Blog by John Baxter
Superimposition and Negation
Inherent in Vedanta is a very clever strategy called superimposition and negation. Let’s give it a definition. For example… You start with a basic idea about yourself. You accept that idea as provisionally true. Then you challenge yourself to find as much wrong with that idea as possible. Negation. And magically, you replace one idea with a better idea. Pretty straightforward.
For instance, replacing the idea, “I can’t get anything right,” with “sometimes I’m right and sometimes I’m wrong,” moves you closer to the truth. Or you replace the idea that the world is a mess with the idea that it is beautiful. In this case you will notice a definite improve in your mood. Hopefully, you get the idea.
A Simple Definition of Psychotherapy
Since we’re nothing more than a jumbled mess of bad ideas much of the time, exchanging bad ideas for better ones seems like a pretty good deal. At the risk of oversimplifying, we might call this psychotherapy. The application could be tricky. We will likely need help identifying these bad ideas… more often than not they remain hidden because we usually think they are good ideas! That’s where therapists can come in handy. They can help us uncover the bad ideas, provisionally accept them, and then challenge them. This is not easy, and it’s up to the therapist to provide a safe setting to make this possible.
The Next Level
Up to now, I’ve described the process of superimposition and negation in the personal psychotherapeutic realm. Why stop there? Well, maybe we don’t have to. Maybe you haven’t heard about Vedanta. It takes this process to a whole other level. While including the personal, it’s way beyond the personal. While psychotherapy challenges the ideas of who you think you are as person, Vedanta challenges the idea of whether you are a person at all. Both Vedanta and psychotherapy are valuable and essential tools depending upon in which realm you’re operating.
Are Ideas Actually Real?
Psychotherapy and Vedanta use the same methodology. It’s a logical progression. Once again, you start with a provisional idea, an idea assumed to be true, and negate it. These ideas are not only assumed to be true, they are literally experienced as “reality.” For instance, the idea “the joy is in the object of my desire”… not true. What! How is that possible? Suffice it to say, Vedanta does a whole lot of this. In fact, it has a series of logical steps for negating ideas like this, and replacing them with much better ones…and on and on… until the only thing left is the idea that you are simply unlimited existence awareness, and since that’s an idea, even it can be eventually negated once you have worked through the steps. Oh my, my head is spinning! I’m not going to go into the details of this process at this moment… that’s a whole topic in itself. However just like psychotherapy, you will need guidance… a teacher and a teaching. It’s not that complicated but it’s pretty subtle.
Provisional Identities – A Friendly Warning
Heed this warning…proceed with care… If you are thinking of doing psychotherapy or Vedanta, you need to proceed slowly under the guidance of a qualified professional. Don’t underestimate the value of your provisional foundational ideas or identities. They are important. They provide stability and that’s not a bad thing. Remember these identities and ideas have gotten us this far. Empathy involves taking yourself (and others) from where you are currently standing…not from where you would like yourself (and others) to be.
So make haste…slowly. Suppose you don’t pay attention and are too heavy-handed in your challenges/negation. In that case, you can cut the legs out from under someone or yourself, and end up with mess on your hands…or at the very least nothing will be gained and you will have lost the power to assimilate critical self-knowledge.
I know I’ve taken some liberties using a Vedanta concept to describe psychotherapy but that’s OK because there is common ground. Please let me know what you think.
Send and email to swartz.jb@gmail.com and I will forward it to John.
