Spirituality Under Attack: Hinduism to the Rescue

by Bob Doolittle

“Who you gonna call?” Ghostbusters posed the dilemma for us quite nicely.
In the old days, you called the clergy with your troubled mind or heart and
found healing wisdom.

Now, you call a therapist.

In the west, mental health professionals have superseded religious professionals
as the new priesthood -- as society?s most trusted resource for troubled lives.
And deservedly so. The young science of psychology has blessed us all
with an incredible wealth of research and treatment methods

to heal everything from broken marriages to eating disorders.

Ministers, and priests (and imams, rabbis) confidently refer severe problems to the mental health
experts and have gladly sat at their feet to enrich their own pastoral skills. They and all believers
have learned from psychology the healing power of: thorough listening, honoring dreams,
meeting developmental needs, discovering hidden feelings, medication,

surfacing childhood wounds, empowering clients to be their own problem solvers--

to name just a few of the many gifts we have received from the therapists and their science.

So what is the big problem? Hasn?t our humility and respect for this new priesthood done us good?
Indeed yes, but unfortunately, psychology does not return that respect and tends on the contrary
to se spirituality as delusional or pathological -- often trying to medicate our mysticism. Imagine
how a psychiatrist might have “helped” Joan of Arc with her voices. Or Mary and Joseph
with their angels. So, yes, we have learned a lot at the feet of the mental health people
but we are plagued by their unkind opinion of the core of who we are.

We desperately need a psychology which can integrate not denigrate spirituality. Suddenly
-- if we can allow it --here comes Hinduism to the rescue with an ancient and elegantly
simple psychology which does precisely that and sees human nature as essentially spiritual.

Traditional Hinduism maps the human body and psyche with seven energy centers called chakras.
Each of them is a center of motivation, desire, and pleasure, a doorway through which the soul
is drawn to and interacts with others. The lower three chakras are regarded as pre-spiritual
or worldly centers -- by themselves addictive and only overcome with much effort and grace.
The upper four chakras are regarded as the centers of spirituality, and can only be accessed
and activated with uch effort an grace.

Spiritual growth is then tracked as the emergence of character as we struggle and learn to live
from the higher and higher motives associated with the higher spiritual centers. That means --
this is very important -- not suppressing but integrating our lower desires within our higher desires.
This spacious and wise model from Hindu psychology grounds and locates spiritual development
in our very human bodies as the inborn and built in potential of our human nature, ready whenever
we are to be developed as far as we are willing to go.

The seven centers are listed below in developmental sequence, but to visualize their location
in the body, please invert the list, the first chakra being approximately at the anus, and

the seventh at the top of the head.

Chakra Title Chakra Drive Chakra Objective

1. The survival chakra The desire to live Food & Money

2. The sex chakra The desire to mate Sex & Babies

3. The power chakra The desire to fight Dominance & Success

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

4. The heart chakra The desire to connect Service & Unity

5. The throat chakra The desire to express Creativity & Beauty

6. The third eye chakra The desire to understand Insight & Truth

7. The crown chakra The desire to worship Mysticism & God

It is an elegant map. The connections with Christian spirituality are many: 1) the monastic

vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience dethrone the dominance of the lower centers by

renouncing what they seek, which frees the soul to develop our higher inclinations;

2) Christian faith is opening up heart to heart contact with Christ; 3) The Holy Spirit descends

at Pentecost onto the top of the apostles? heads and releases the ecstatic love of God and
the power to reach others.

Freud had a word for the motivating drive underlying all human behavior: the libido.

He thought it was in essence the sex drive, though it could be “sublimated” to higher

purposes like creativity and service. Hinduism says in effect that Freud had only discovered
1/7th of our human nature, and offers another word for that essential motivating drive
which energizes all our pursuits. The kundalini is the pleasure seeking vitality of the soul
which finds any of seven different expressions and enjoyments depending which part
of our human nature it animates. Eastward leaning Americans tend to see
the “awakening of the kundalini” as an esoteric spritual exeperience rather than
a model of human possibiliy.

Here are several more chakra lists which are just meditations of my own to illustrate

the power of this psychological map to integrate both the “animal” and the “spiritual”

parts of our human nature.

Associated with (and built upon)

one particular physical system

1. Digestive system (Survival)

2. Reproductive system (Sex)

3. Muscular system (Power)

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

4. Circulatory system (Heart)

5. Respiratory system (Voice)

6. Sensory nervous system (Third eye)

7. Central nervous system (Crown)

When a lower center predominates and

defines us, the higher ones are eclipsed

1. Anxious materialism

2. Self indulgent sex

3. Competitive ego

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

4. Cold heart

5. Silent gifts

6. Closed mind

7. Darkened soul

When a higher center predominates and

defines us, lower ones can blossom too.

1. Produce, share abundance

2. Unite in mutual commitment, generosity

3. Overcome problems, defeat injustice

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

4. Serve joyfully

5. Say wonderful Things

6. See objectively

7. Lose oneself in God

Public figures whose greatness

manifests a particular chakra

1. Bill Gates, Paul Newman

2. Abigail Adams, John Adams

3. Lance Armstrong, Rev. Martin Luther King

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

4. Oprah, Jerry Lewis

5. Stephen Speilberg, Michael Moore

6. Dr. Bernie Seigel, Thich Nhat Hahn

7. Mother Theresa, Rabbi Abraham Heschel

Let?s be very fair to the mental health movement overt its assessment of faith as pathalogical. My brother, a successful therapist, says his colleagues are about evenly divided over whether the faith of their clients is an asset or a liability -- an ego strength or an ego weakness. However, those who do affirm faith know they are dissenting from orthodox psychology, and I propose that they are as much in need of the larger, more inclusive model of human nature which Hinduism so beautifully provides.

