'Another Way to Live' - A Psychiatrist among Indian Ascetics by Prof. RL Kapur

The intermingling of science and spirituality especially Indian spiritual traditions has had a long journey and witnessed many debates, discussions, fawning acceptance and equally acrimonious negations, but has also seen many concerted and dedicated efforts to understand it. Though was aware of many academic and rather pedantic works which dealt with the subject, a work for public consumption and common aficionados like myself wasn't in my purview. This is important because the current popular discourse on the intermingling of science and spirituality has either been lopsided or plain caustic on both sides. My personal interest in the subject had my antennas searching for such a work for quiet sometime. Thanks to Prof. Sangeetha Menon of NIAS who introduced Prof RL Kapurs seminal work 'Another Way to Live' to amateurs like me through her post on FB, that lacunae too was addressed.

Prof RL Kapur was a internationally well known psychiatrist and had held visiting positions in several prestigious institutions in UK and USA. He was Head of the Department of Psychiatry at NIMHANS in Bangalore. He also played a crucial role in the formative years of NIAS and was also the Deputy Director of the Institute for a long time. He used to visit the Himalayas almost every year to interview Sanyasis and Sadhus to find out the real motivation behind their drastic decisions to change their life style to Sanyas from normal family living. His work 'Another way to Live' is a culmination of his life long research which he conducted along with his wife Malavika Kapur, who was instrumental in publishing the work after Prof. Kapurs unfortunate demise.

In this rather long post I try to bring out the best of RL Kapur’s research, lessons learnt and findings from 'Another Way to live'.

RL Kapur initially lays out the reasons as to why this research was taken up and questions that bothered him with respect to the area of his work, which was psychiatry. I summarize them as below:

1) Can people change for the better?

2) Whether spirituality was helpful to ordinary people and those with mental health problems?

3) Was sanyas or life of renunciation and withdrawal be a technique which could provide a safe space for potential schizophrenics?

4) Study mystical experiences of Sadhus 

5) Can some sadhus with siddhis go beyond the known laws of physics? 

6) Whether there was something to learn from sanyasis which would help me and other professional therapists to become better psychiatrists and solve people's problems.

RL Kapurs earnest effort to understand the life of sanyasis without any blinkers are evident from the above reasons. As in any serious research, the methodology used is as important as the reasons laid out. Methodology used by RL Kapur while studying Sadhus/Sanyasis were as meticulous as one can expect:

1) Life history of a Sadhu 

2) Point of encounter with spirituality 

3) Reasons for taking sanyas 

4) His/her experiences as sadhu later 

5) Know about their spiritual experiences 

6) Sadhus personal relationship with their gurus 

7) Life of a sanyasi in detail

Prof. Kapur admits that although psychiatry is often successful in reducing distress caused by mental illness, it has had less success in promoting that state termed as 'positive mental health'. This state includes ability to cope with stresses of life, experience greater eneter, transform energy into joy, compassion and creativity. Could spiritual quest bring about this positive mental health was another question that bothered Prof. Kapur.

The research was also a spiritual quest for the author. However, during his research, he came across many beneficiaries who claimed that their lives changed for the better after living a life as a sanyasi or a dedicated disciple. In clear terms, he elaborates the lessons from spiritual quests which I summarize as below: 

1) Constant interchange of energies is the law of life. Air one breathes in HAS TO BE breathed out. Same with food, taking anything and love too.

2) Do not cease from action but distance oneself from anticipation of the results. This brings equanimity of mind.

3) Equanimity of mind comes from constant vibrancy i.e from continuous action to correct one's balance 

4) If genuine concern/respect is shown, face expresses it. Person opposite(client) will pick them up irrespective of difference in cultures or traditions.

5) Suffering can be often relieved without knowing its cause. Need not pay too much attention to causation every time.

