How to transform yourself?

Everyone has to overcome both extrinsic and intrinsic challenges during one’s life. External challenges could include physical problems like diseases, social problems like problems within family, problems with finance, problems within profession, or whatever external situations which can challenge us – events that appears to be beyond our control but that we have to face them head-on whether we like them or not and deal with best of our physical and mental abilities.

What are our internal challenges? Personality traits that impede our progress in life? What are they? Lack of concentration? Bad habits and their negative inclinations? Prejudices and negative attitude towards life? We have probably inculcated these weaknesses along with us for a very long period since eternity. They have metamorphosed themselves into bad habits. These bad habits may even transform into abnormal personality if we allow them to linger and allow them to grow into deep roots. The deeper the roots of these habits, the more difficult it will be to overcome these karmic transgressions.

Have you heard about “Stockholm Syndrome”? The name “Stockholm syndrome” was derived from a 1973 bank robbery in Stockholm, Sweden, where four hostages were held for six days. Throughout their imprisonment and while in harm's way, each hostage seemed to defend the actions of the robbers and even appeared to rebuke efforts by the government to rescue them. The Stockholm syndrome is a condition which is developed from extreme fear and acute stress. Stockholm syndrome is a condition which separates an individual from his or her relatives and loved ones.

People with Stockholm syndrome report the same symptoms as those diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD): insomnia, nightmares, general irritability, difficulty in concentrating, being easily startled, feelings of unreality or confusion, inability to enjoy  previously  pleasurable experiences, increased distrust of others, and flashbacks.

There are many self-help books, websites and psychotherapists who try to suggest remedial measures for breaking the cycle of addictive bad habits but they are all temporary measures and are not very effective. It is like directing mind to reform itself but mind being slave of senses soon turns back into its old habits.  But solution lies elsewhere. We have to change our perspective to observe the remedial measures in spiritual terms. We have to direct our remedial efforts to overcome our negative attitude, negative inclinations and mental weaknesses towards spiritual measures as part of our spiritual growth, finally leading us to spiritual maturity where our soul dominates our mind and senses.

Yes, this process involves our trying to subdue and control our mind by awakening our spiritual potential, and our engine of control is through our meditation.

We need to stay positive and turn to the Holy Word, have faith in Him and in His power. The Holy Word is the positive power that gives us strength. So instead of focusing on the negative tendencies, ruminating over our failures and weaknesses, we should just attend to our meditation with faith and love. If we seek His refuge, all negativity will be dispelled.

So, what prevents us from following this apt measure consistently? Why do we keep reverting to our old ways and act like a defeated warrior?

It is because our mind is slave to our senses. We are addicted to sensual pleasures, illusions and passions of life. The problem is that we are fond of our illusions – we enjoy living in delusion even though we know it is not the reality.

This is the psychological phenomenon which we have already discussed – The Stockholm Syndrome. We already know that this term is sometimes used for a person who has been kidnapped or taken hostage, but who gives up trying to free himself. He identifies with his captor and accepts being a prisoner. In fact, he no longer sees himself as a hostage, or a prisoner. Instead, he begins to trust his captor and even feel sympathy and affection for him. He mistakes his enemy for his friend.

And this is the same what is happening to us when we become addicted and slaves to our senses. Maya – the illusion – is our captor. We literally enjoy being hostage to the power of our senses. We know that sensual pleasures are transient and ephemeral and are like sweet coated bitter pills. We happily live in our own web of delusion. We are reluctant to face the reality that we are prisoners to these senses and do not have any freedom at all. We even get comfortable living in that captive state, as it is easier and relaxing– as great effort would be required to put up resistance and free ourselves to permanent state of bliss.

Since we have already internalized our weaknesses, our negative tendencies, we think that is our real personality and that’s who we really are. We have willingly given up our freedom and become slaves of our senses. But this is not who we are. We have to take the power back to regain our real self! We have to empower ourselves.

We are slaves to our senses, to our egoistic attitude, to pride of intellect and knowledge, to status and wealth. We seek shelter and take comfort in distracting our mind through these things. They are the means and not an end to pursuit of permanent happiness. The strongest shackles that imprison us are our own bad habits, the negativity that dissipates our spiritual energy and which we no longer resist.

Why should we complain and ruminate over our failures? We just need to move forward. This problem of entrenched bad habits and our difficulty in controlling them is not just something that comes with modern life, with incessant smoking and booze, with internet, social networking and cellphone addiction, or too much television-watching. All the challenges we face in modern life are just a latest manifestation of the same downward and animistic tendencies that people have encountered since times immemorial.

Once we recognize that the problem lies within us, in handing over our independence and freedom to our old enemy, our captor, we need to exert the effort to reverse the downward and outward direction of our mind through meditation. We need to have the confidence that we have the ability to get free. We need to have confidence that, with the spiritual guidance, we can change. As William James said, “If we make a habit of that belief in change”, the change becomes real. We can adopt good habits as well as bad habits, so why not adopt the good habits and positive attitude and reclaim our freedom?

In “The Power of Habit”, Charles Duhigg quotes William James, the American theologian and philosopher:

“All our life … is but a mass of habits – practical, emotional, and intellectual … bearing us irresistibly toward our destiny.” …

Habits, he [James] noted, are what allow us to “do a thing with difficulty the first time, but soon do it more and more easily, and finally, with sufficient practice, to do it semi-mechanically, or with hardly any consciousness at all.” Once we choose who we want to be, people grow “to the way in which they have been exercised, just as a sheet of paper or a coat, once creased or folded, tends to fall forever afterward into the same identical folds.”  (Duhigg, Charles, The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business, pp.271, 273)

Duhigg discusses another insight of James:

“If you believe you can change – if you make it a habit – the change becomes real. So [James] says that ultimately your habits are what you choose them to be. Once that choice occurs – and becomes automatic – it’s not only real, it starts to seem inevitable, the thing, as James wrote, that bears “us irresistably toward our desiny, whatever the latter may be.” (Duhigg, Charles, The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business, pp.273)

We have the cure, the panacea to all ailments: the meditation. Waking up for us means waking our spiritual selves that have been dormant for lifetimes. It means shaking up our routines to make meditation our number one priority. It’s essential that during this time of so much uncertainty, that doing our spiritual work regularly will provide the calmness and balance needed to get through all the challenges we could be faced with throughout life in general.