Mind Materialism

A stuffy office in Delhi’s South Extension has Surinder and Sonia Paul preaching the precepts of the Neuro Linguistic Programme (NLP) for a fee. Connect words, thoughts and behaviour to control feelings and cope with failure, they say. Thousands of miles away, in Calcutta’s Cotton Street, Pradeep Agarwal teaches people selfhypnosis for relaxation and relief from anxiety at the Institute of Mind Control and Development. In Bangalore, dedicated followers of New Age Guru Sri Sri Ravi Shankar distribute literature to spread awareness about his ‘Art of Living Course’ to "enhance the quality of life and improve relationships at home and at office". From his New Jersey home in the US, Shiv Khera coordinates with his Delhi office for his ‘Total Quality People’ seminars held in Indian corporate houses. In busy Bombay, members of Reiki India Research Centre chalk out plans to hold yet another workshop in neighbouring Badlapur to channelise cosmic energies to heal bodies, minds, even relationships. The Bihar School of Yoga in Munger, meanwhile, has no dearth of takers for its 30-minute audio cassette on Yoga Nidra, "a psychic sleep induced through a systematic method of complete physical, mental and emotional relaxation". Even as Bimol Rakshit, in his swank Faridabad office, systematically draws up schedules to hold workshops on the Silva method of mind control in five star hotels and clubhouses in the various metros...

The list could continue. As does the steady flow of clientele in each of these mind clinics. Seeking respite from depressions, frustrations, anxieties, conflict in relationships, emotional traumas, career failures, and even boredom. Intimidated by the science of psychiatry and alienated from religion which was the traditional salve for the soul, the stressed urban Indian faces dilemmas that he hopes the alternative therapists will help resolve. Having voluntarily isolated himself from the succour of a supportive joint family, he is willing to pay for that one shoulder which he could cry on. Someone who could teach him how to cope with increasingly cut-throat competition at work and the changing face of his family at home. So, he searches for that one therapy or technique that might make the mind happy, the heart lighter. And life more livable. "I was so unhappy and restless. I had become an insomniac. Till I discovered reiki," says 36-year-old Bangalore banker Madhav Rao. "I had been too embarrassed to visit a shrink. I could have offered no rational reason to a psychiatrist for my unhappiness." So, Madhav Rao tried out the alternative mind healing process. Where no questions were asked. Today, he still has a successful career, a house in posh Indiranagar, a loving wife and two adorable kids. "Also, a good night’s sleep and peace of mind."

Something that 40-year-old housewife Nandita Suri comes looking for in the capital’s Aurobindo Centre every other day. She doesn’t mind the long drive from her farmhouse near the Hindon canal in Hary-ana, nor the hours that she has to wait for her turn for a healing session at the crowded Pranic Healing centre. "I think I was suffering from some kind of a mid-life crisis. My depressions were giving me severe migraine. But three sessions, and the headaches are gone and I feel rejuvenated," she says. The remarkable results, she observes, have impressed her automobile dealer husband and her son who’s studying at Doon School so much that now even they want to give pranic healing a try. What Madhav Rao and Nandita Suri claim to have benefited from are systems that involve working on an invisible energy field or bioplasmic force that surrounds the human body. Identified by the healers as ‘aura’, this energy body has seven chakras and nadis which correspond to the vital organs and blood vessels respectively. Disease, the reiki and pranic healers believe, first manifests itself in the aura. So these healers work on the aura and remove diseased energy and replace it with fresh, vital energy. Physical ailments, according to both systems, have accompanying mental or emotional symptoms and vice versa. Both treat the disease as a whole for total cure.

The difference between the two is that while the reiki healer uses personal energy to cure, the pranic healer also uses cosmic energy from air, sun and ground. Physically, the reiki healer touches the person to transmit energy, the pranic healer doesn’t. Significantly, both systems claim to be more than just curative. While pranic healing claims to enhance physical, mental and emotional attributes like character, attitude and strengths of an individual, reiki masters say it makes a person "whole and complete" and helps "gain control of life".

