So Judge Already
The flowers on the azalea were deep red in the center, slashed by black pistils and faded to pink at the end of each petal. The threads of a spiderweb slinked between the plant’s leaves, behind the flowers, dotted with dew that glistened in the bright morning sun. But this morning the flowers have faded to dull pink, and soon they’ll be brown clumps clinging to an unexceptional shrub for much of the late Spring, into the early summer. The azalea will be ugly for much longer than it was beautiful. The beauty of an azalea depends on when one sees it, for like everything alive the plant is ever changing. Like everything alive the plant exhibits impermanence, or to us the lack of a definable self. Realizing the nature of impermanence is the end result of the message taught in many meditation traditions.
It is a devastatingly dangerous idea.
The idea that we each do not have a developed centered self, the idea labeled no-self by many Eastern traditions, is as rabid as the concept of nonjudgmental awareness to many who teach and practice mindfulness. But just as we must make judgments all day, every day, and that we must have the integrity to have an ethical underpinning of what is right and what is wrong, we must have an awareness of who we are, a connection to the core individuals we are, even as we develop and change in our relationships and our self-image.
Meditation, as I practice it in the Zen tradition, does reveal that the self, like the azalea, is mutable. But so does good therapy. And so does a careful contemplation of the arc of a person’s life. An honest meditation practice guided by an honest, experienced teacher can reveal much about these changes and how they influence how we behave. And who we are. Yet over the cycles of the seasons, with the whole plant everchanging, the azalea is still an azalea. We must be the same.
The Western tradition insists that we are unique, morally equal, and full of potential as individuals. We can decide on a life and create tremendous influence on the world and the people around us. It also drives us to be secure with who we are, to be realistic, to be humble, and to be honest. When self-identity suffers, so does our mental health. Yet the concept of self-identity, the fundamental truth of Western Civilization, the mash up of soul and reason that has so blessed the world with human rights, material wealth, solid communities and honest free expression, has been undermined by a pivot to Eastern thought that most teachers of Eastern thought in the West do not fully understand, or worse yet seek to corrupt in the promotion of some biased idea that runs counter to fact and nature.
What many teachers of meditation with shallow roots in Eastern practice teach, and I believe they do teach it to be helpful, can be defeating, deflating and damaging to every individual, every self, that they influence. All too often, poor mental health is the result of this turning away from the tenets of the Judeo-Christian traditions that underpin our culture. For answers we need not look to distant continents. The answers are very nearby.
The answers begin in naming things.
From the deck I watch across the bay as two birds of prey sit on a piling atop a fish that glistens in the light like polished metal, kicking every once in a while in a ritual of surrender. It’s a beautiful sight, nature playing out right before me, with the greening marsh grass gently waving behinds the birds and the shadows cast by the pilings growing shorter. I seem to merge into the moment. First as a participant, and then just a part. Many people think this should be enough.
But it’s not.
I’m pulled out of the moment by a desire to find out what these birds are, to reach for the binoculars and the Sibley Guide and identify, and name, these predators; to compare their markings with the pictures in the book. To determine that they are Osprey, and that they mate for life, and that they’ll likely always call this spot on the water home, at least for part of each year. With this the scene seems more complete. We’re an inquisitive people.
In Genesis Adam walks through the Garden of Eden with the authority to name all things. To separate them into their individual roles in this interconnected system. Of course the tragedy of Genesis is that Adam and Eve face the ultimate separation as they are cast out to wander as individuals apart from all he named. But in this tragedy are the seeds of our humanness. We are individuals. We stand alone even as we live together.
This naming things, and the realization that once you name something you set it apart, was one of the keys to my healing. I was lost in a confusing and painful maelstrom of mania and depression that I did not understand. My full experience of what I did not understand caused me to suffer terribly. Then, after a litany of misdiagnoses and trial and error, a doctor named it. Manic Depression. Naming it set it apart, enabled me to no longer identify with it, enabled my doctor to treat it, enabled me to first imagine and then actually live without it. Had I been satisfied to simply live in the moment without judgment I would still be suffering.
This is our strength in our Western culture and this is our strength in ourselves. We are individuals, we have names. We create and act on the world and can change things and make the world better. We can leave the world with something that didn’t exist before we touched it. And we can take things that dissatisfy us and cast them off. In fact, a healthy dissatisfaction helps us make the world a better place, and ourselves better people.
So yes, we are a part of nature. Of course we are. But we are above all else thinking and acting humans. If mental illness is something to be accepted and experienced without judgment as part of nature than it is natural. In a way, every disease is. But they’re still diseases. We should view them as dysfunctional if they cause us to not fully participate in the world and if they cause us to be dependent without our will and promise and to live passive lives with no possibility of cure or success. Yet we can define our success. We can achieve it, if only we can accept that we are not happy with the present moment, that we judge it negatively, and set about to change it – to add something that didn’t exist before we walked the earth – to live lives of possibility. Nonjudgmental acceptance of our circumstance is a fraud. We must judge all day in order to make good decisions. In order to change, heal and live well.
Sitting with azaleas or watching birds, fully in the moment, is immensely satisfying and I highly recommend it. But it’s not enough. To truly live a meaningful life we must look beyond the present moment and act upon a better future. Otherwise we are left, fully experiencing the present moment without judgment, to live desperate, hopeless lives.
The true strength of our culture is that we do not accept things as they are. We are not stuck in the present. We can improve, heal, and bring to the world things that did not exist before we stood up and did something. It’s the same with mental illness. We must view it as a disease we can overcome. We must not be satisfied with our present if it is painful or if it imposes limits on our lives that make our lives less full and less successful than the lives of people without mental illness. We must find the best care we can and look ahead to better days. And act in ways to bring those better days about.
Meditation can go a long way toward helping us with this goal. It can help us identify signals in the body and the mind that warn us a difficult episode is approaching and it can give us the time, with our caregivers, to act to avoid or make the best of these episodes. Meditation can give us insight and space to develop our selves. But meditation with the goal of fully experiencing the present moment without judgment can truly hurt us. We are individuals who have a mental illness. We can get better. We must not get lost in ideas that can only keep us locked in cycles of illness and suffering. We can name our disease, manage it, or even heal from it, and live satisfying and productive lives. Don’t accept the limitations of illness. Don’t accept anything that does not have a positive impact on you and your world. Get better. You can.
Learn how to use meditation to predict, prevent and manage episodes of anxiety, depression and mania in my book Practicing Mental Illness: Meditation, Movement and Meaningful Work to Manage Challenging Moods. Available here.