There's hope for spring

Finally the snow has melted, and crocuses are blooming at the farm. Patricia prepared a fantastic Easter dinner. Bob read a passage from "The Autobiography of a Yogi" about death and renewal. We surrounded ourselves with dear friends. Life is very good.

It is at this time that we have taken stock of the remaining produce stored last fall. Boy, did we overdo it this year. We still have two bushels of potatoes, no matter how often we eat them. And there's corn, applesauce, rhubarb, strawberries, peaches, spinach, green beans, tomatoes, pickles, jams, etc.

Next season we must remind ourselves to "put up" in moderation. And we will have time to plan other summer activities.

Malia and I have been attending bee school and will place two hives near the garden this year. Malia has already planted a couple of rows of buckwheat to provide food for the bees early, while the hive is getting established. We are both looking forward to this new adventure, with our eyes on honey in the fall.

With colony collapse disorder a reality, we're trying to do our part in supporting healthy bee hives.

The remnants of the ice store are everywhere in Derry, now that the snow has melted. We still have much cleanup ahead of us. Paul has purchased a chipper.

For me, I am looking forward to spring, then summer and fall. I am grateful that winter is behind us all.

Ice Storm

In December 2008 Sunpoint Farm was hit by an historic ice storm which knocked out electricity for over 95% of Derry, NH. We learned what community really meant, as Paul and Scott worked hard to help neighbors clean up downed trees, and Bob and Tate Conlon trekked all the way to Patterson, NJ to purchase generators for themselves and neighbors. The house up the road (70 Old Chester Rd.) was symbolically restored to power around midnight on Christmas Eve. Paul, Patricia, Malia, and I were at the Hampstead Episcopal Church Christmas Eve service that evening, singing carols and listening to inspirational stories of neighbors helping neighbors all across the area.


Yes, there was vandalism and theft, which, I suppose, shows that crises bring out the best and the worst of us. However, this experience has left me grateful for those luxuries I have taken for granted: light, heat, and water. And more than ever it has shown me that community is really, really the answer.

My parents survived the dust bowl of Oklahoma in the '30's because of friends, neighbors, and families. They reinforced in me the necessity for us to support one another in hard times.

This crisis proved again that their lessons are as true today as they were 70 years ago.

Thanks to Scott who took the photos of Sunpoint Farm and who tolerated the invasion of four round-the-clock inhabitants at the farmhouse, where wood stoves and water from the local fire station, as well as Paul's stash of candles (garnered from various yard sales) kept us going through the darkest hours.

Late Autumn

The secret of life is to "die before you die" -- and find that there is no death. Eckhart Tolle

I am always amazed at the blaze of color in autumn, especially in New England. The garden is now put to rest. Malia has been busy raking leaves to define the pathways between beds and to gently cover the carrots as we await our first snow.

I have turned to baking and spinning wool near the pellet stove. We're cutting down trees. A group from our UU church helped stack wood for the farmhouse wood stoves so there will be warmth this winter.

And even as we prepare for winter, we talk about the next season, the next crop, spring's promise of tulips and crocuses.

Each autumn teaches us Tolle's lesson. As autumn passes and plants die, we have time for the quiet, reflective season of winter, and know that nature will again bring us spring.

I love winter. I spin, knit, read, and enjoy watching the snow fall.

And for today my heart is full with all of the blessings this life offers.

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Johnny

On dogs: "I am joy in a wooly coat, come to dance in your life, to make you laugh." Julie Church

Johnny is our joy, our little mascot in the garden, almost always happy, and he often dances for a treat. Johnny is a rescue cream-colored toy poodle from Indianapolis Poodle Rescue. He is named after Johnny Cash because he was a stray in Tennessee, a little guy who had received a few hard knocks. He is eleven pounds of love and sheer delight, inviting us to be in the moment with him and enjoying all that life offers.

And as far as laughter goes, I dare anyone to try not to laugh when Johnny attempts to herd the shetlands, all eleven pounds trying to make those five sheep go where he wants them to go. First they run, but after a while they realize this little pup is not a border collie and quit taking him seriously. One would think that would be a blow to his little ego, but I've watched him immediately give up the chase and plop himself in the meadow, with a wide open smile.

For Johnny the whole world is his playground.

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Summer Garden Photos

Late Summer in the Garden

"This was one of those perfect New England days in late summer where the spirit of autumn takes a first
stealing flight, like a spy, through the ripening country-side, and, with feigned sympathy for those who
droop with August heat, puts her cool cloak of bracing air about leaf and flower and human shoulders."
- Sarah Orne Jewett, The Courting of Sister Wisby, 1887

The red tomatoes are begging to be canned. We have many green ones also. Patricia is in the kitchen now putting up pesto to delight our senses in the winter months to come. October is the season, but the temperature is that of a late summer day. I'll bake bread in the coolness of the morning now and dream in the evening of wool to spin and knit into warm fuzzy things.

Here are some photos of summer in our garden. Malia is there now putting it to bed and preparing it for the winter months to come.

Yesterday Paul, Patricia, and Malia planted fall garlic. Wednesday Patricia planted tulip bulbs. We have life to look forward to when winter comes.

Denise