Claims that obviously many have found enough reason to believe. Pranic healing, says managing trustee of the Delhi Pranic Healing Foundation Krishnan Veerapan, already has 1,500 active healers in India. And the past five years have seen an estimated two lakh people attend reiki workshops in various parts of the country. Some of them, like Deepti Sachdev, teacher at Delhi’s New Era Public School, have even set up their own little reiki clinics. And at Rs 65 per session, Deepti Sachdev’s centre attracts more takers than she can handle. "There are just too many people who want relief. I don’t get time. So, of late I have started refusing treatment to many," she says.

But there are others waiting to take on those who Deepti Sachdev turns away. With promises to smoothen those worry lines.

And more. Check out the advertisements that Rakshit inserts in mainstream dailies to advertise his Silva workshops. They promise to "make every aspect of your life happier, more effective and successful". An NRI architect who returned to India in 1991 to "spread the Silva method", Rakshit uses a progressive relaxation technique to lead people into the alpha state—a brain wave pattern identifiable by the EEG (electroencephalograph) machine. He then whispers a whole lot of positive messages. "I tell them to think they are getting better every day. To fantasise about anything that brings pleasure—from a vacation in Phuket to a pay raise. Whatever your fantasy, the more relaxed you are, the more potent your fantasy," says Rakshit with a flourish.

A system of positive thinking that, Rakshit says pointing to a portrait of Sanjay Dutt in his office, worked well for the cine star during his stint in jail. As it has for Balakrishna Doshi, founder of the Ahmedabad School of Planning and Architecture, who feels Silva has added a "creative dimension" to his work. For Bombay-based teacher Marina Dutta, who runs a nursery school in Colaba, Silva has brought on a "state of mind where I feel confident enough to take on all life’s problems with dignity".

But Prof K.D. Broota, head of Delhi University’s Psychology department, remains unimpressed by these results. "Most of these ‘experts’ who offer mental salvation and health on a platter are nothing but quacks who hypnotise people and take them onto a heightened state of suggestibility. The patients start believing what is said to them. It brings about temporary relief and no cure," Broota says. The academic argues that these ‘methods’ could, in fact, harm people with serious mental ailments. "Each person has a different psychological makeup. And what these mind clinics offer is a blanket treatment. It could cripple people emotionally for life," says Broota, "because most of these clinics don’t bother to check out the dynamics, the root cause underlying the problem. "

But, believe it or not, in the mind market there are therapists who venture very far to discover root causes. Into past lives. Yes, Aparna Jha’s ‘Sahasrar Journey’ comprises individual and group courses in past life therapy. The 33-year-old Delhi housewife remains ‘quite’ busy in her posh Greater Kailash house that is her clinic. Her clients are willing to pay her Rs 8,000 to take a guided tour into their previous births to "identify, live through and resolve the past life traumas that are troubling them through this birth".

A recipient of this exotic therapy, Jasjit Brar, in her late 40s, claims to have gotten over her "daily morning nervousness that left her throat parched" ever since she discovered during one such session that she had been choked to death in one of her previous births. "Reliving my past trauma has reduced it in this birth. Also, it has made me understand so much about myself. Helped me cope with myself," she says, quite obviously in awe of the therapy. "I have seen the essence of myself, my mind, over so many centuries."

For those who don’t want to dig so far down into the mind’s recesses, however, there are mind therapies skin deep. Quite literally. Indulge yourself with special massages to wring out those depressions.

Realising the potential market, last year renowned beautician Blossom Kochhar felt time was ripe to launch her ‘Blossom Magic, Aroma Therapy Range of Oils’. Available at exclusive outlets throughout India, these fragrant oils extracted from flowers, roots and barks, claims Kochhar, liberate the mind. "The jasmine flower is used so often in Indian marriages because it induces confi-dence in the bride. So, a good jasmine oil massage should do the same," she reckons. For those interested in sniffing out the truth, it’s Rs 150 for every 15 ml of therapeutic oil and upward of Rs 300 for massages for a merry mind. "It’s worth it," emphasises Kochhar, "because 98 per cent of what you smell registers a reaction in the subconscious. And a good smell can bring about a good feeling."

Just talking out bad feelings could also bring about good feelings. Which, simplistically put, is the premise Forum seems to work on. For the English-speaking urbanite in Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore and Ahmedabad with Rs 2,500 to Rs 4,000 to spare, the Forum organis-es three-day-long seminars where life’s experiences are ‘shared’.

