higher consciousness and spiritual concerns, itdoes not mean that therapeutic work must always include these realms. AsWilber points out, for example, if a 50-year-old businessman with a family,who is functioning well and being generally happy, but suffering some mildanxieties and insomnia, comes to therapy it would be pointless to begin byaddressing his ontological anxiety stemming from his lack of realization that

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he is really one with the absolute unitary consciousness. In this instance, anyof the major western therapies can address his problems more effectively.

THE DEVELOPMENT OF WHOLISTIC THERAPIESFROM YOGA AND BUDDHISM

Recently, four authors have put forth excellent works on psychoanalyticpsychotherapy from a Buddhist point of view (Brazier, 1995; Epstein, 1995,1998; Rosenbaum, 1999; Rubin, 1996). Each articulates ways of conceptual-izing, experiencing, and practicing psychotherapy that are infused with deepknowledge of the eastern traditions, notably the Buddhist. Each empha-sizes subtle currents in the interface of Buddhism and psychotherapy, andall are rich with personal and case examples. Prior to their works, the mostcomprehensive system of assimilative integration used yogic and Buddhistteachings and was offered by Rama et al. (1976) and Ajaya (1983). Yogaand Psychotherapy was written by three authors: Swami Rama, an authen-tic Himalayan Indian sage in the lineage of Raja Yoga who was educatedin the west in philosophy and medicine; Rudolf Ballantine, a physician andpsychiatrist; and Swami Ajaya, an American initiate into the monastic or-der of his teacher, but also a clinical psychologist. It was this group that,in the early 1970s, founded the Himalayan Institute for Yoga Science andPhilosophy, one of the original U.S. centers for the teaching, practice, andresearch of eastern traditional disciplines and health. Their Yoga Psychologypresents a comprehensive view of the human condition and the process ofchange that is drawn from two of India’s ancient philosophical systems, Yogaand Vedanta (Radhakrishnan & Moore, 1973). This model, as discussed inWilber’s spectrum, talks about human beings as comprised of the koshas, orlayers, manifesting as body, breath (energy), mind and emotions, and spirit.Modes of knowing and interventions for change are presented that drawupon the yogic tradition and also integrate more modern knowledge frombehavioral, cognitive, analytic, humanistic, and transpersonal psychology.For example, cases are described from their residential “Combined Thera-pies” program where patients would come for a couple of weeks to manymonths to work on healing body and mind or on both. Depending upon whatmixture of problems and diseases the person suffered from, interventionswould be designed that made use of rest, exercise, vegetarian diet, juicing,homeopathy, supplements, and psychotherapies such as individual Jungiananalytic, cognitive behavioral, Bioenergetic, or Gestalt. Daily hatha yogaand meditation would be prescribed, and the thoughts and feelings evokedby these practices would be grist for the therapy mill. Patients might spendextended periods in silence and sometimes also be asked to engage in service

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work. Some of the traditional yogic methods for inducing change, such asfasting and mantra practice, might be used for particular purposes.

Yoga Psychology is the name given to this wholistic system of therapeu-tics. Actually it is more than a therapeutic intervention; it is a philosophy oflife and a way of healing human suffering. The oldest roots date back some5000 years to the Vedic period in India. Advaita Vedanta means the ultimateknowledge of nondualistic consciousness, and it forms part of the basis ofYoga Psychology because it articulates a view of reality whereby painfuldualities can be transcended. Added to this is the work of a second cen-tury BCE sage, Patanjali, who codified a way of practice in the Yoga Sutras(Aranya, 1983). These teachings are alive and relevant to our therapeuticpursuits across the 2000 years. In fact, reading his sutras, one feels as if inthe presence of a cosmic cognitive behaviorist:

Yoga is control over the mind and its modifications [thought patterns emotions anddesires] and the direction of mental energy toward attaining the purpose of life.

When the mind and its modifications are controlled, the experiencer abides in histrue nature.

