PSYCHOLOGICAL EXAGGERATION

 

Some scholars go overboard and become irrational in their praise of Upanishads. Undoubtedly, the Upanishads have a great value for spiritual people and the wisdom it contains can be used by worldly people also to solve their problems, build their character, reason, discretion, perception and clear thinking.

However, it is debatable whether they are superior to present day works on psychology or replace them. They both belong to different domains and serve different purposes with some overlapping here and there. However, comparing them to assess their superior is like comparing apples to oranges.

The Upanishads look at the mind from a spiritual perspective and the books on modern psychology, if at all they dwell upon metaphysics or soul look at it from the perspective of the mind and perceptible field of experience and cognition. Thus, one belongs to the higher or the transcendental world and the other to this world. One is divine and the other human.

The Upanishads may enhance our spirituality but they cannot as effectively deal with the problem of human behavior or the secrets of the mental mechanisms as modern psychology. 

Today, we are rationally and scientifically dealing with mental abnormalities and mentally ill people and showing them great compassion and understanding. 

The Upanishads existed for over 5000 years, during which nothing much happened in India in the field of human psychology to improve the mental health of ordinary people or provide effective solutions to cure mental illnesses.

The knowledge of the Upanishads itself was kept a closely guarded secret and denied to others. Their teaching was confined to a group of select individuals and served little purpose in inspiring or liberating the common people. Despite the existence of the Vedas, the Upanishads and thousands of other scriptures, people at large remained ignorant, superstitious and primitive in their thinking and attitude.

When we make statements about our scriptures, we must be rational and balanced. Morally, there is no difference between telling lies and embellishing truth about our psychological existence with exaggerations and false comparisons. Whether our attachment is to our thought process or to a worldly object, both lead to bondage.

Streamlined psychology fanaticism has become a growing malady in today's world. It turns every psychology into a weapon to oppress people or attack those who disagree with it. If we are a spiritual person, we should be away from it, because fanaticism arises from the quality of tamas and clouds our judgment. It is neither ethical nor spiritual nor lawful, but a sign of ignorance, delusion and attachment.

Philosophical psychology is a means, not an end in itself. We should use it for our spiritual development, and purification, but not to fill ourself with pride and vanity which will make us unworthy of liberation. It gives us an opportunity to grow the divine in ourself. Therefore, it is important that we should not use it as a status symbol to strengthen our ego or establish our social or cultural superiority. 

Fanaticism manifests in many ways. One of them is when religious person blindly upholds his beliefs, scriptures and values ignoring the obvious contradictions and fallacies.

To sum up all this, psychology or thought process is something which one adopts from their surrounding and then try to enhance it with their personal need and worldly greed. This adaption changes from gender to gender, race to race, and even caste and religion. Any worldly centric psychology when gained leads to a worldly centric thought process. Watching our psychological barriers and limits from a third person point of view will make all this psychological chaos much more simpler and lead to way better state of mind. Aham Brahma is what makes this way of thinking much clear.

The brain is built to change in response to experience.