Cutting Free from Delusions

In the Buddhist symbolism, the Bodhisattva Manjushri, wields a flaming sword, representing the power of compassionate wisdom to cut away all delusions. I have a small Manjushri figure on my home-altar and this image reminds me that this process of severing myself from delusions is an active, humbling, and sometimes intimidating ideal and practice. I’ve found that an attitude of gentleness and humor, lovingly not taking myself too seriously, often helps.

A delusion that I held onto for a long time and that I find common with many clients is often some form of “something is wrong with me”. Here’s the good news that may feel a little difficult to hear:, there is nothing wrong with you. Maybe a little “ouch”, right? What is it like to have this idea challenged? How does holding onto it continue to seem useful? Why is it so difficult to release ourselves from it? These are big questions, and I will only attempt to scratch the surface here.

A lot (most? all?) people seem to come into therapy with some version of “something is wrong with me”. This story could have been written last week or as with most people, across many years, even since childhood. It is so easy to identify with the difficulties that life brings us and the feelings that these experiences leave us with. We internalize our experiences across a lifetime and can effortlessly make them into stories about ourselves. Sometimes these stories can be quite strengthening and positive and often it can be quite the opposite. In this process, “our problems” become “our identities” and no matter how much we might not like ourselves we still cling to our ideas of who we are, because to not do so is so challenging and threatening to the stories of our identity that gives us a seemingly coherent sense of self no matter how difficult that may be. Starting to loosen this problem-self-identification is not a process of denial or closing off to our experiences and feelings. It does not mean that difficult, tragic, horrible things haven’t happened. We experience things that cause us to rightly and understandably feel “wrong” (sad, frightened, anxious, regretful, numb, isolated, exhausted, etc), but still, there is nothing wrong with you, you are not your feelings. This is a process of reimagining and redefining our relationship to our experiences, thoughts, emotions, and ultimately to ourselves. I sometimes refer to the phrase “real but not true”, meaning that your experiences, thoughts, and feelings are real, but the story you tell yourself about yourself may not be true.

When we associate or link negative experiences and emotional states with our sense of self, we make the leap from “bad thing” to “bad me”, which is a fundamental error that involves a lot of unhelpful “I am-ing”. What challenging this idea can lead to is a destabilizing and sometimes unwelcome question of “If I’m not my problems, then who am I?”. The thought of looking into the abyss of maybe not being anybody or being someone different that who we’ve convinced ourselves we are can be so frightening that we retreat into the safe yet unhappy familiarity of our old self-story. For better or worse, a recognizable self-story provides structure, predictability, and a well-known vantage point to understand the world, our history, relationships, and ourselves. However, it’s a misapprehension that betrays and blocks the inherent goodness that lies obscured by the negative self-story. Paradoxically, this problem identification keeps us feeling safe, or at least feeling safer from the potential destabilizing effects of really getting under the surface and finding out what might be at the roots of our suffering. Letting go of this identification will demand change and change can be the most frightening of things.

How do we work with this phenomenon of identifying with our problems? Manjushri’s sword is guided by compassion and wisdom. We need both because compassion without wisdom is idiot compassion and wisdom without compassion is arrogance. The energy of Manjushri’s sword is not a shaming teacher, belittling boss, or a disapproving and angry parent. It is loving, kind, and understanding. It is also direct and based in reality. This is the ideal starting point for working with any difficult feelings, experiences, or situations. When we approach our own suffering with love, kindness, and an open and curious heart that is anchored in reality and forthrightness, we can use that flaming sword to cut the ties between ourselves and all the problems that we have identified with for so long. We can begin to separate our self-sense from the “problems”. We can start a process of disidentification and regain a more steady and loving sense of self, despite how difficult our experiences might be. When we strongly identify with our emotions or experiences, they can feel burdensome, overwhelming, unpredictable, and frightening, and we in turn become the same to ourselves. When we don’t identify with our feelings completely, we allow ourselves more spaciousness and stability to truly feel them, be curious about them, attend to the messages they tell us, and start to change our relationship to our lives, our histories, and ourselves.