When they are not controlled, consciousness becomes falsely identified with themodifications. (Quoted in Ajaya, 1983, p. 129.)

The resulting system of Yoga Therapy is scientific, systematized, andopen to verification or disproof, and the eastern masters could even be saidto have an empirically supported, “manualized” therapeutic regimen thatcan reliably move the student/client through the process of clearing awayimpediments, i.e., psychopathology and physical ills, that exist in the varioussheaths of being. It involves no religious belief system, only the cultivationof more and more refined awareness and is, at its root, experimental. One isasked to try various methods of body and mind awareness and control and toevaluate the effects upon his/her well being and happiness. It encompassestherapeutically active, prescriptive interventions, and skill acquisition, whilede-emphasizing extensive exploration of personal history. Rather than ex-tensive dialogue with a therapist about one’s history and problems, the east-ern forms rely more on practices, notably meditation, as tools to unfoldintrapsychic understanding, loosen attachments to the transitory world, andsee beyond the limited self, or what the Zen tradition might call “little mind.”Here, the teacher’s role is more as example, inspiration, advisor, and conduc-tor of the process. But there is a “therapeutic” progression, so to speak, thatthe teacher understands from tradition as well as personal experience, andthe guidance given with the selection and assignment of modes of practiceis crucial to the process.

An example of the master’s use of psychological diagnosis, under-standing of the needs of the “client,” and selection among techniques for

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intervention is offered by Engler (1986). He reports hearing a discussion ofa woman who had come to the forest ashram of a southern Asian Buddhistmaster wanting to learn meditation. She suffered from anorexia and had ar-rived in a state of great anxiety, insomnia, and agitation. She was only able tosleep little and intermittently at night. The teacher’s first intervention was toallow her to come each day and pour out her complaints against her familyand life’s injustices. He spoke some, mostly listened, and allowed a specialrelationship to develop. He encouraged her to sleep and she began to sleepmore until she was up to 18 hours a day. Then she came complaining thatshe had come to learn meditation, and now wanted to. He taught her theshamatha or breath watching concentration practice. As she focused uponher breath during sitting and walking practice, each night brought a bit lesssleep until she was needing to sleep only about two hours a night and feelingbetter. At that point the intervention was changed to the vipassana medita-tive practice whereby one allows observation of all mental contents withoutinvolvement in any. When Engler, intrigued by this eastern diagnosis andtreatment planning, asked the master what was his rationale for first pre-scribing the concentration on breath intervention and then the awarenessor “insight” meditation practice, the reply was, “Too much pain.” In otherwords, the master realized that she would not initially have been able totolerate the mental contents resulting from her personal history and recenttraumas, and would have been further overwhelmed with anxiety and panicif he had asked her to witness them. Instead he used a technique that wouldgive her mental and physical anchoring in a safe place until she could amassthe centeredness and strength to begin the meditative practice that coulddislodge her from identification with her torment. Sleep, recharging of thelife energy through breathing practice, and a feeling of psychological safetyhad to come first. Within a couple of months she was free of anorexia andhaving a much easier time in interpersonal relations.

Therapy from this wholistic perspective can be thought of as based upontwo principles. The first is that the therapy is a guided practice of working to-ward self-realization. This is understood as a process of purification, the wayone would remove pollution from a lake to restore it to its essential purity.The yogic view of human nature is that of the perfect unitary core coveredby illusory layers of beliefs, assumptions, conditionings, false identifications,and limiting self-concepts. The application is based upon the second prin-ciple, that of holism. Yoga science applies that purification process to eachkosha—body, breath, mind, emotions, and spirit. As such, it doesn’t theo-retically or technically disenfranchise any of the western or other healingapproaches. What it does is to arrange a hierarchy of needs and functions,not unlike Maslow’s (Maslow, 1968, 1971), ranging from what yoga calls the“four fonts”—the basic animal instincts of self-preservation, food, sex, and

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sleep—to what Wilber calls the higher “bands” of the spectrum within thelevels of Ego, Existential, and Mind.

