DR. CLIVE SHERLOCK ON ZEN BUDDHISM AND MENTAL HEALTH
Dr. Clive Sherlock Psychiatrist and Zen Buddhist Master
‘I can hardly compress thousands of years of thought into 50 minutes, but I shall try’
Dr. Clive Sherlock gives a stimulating lecture on the life of the mind. His premise is that modern approaches to suffering are not only useless but harmful. A practice that is thousands of years old, Buddhism has one tenet only; the relief of suffering . Towards that difficult goal is a difficult path harder to tread than it first appears but once mastered brings enlightened relief. It involves taking our emotions seriously, controlling them and learning slowly to see that they are a very poor guide in life.
‘ The key realisation is that everything is impermanent and not only will we no longer be here but everything around us ‘ he taps the desk in front of him ‘ will vanish.’ so why do we concern ourselves with the past about which we can do nothing, or even the future over which we have no influence . All we can affect is the present moment and our ability to live it as well as we can’
‘ A story about the Buddha’s own life illustrates this. His young servant boy was preparing his master’s tea in the afternoon when he dropped the Buddha’s favourite teapot. It smashed. The little servant picked up all the pieces and went to confront his master, with them hidden behind his back ‘ You know Master you say everything comes to its end -’he produced the smithereens from behind his back ‘your teapot has just come to an end’. The Buddha felt his had understood something important.’
Strangely, later in the week I iistened to the thoughtful and compelling Father Alban McCoy. Quoting Meister Eckhart, a medieval mystic thinker he announced ‘ All that is open to us, is to do the next thing - with delight’
So it does seem from that small sample the idea of focus on the present and a willingness to live as well as we can from moment to moment, is a traditon handed down from the Buddha but present in other traditions and religions.
It is not a fashionable or popular philosophy in a world which thrives on hopes for the future to hold our attention and constant review of the past when things go wrong .
Clive Sherlock trained as a psychiatrist using the tools of the trade - drugs and talking therapies. But after over twenty-six years with the NHS he felt he was doing nothing to address the core of people’s problems,
“At Medical School we studied every part of the body and the mind. But when I asked ‘Are we going to examine the emotions?’ there was a blank stare. Even in psychiatry we learned only about the effect of the emotions, like anger and grief. But how we really feel, nothing at all.”
“When I was in practice in the NHS, we offered people drugs to control their emotions, or encouraged them to look into their past to explain how they felt, about their experiences using talking cures and counseling. But where was the help in dealing with the here and now?’
“ Going over what went wrong, blaming our parents, our upbringing, and our education makes us re-live the resentments and injustices of the past. And in doing that we re-visit the pain we felt then. Adaptation Practice, designed to deal with anxiety stress and depression changes lives - and offers a challenge to conventional medicine With AP, the idea is to open up to life as it is now. To accept the emotions we feel, not to try and dull them down with alcohol or medication, or drugs - but not to express them through angry outbursts either.” Dr. Sherlock thinks that unless we realize our feelings are very much the essential part of us, that thoughts are only a section of who we are, we have not learned to be ourselves fully. It is not an easy road.
“We all prefer to avoid what we dislike. It is only natural. Trying to avoid what we dislike and what we fear can drain our energy, especially when it is our own emotions that we dislike and fear, and want to get rid of.”
“But doing what we like is not always good for us. We have to learn to confront our fears, not hide from them or wrap them up. The Ap practice helps people find their inner bravery convinces them that they can handle their feelings and manage their lives. “
“Inner strength develops when we try to do what we find difficult and what we do not want to do. It is the same for babies developing the strength in their legs to bear their own weight by repeatedly standing up again each time they fall down. Developing inner strength brings tolerance, courage, insight and compassion.”
Emotions are the core of our being, the impulse to everything we do from expressing joy to convulsing with unhappiness
“The challenge we all face, but few see, is to contain emotion, without letting it overwhelm us and carry us away. And then to tame it. When we do this we no longer fear emotion in us or in other people.” Says Dr. Sherlock.
The Practice begins with a timetable. Patients agree to get up at a prescribed time, a time of their choosing but the same time every day. Many people find it incredibly hard to do.
Patients usually add another set time, such as when they will go to bed. And they agree to sit down at the table three times a day, sit and stand in a firm positive way, smile when they meet people and do everything silently and thoughtfully.Bothersome thoughts are kept at bay by action. Dr. Sherlock is fond of polishing as. a distraction from the crowded intrusion of anxieties and regrets. ‘The key thing is to get on and do something , not talk about regrets from the past or worries about the future.’
With what he calls Adaptation Practice, Dr. Clive Sherlock has helped countless patients to move from the crutches of drugs, medication or leisure, drink or self harm. By training to deal with emotions not run from them or wrap them up in some kind of distraction or medication, he has freed patients with what would seem insuperable mental suffering back into living a life of calm and action, not agitation and regret.
His gift to the world is immense.
Dr. Clive Sherlock works in Oxford but is often a Visiting speaker at Clare Hall Cambridge
