Byron Katie + Eckhart Tolle + Karen Horney = Better Health (1)

It's been a hobby of mine for as long as I can remember to find apparently different or contradictory philosophies, find the rub, and see if something comes out of trying to unravel any puzzles that might be found there. Like checking out Ramana Maharshi and Csikszentmihalyi in previous posts.

Byron Katie has been on my radar recently. I have spent some time considering how her type of inquiry or "The Work" as she sometimes calls it fits with the three degrees of interpersonal relating (inclusion/exclusion, power/status, and the closest one--intimacy). Part of what I like about her presentation is that it allows for dialogue to be helpful. Rather than sitting on a meditation cushion, we can make solid personal progress by having a reasonable discussion concerning things that make us unhappy. And doing so in Katie's way structures the conversation so that progress is almost inevitable and sometimes truly amazing. As with many things, the more you do inquiry, the more "natural" it may feel. Part of what I love about personal progress, though, is that this natural feeling retains a certain specialness even as it becomes expected--it becomes somewhat ordinary to us, but remains bright. (I'll assume some familiarity with her ideas, but there is a link to her website above.)

Essentially, I'd say inquiry is a type of cognitive therapy from a more enlightened perspective than cognitive therapy(CT) is usually conducted from. In other words, it is very like CT but goes beyond what most would consider to be CT. Many cognitive therapists, though, would benefit from engaging The Work. Katie believes that all suffering comes from attachment to thoughts. Rather than just trying to detach from thinking--which she sees as pointless--she tries to help people find their problematic thoughts and then invite people to change their relationship to those particular thoughts.

Thoughts (as Katie describes them) seem most often or most obviously connected to introjected roles and customs at that second degree (power/status) of interpersonal intimacy. These introjections are the "shoulds" about ourselves, the world, and perhaps God that help consolidate personality and cultural disorders. These disorders are simply unhealthy and unhappy habitual patterns of engagement, feelings, thinking, and behavior.

Karen Horney (1885-1952) was one of the first female psychiatrists and a very influential thinker in the field. She described three neurotic means of reacting emotionally and one healthy way. Her healthy manner she describes as "moving with" others. The three unhealthy means are: moving towards (or simply complying in a way that compromises oneself), moving against (aggressing in a way that compromises others), and moving away (detaching in a way that compromises the relationship). I find it fascinating but not necessarily surprising that Katie presents her inquiry in a more fluid manner than I have seen cognitive therapy conducted and Horney gave interpersonal descriptions of neuroses (as compared to Freud's intrapersonal descriptions of neuroses. Both of these women, then, present things in a way that allows much better communication and shared progress. Whereas Freud mostly worked on other folks' intimate neuroses from a more "professional" standpoint at the power/status level of interpersonal intimacy, Katie and Horney included at least the recognition of intimacy and sometimes that intimacy directly.

I believe it was Marshall McLuhan who said that what the world needs now is "thinking mothers". This gender stuff fascinates me. If McLuhan's comment is interpreted in a contentious manner, we could respond that the world needs "feeling fathers". Having done my internship at the VA, though, I'd say that many of those men--having been taught to not feel and express emotions--will feel better about feelings if they have a solid way to think about and also talk about emotions. The knee-jerk reaction to women's oppression may be a radical sort of anti-male feminism, and it helps to both be thoughtful concerning that reactivity as well as remaining aware of intimacy while addressing oppression. (Unless you want gender pogroms.) On the flipside, the knee-jerk reaction to facing suppressed emotion includes everything from rage to shame, sorrow, depression, confusion, meaninglessness, etc. Good luck trying to convince guys that they need to go into that swamp of feelings without some tools and a plan. And if you think you just want them to feel and express whatever they might feel as genuine, spend some time in anger management groups! Society in general is also better off when men have some tools and a plan.