The client is assessed across these levels and then therapy and practicesare undertaken to address problems on each level. The therapies may be fromany of the healing systems that address the predominant problem areas. Ifthe therapist personally can’t perform the needed service, she or he mustorganize other experiences for the client that will provide the needed help.The wholistic therapist needs to be aware of, and experienced with, the rangeof wholistic therapies, but need not be expert in all. A network of referralsources for many of them is needed, where close collaboration with othertherapists is possible.

Examples of such interventions might be (according to the level or koshaof their disturbance) dietary change, fasting and juicing, nutritional sup-plements, herbs, homeopathic remedies, chiropractic, ayuravedic medicine,acupuncture, orthodox medical treatments, relaxation methods, visualiza-tion, hypnosis, meditation, yoga, exercise, eastern body and energy worksuch as Tai Chi and Chi Qong, traditional western psychotherapeutic inter-ventions (behavioral, cognitive, psychoanalytic, systems, etc.) as well as new“energy” hybrids that make use of Chinese acupuncture meridians, suchas EMDR and Thought Field Therapy (Gallo, 1999; Tiller, 1997), and theinvolvement of the client in a spiritual practice of his or her choice.

Cognitive and Psychodynamic Aspects of WholisticTherapy—and Beyond

An important central idea in yoga therapy is that of samskara, whichis translated as “impressions” or “grooves.” It holds that our habits of mindand behavior become deeper and deeper “impressions” and that the thera-peutic task is first to begin to cultivate beneficial alternatives and allow thosenew “grooves” to strengthen, eventually replacing the old, maladaptive ones.Eventually, through practicing nonattachment via the methods of yoga, thenumber and intensity of our samskaras is lessened. This emphasis on coun-terconditioning by reinforcing the new is one of the more behavioral aspectsof the tradition. Cognitive aspects include the disputation and restructur-ing of self-limiting beliefs and irrational ideas, as well as the evocation andexperiencing of the interpersonal dimension of these in the therapeutic re-lationship using such techniques as modeling and role-playing. In the east,these methods are called “mindfulness practices.” In the west, we call them“cognitive strategies” or “behavioral techniques.” It is interesting that, al-though the ultimate goal of these eastern approaches is to transcend theindividual self and loosen attachments to the transitory world, the processrecognizes that an integrated (albeit illusory) self and good interpersonal

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relations and productivity in the world are necessary foundations upon whichwe then move into the transpersonal and absolute realms. As such, the useof western systems of therapy that accomplish these goals is valued, and thiskind of work generally precedes working with the higher levels.4

Here the approach moves into ideas that lie outside the mainstreamcognitive, behavioral or psychoanalytic domains. Not only is the eliminationor restructuring of irrational or problematic thoughts advocated, but it goesfurther to say that it is possible to let go of identification with all thought.Because thought originates from our consciousness meeting, through thesenses, the world of material phenomena and experiences of pleasure andpain, we are thrown into what Buddhists call the chain of dependent arising,or more familiarly and locally, what western psychology would call condi-tioned behavior. The eastern path to liberation by loosening identificationwith all thought forms first requires intensive work with what western psy-chology would call conditioned responses, stimulus control parameters, in-terpersonal patterns, addictions and habits of body and mind, and repetitioncompulsions or cyclical psychodynamics (Wachtel & McKinney, 1992). Asthe Buddha put it in his Four Noble Truths, the way to ease human suffer-ing is to work with our conditioning, our tendency to hold onto pleasure,avoid pain and stay ignorant. He taught that actual pain and pleasure areinevitable, but that our suffering arises from clinging and aversion, fromthe conditioned mind. In fact, the Buddhist Abhidharma, its psychologicalcanon, goes into great detail on how the mind’s tragic clinging and aver-sion to ephemeral forms limits us, causes suffering, and persists as a prisoneven over lifetimes. The therapeutics and practices that arise from this per-spective have something important to add to the repertoire of the westerntherapist.