As part of his research, Prof. Kapur himself involved in the study and practice of 'Ashtanga' Yoga for more than an year. Being a psychiatrist his learnings/hypotheses from his study of Yoga are below: 

1) Meditation helps hypochondriacs by reducing attention they pay to body and relaxation of ego-boundaries can help people become less anxious

2) Pranayama increases alertness and may assist depressives

3) Asanas focus attention on body rather than on thoughts and is useful to schizoid people

4) Yoga Nidra shifts mode of experience away from linear verbal thinking to images and visualization which helps people with OCDs

Research findings: Yogic techniques can lead to a sense of well-being, joy, creativity, understanding, energy and compassion and therefore contribute to personal well-being.

The book also looks into various aspects of self, suffering, psychotherapy. I list a few findings of Prof. Kapur below.

On Self, learnings and suffering:

- Spirituality is a mental state in response to existential questions about the meaning of life, illness and death

- The most dangerous desire is the desire to have one particular self-image.

- Pursuit of sensible goals which are in tune with possibilities open to individual in social context, bring relief from suffering

- Suffering is because we either do not get what we want or because we are forced into a situation which we do not like.

- Is literacy(?) a precondition for self-knowledge?

- On why sadhus are always happy, full of energy and love? It comes from being free in every sense: no possessions, no worry about obtaining food and most importantly, no sense of separate self.

- Real spiritual accomplishment is cognitive, and come through contemplation and much enquiry

On comparisons with Psychotherapy and Indian spiritual traditions:

- Psychotherapy aims to bring peace and fulfillment in the ordinary day-to-day world while the Indian spiritual traditions ask you to transcend the ordinary world 

- The focus of therapy is the individual self in its social context

- Western rationalist tradition regards suffering as an aberration that has to be suppressed. Eastern traditions view suffering as an inevitable consequence of being alive.

- One area of similarity between psychiatrist and the spiritual seeker is their interest in the individual, whether as patient, client or devotee.

- 'Prarabdha' philosophy can promote tolerance

Some killer quotes in the book that caught my attention:

- Another purpose of travelling continuously is that you do not get attached to a place

- "Burning your boats" - Has a story attached to it!

- Yoga can help in healing you but it cannot give you knowledge. Technique isn't enough to change a person, but knowledge can.

- Total surrender. Either take full charge of your life or let god take it. 

- Suffering is only the forgetting of freedom

- Believing is intellectual, unreal and changeable. Knowing is awareness and unchangeable. Suffering starts when we confuse the two

- 'Justice' and 'Injustice' are impositions of mind on nature. They are relative and changeable.

- An aimless life is miserable life. Don't forget that the quality of your sankalpa (resolution) depends on the quality of your life.

- Order is not for its own sake but to get things so well arranged that you can leave them anytime and walk away. Order gives freedom.

- Before making a judgement about behaviour of others (Sadhus and sanyasis), I should have a first-hand experience of the phenomenon myself.

- I approached this question in the rational and scientific manner of a non-believer but with a passion to discover more about man's search for meaning.

- Along with an in-depth exploration of the psyche, Indian traditions have also suggested methods of cultivating the mind

- My ability to say 'I do not know' gives me freedom; Freedom to think for myself and to take responsibility for my actions. 

- Perhaps Freedom of thought is the ultimate human value

Some of the other works mentioned in the reference section of the book caught my attention as I deemed them to be of non-academic in nature and for common consumption. Am sure it would enrich us in understanding deeper connections between psychology and asceticism: 

1) Hoch EM 'Ancient Indian philosophy and western Psychotherapy' 

2) Patanjali's 'Yoga sutras'

3) Sri Aurobindo's 'The synthesis of Yoga'

4) Viktor Frankl's 'Man's search for Meaning'

5) Swami Satyananda 'Four Chapters on Freedom'

6) Swami Vivekananda 'Raja Yoga and Conquering Internal nature'.

Overall, a must read for anyone interested in the subject of science and spirituality. The authors numerous interviews, experiences from many trips, interpretations in the book are much much more than what has been elucidated here. A Kindle read should be good enough as the printed version is way too costly.

Prof. RL Kapur