How to live a traumatic event as an opportunity for growth and evolution
Extract:
This book is not made, or useful, only for those who work in the field of medical or social assistance: it is valuable for all those who must face the experience of life and death. The three key words in psychological help to terminal patients and their family members are: Welcoming, Assisting, Accompanying.
Welcoming means to make oneself available to the person, by opening one’s arms as well as one’s heart and mind. Assisting means to operate gently, remaining always open to empathy, listening to the needs and the mentality of the person. Accompanying means to walk by the person’s side rather than in front, sometimes even walking behind in humility and love, to encourage his or her progress. Accompanying is to gently coax the person towards his destination, with kindness and warmth, empathy, compassion and generosity.
In this book we will not discuss the case of patients who can recover to a state of physical health. We will rather focus on the assistance to patients in their terminal stage, from the perspective of the Bhakti-Vedanta psychology1 that is certainly extremely valuable for the Western world, too. Our approach is holistic, free from the defect of fragmentation between medicine, psychology and spirituality. I have been studying psychology for over 30 years, achieving specializations and exploring various Schools of thought, with particular attention to the classical Indian civilization, that created a very advanced Science of health (Ayurveda) and an important School of psychology (Upanishads, Vedanta, Bhagavad gita, Yogasutra and Puranas), very likely the first in the history of mankind.
This civilization, considered by many as the original culture of the world, is based on the Vedas, the most ancient texts known to mankind, universally appreciated and recognized by many as an authoritative source of physical and metaphysical knowledge, unifying the sciences of matter and spirit.
This ancient knowledge, several thousands of years old, has been preserved, transmitted and renewed in time through the exegetic work of the various traditional Schools, and today it is highly respected in the West, too, amid a growing academic and scientific interest. It expresses a mature vision, characterized by advanced discoveries in the various fields such as medicine, philosophy, psychology, sociology, astronomy, mathematics, etc. It also offers surprisingly modern information and therapies that integrate the most cutting edge discoveries of contemporary science.
The Bhakti-Vedanta tradition offers information and methods that heal the individual on a global level, in all his/her anthropological aspects: physical, psychological and spiritual, substantially and effectively helping the development and the harmonious integration of personality, the tuning of the subconscious elements with the ego and the self.
It offers an integrated, profitable and totally satisfying connection between sentiments and thoughts, intuition and reason, deep subconscious issues and operative rationality, up to the concrete and global experience of the visualization of the higher levels of reality (the self consciousness).
We will study the issue of terminal disease by considering not only the physical instrument (the body) but especially the psychological instrument, and the emotional blockages, guilt complexes and depressive states that often affl ict those who are facing such an important step. We will also study the spiritual aspect, but not in an abstract sense, without the possibility of application in the immanent reality of the individual.
Thus we will approach the person on a integrated way, in a wide and global perspective, including the rituals of physical and spiritual preparation to the transition, and the psychological needs of the patient to prepare for the “journey” of the soul after death.[...]
Notes:
1. The Bhakti-Vedanta psychology does not use psycho-therapeutic techniques, but practices teachings and exercises for the development of a spiritual vision of man and cosmos. It does not limit itself to the solution of psychological discomforts but aims at rising awareness, so that the individual becomes able to rediscover his original nature beyond the cquired beliefs, the artificial identities and the false behavioral patterns hat restrict the potential and the noblest aspirations of the living being.
Contents:
Preface 7
The Problem of Identity 10
The Phenomenon of Death: An Inescapable Fact 10
Cure and Care 13
The Human Being and His Energies 15
Koshas: The Coverings of the Self 19
The School of Samkhya in the Psychophysical Constitution of the Universe 21
Psychological Types and Categories of Love 25
Types of Death 27
The Dynamics of Dying 28
The Psycho-Sociologic Phases of the Process of Dying 31
The Fears of a Dying Person 33
The Reality Beyond Sensory Perception 40
Wakefulness, Sleep, Dream, Birth and Death 41
Thoughts and Emotions: How to Modify Our Feelings 42
Karma and Destiny: We Can Make a Difference 44
Maturing Karma and Transmigration of the Living Being 45
Meditation and Psychic Flows of Objects 46
Perceptions and Visions of the World 48
Identification and Identity 49
The Emotional Charge of Psychic Waves 51
The Five Conditionings 52
The Dignity of Death 54
The Role of Consciousness Here and Now 54
Working On Pain 56
Meditative Visualization 57
Questions and Answers 61
Prof. Marco Ferrini 81
Centro Studi Bhaktivedanta 82
Bibliography 83
Publications 85
Note on the Author:
"Founder and President of Centro Studi Bhaktivedanta and of its Academic Department of Traditional Indian Sciences is Prof. Marco Ferrini, Ph. D. Psychology. For over thirty years, he has been studying and teaching Vedic culture and his research has taken him in numerous study trips in India and long stays in the sacred Hindu sites. He has designed radio programs and appeared in television broadcasts focused on topics of Vedic culture. He is author of several essays and books on ancient Indian Philosophy, Sciences, Arts and Religion. (continue)
Relationships and Society