What it boils down to is that the western emphasis on acquiring newskills to replace old maladaptive patterns is emphasized less in favor of theeastern prescription of disengagement from all limited identifications. Less ismore. It is about removing the impediments to what we all can fundamentallyexperience in life—unitary consciousness and liberation. The eastern view is

4There is a fascinating and complex controversy regarding the developmental linearity of theself and the legitimacy of spiritual attainment. Taking off from Wilber’s notion of the pre-self,self, and trans-self levels of development (Wilber, 1977, 1980a, 1980b, 1981), Engler (1981)offered the notion that, “You have to be somebody before you can be nobody.” By that hemeant that “Both a sense of self and a sense of no-self, in that order (italics added) are necessaryto realize that state of optimal psychological well-being that Freud once described as an ‘idealfiction’ and the Buddha long before described as ‘the end of suffering’” (Engler, 1981, p. 65).Others, and later Wilber, Engler, and Brown (1986) themselves, have taken up Grof’s morespatial arraying of developmental epochs of the self (Grof, 1975) and, like Rubin (1991),offer the idea that linear development and the absolute predication of higher transcendent-of-self states of consciousness upon firm and completely developed pre-self and self states isinaccurate. People do not function exclusively on one level or another. For a more extensivediscussion of this area, see Suler’s chapter on “Self and No-Self” (Suler, 1993).

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to let go of limited ideas of self that have been conditioned over our lifetimes,not just to strengthen “better” ideas.

In language that resonates more with the psychoanalytic and existen-tial traditions, Yoga Psychology’s prescription for wholistic intervention alsopays great attention to our search for relationship and meaning, our difficul-ties with conflict, our dreams, unconscious processes, and the transferentialphenomena inside and outside the therapeutic relationship. It is possible todraw not only from the work of Freud but also from the work of Winnicott,Kohut, Bion, Jung and the Interpersonal tradition while operating from themetaperspective of the Yogic and Buddhist systems. In fact, as shown here,each of the major schools of psychotherapy can be thought of as addressingan important aspect of the eastern and wholistic view of human beings:

Aspect School of Psychology

Habits Behaviorism, classical and operant conditioning modelsBody Reichian, BioenergeticsSexuality and conflict Freudian psychoanalysisBreath and energy Bioenergetics, Thought Field Therapy, EMDRWill, mastery, and self efficacy Ego psychology, social learning theory, existential

approaches, psychosynthesisCognitions Cognitive therapy, Rational-Emotive therapy,

Ego psychologyInterpersonal behavior Family systems theory, Neo-Freudian Interpersonal

schoolsSelf and self worth Client centered therapy, Self psychology, Object

Relations theoryPersonal unconscious PsychoanalysisTransference Psychoanalysis, Jungian analysisCollective unconscious Jungian analysisSpiritual dimensions Jungian analysis, Psychosynthesis

Adapted from Ajaya (1983).

WHAT WORKS AND WHY?

Interestingly, here we are faced with a familiar therapeutic challenge:How do we know which treatment is “best” for a particular problem? Forexample, would Tai Chi or bodywork such as Rolfing would be a better inter-vention for a person who has chronic muscular tension with panic disorder?Some of the same issues that have stalked behavior therapy and those advo-cating technical eclecticism are also relevant to the scientific application andevolution of wholistic therapy. The question asked by Paul in 1969 (p. 44) isstill important. He thought that for behavior therapy to advance, it neededto be able to know which therapeutic technique would work best, for whom,by whom, and when to use it.

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Historically, the yogis and masters of these traditional forms of growthand therapy have amassed a body of pragmatic case studies using the vari-ous practices and disciplines. They have developed a database of sorts, notunlike the pragmatism advocated by Fishman (1999) and others who haveworked to forge a tradition somewhere between the natural science basedexperimentalists and those who work with interpretation in its cultural andhistorical contexts. As Fishman points out, it is only by turning psychol-ogy upside down and beginning with the client and the situation, and fromthere building a record, case by case, of intervention strategies, that appliedpsychology will advance. Arkowitz (1997) also called for this “bottom–up”approach by starting with the specific problems and disorders and workingto find similar cases in the literature in order to guide intervention strategy.Certainly for the wholistic therapy community it is not feasible, nor desirable,to excise simple problems from their complex human context and “treat”them with laboratory based interventions, compare them to control groups,and believe that we have arrived at a treatment that honors the complexityof peoples’ predicaments. But it is important and scientifically responsible toknow how to best implement integrative therapies. Fishman’s methodologyof pragmatic case studies allows for clinically relevant evaluation and re-porting in order to build a database that would be useful for all practitionersand many different kinds of clients over time. This may be one approach toanswering the questions raised by Sollod (1993) regarding how to integratespirituality into psychotherapy in a scientifically responsible way withoutreducing and killing the phenomena.

Space does not permit a fuller discussion of the theoretical, scientific,and practical issues facing wholistic therapy, but one further piece of thepuzzle is worth discussing: Messer’s observation that when one assimilates atherapy, or elements thereof, into one’s own system, “. . . a procedure takesits meaning not only from its point of origin, but even more so from thestructure of the therapy into which it is imported” (Messer, 1992, p. 151). Itshould be obvious that if a wholistic therapist with a perspective that includesbody, breath, mind, emotions, and spirit is using biofeedback to help traina client to relax tense jaw muscles contributing to tension headaches, he orshe will use that procedure in a different way than a therapist who believesonly in conditioning of responses and a purely behavioral understanding oflife. For the wholistic therapist, the “. . . structure of the therapy into which[the technique or concept] is imported” is vast, ancient, and full of meaning,such that the experience, for therapist and patient, of using that therapeu-tic approach or technique is imbued with dimensions of felt meaning thatprobably wouldn’t have been present when it is used in its original context.

I can verify this point from my own experience using biofeedback andother more behavioral techniques in the context of wholistic, eastern-vision

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based integrative work. Prior to extensive training in yoga and eastern prac-tices, biofeedback, for me, was simply a conditioning based behavioral tech-nique. Now it is a tool among many in yoga to enhance awareness. It helpsclients to become more conscious of internal processes so that they can beopen to learning and refinements that are needed to restore their health andchange internal patterns of responding or both. I believe that I am moreeffective and creative in using biofeedback with clients now than when Ithought it was merely a conditioning tool, and that clients benefit frommy enhanced awareness. Cognitive thought records are another exampleof tools to increase awareness and attention to the subtleties of thinking,thereby contributing to greater possibilities for intervention and healing.

CONCLUDING THOUGHTS

Many such changes are possible, for clients and for therapists, whenwe follow these paths of assimilative integration and are enriched by the“otherness.” I have tried to convey the value of using the eastern vision ofthe human condition as a starting point into which western therapies canbe assimilated, although I do not wish this to be read as proselytizing foran exclusively eastern way of working. In citing Suler (1993) and Rubin(1993, 1996) I hope to have conveyed their astute sense of balancing acrossthe two traditions’ strengths and weaknesses. The main conceptual value ofbeginning with the eastern viewpoint is that it provides a particular orga-nizing structure that honors the usefulness of many different approaches topsychotherapeutics and respects those who have developed and use them.Although I may sometimes have the sense that an eastern way of workingwith a client might yield greater fruit, I am also aware of the limitationsimposed by any one approach. It was with this very point that I began thepaper and lamented the “divergent assumptions about psychopathology andhealth” that both ground us yet keep us apart. Hopefully, we are all reme-dying the inevitable value-schisms by constantly evolving, in an assimilativeway, as we work using our own training and values but aspiring to whatSuzuki called “Beginner’s Mind” where we stay open, avoiding the rigididentifications that can choke off innovation.

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