About 150 to 300 people spend over 12 hours daily discussing their personal failures, anxieties, traumas and depressions with trained Forum instructors monitoring the proceedings. And the ‘Five Top Benefits’ are lucidly chalked out on a blackboard for all to see: effectiveness in relating to others, confidence, personal productivity, making the right choices, living life fully.

The follow-up sessions over the next 10 weeks have the same people meeting up to assess their progress and learn to apply what they have picked up in practical life. One such evening session at an auditorium on Delhi’s Siri Fort Road recently saw a middle-aged woman make a moving speech thanking the Forum because she had finally managed to tell her father how much she loved him and admit the mistakes she made in her marriage to her estranged husband. A young couple, however, was bitter. "Thanks to baring our minds here, now we have so much armour to attack each other with," the harrowed husband said.

Neuropsychiatrist Dr Avdesh Sharma isn’t surprised at such contrary reactions to the same mind programme, and says it only proves their lack of bonafides. "At best these clinics offer you human contact. At worst they are not qualified enough to admit that mere human contact cannot cure many mental ailments. Most of these alternative mind therapists don’t know when to admit they can’t and shouldn’t help," he says. Illustrating with an example, the doctor explains that a woman suffering from low self-esteem because she has given up career for marriage could "feel better" with a relaxing massage or some reiki, but group therapy with people discussing their career problems could be detrimental. "So the idea should be to choose a simple therapy which relaxes without professing to cure," the doctor advises.

But then, there are an increasing number of people who are discovering the edge that the new generation therapies have over conventional psychiatry. The Indian mind’s resistance to clinical couches, probing questions and drug-doused treatments makes visiting the shrink an unpalatable option for most. Also, modern psychiatry’s tendency to pigeonhole one as a psychological type and find alarming names for mental problems is unappealing. Contrarily, the mind therapist’s friendly and feel-good publicity allures. While psychiatrists rarely discuss their treatment methodology with patients, the mind therapist is keen to convince a client of the effectiveness and merits of his techniques. And unlike the shrink who seems to be in control, alternative therapies promise to help you pilot your own life.

"You don’t have to keep visiting me like you might have to with a shrink. Learn what I have to teach you and practice it yourself every day to relax," Agarwal of the Institute of Mind Control and Development tells those who come to him to learn self-hypnosis. Agarwal emphasises that most alternative therapies are about methods that teach you to regain that lost contact with your inner-self. "The trick is in being with yourself—really, truly—for at least 10 to 15 minutes a day. In today’s rushed world that is what our mind misses. And that is what hypnosis allows you to do!" he exclaims. Marketing 30-odd self-hypnosis cassettes and holding workshops in places as far apart as Madurai, Calcutta and Delhi, Agarwal’s mind business is big enough for him to advertise in glossies like Stardust.

And, prospering themselves, many in the mind bazaar have even taken to making business houses thrive. Their slickly-packaged and brochured agenda being to "unclutter the executive mind of the undesirable stress elements it picks up in the rat race".

Leading the bandwagon, it seems, is US-based Shiv Khera who brands himself a human resources developer and drops into India regularly to hold three to five-day-long Total Quality People seminars. At companies as varied as Godrej soaps, Orissa Cement, Onida and LML Vespa among others. He lectures managers on the imperatives of "balancing their personal and professional lives" to make them more productive and business more profitable. "After all, it is still the ‘human chip’ that controls the computers. So, the aim is to make executives realise that a better human being is a better professional," Khera avers.

ANOTHER organisation that works in tandem with the corporate world is the Indian Society for Applied Behavioural Science (ISABS). The low-key ISABS holds what they call the Basic and Advanced Human Process Labs once a year for executives. Drawing on techniques from encounter groups, transactional analysis and Gestalt therapy, the labs leave small groups of people to their own devices for long sessions, encountering themselves and others, with the facilitator intervening as little as possible. The objective, says ISABS boss Kripal Singh, is to improve interpersonal relations, to be able to recognise one’s feelings and needs more clearly as well as to live more effectively and meaningfully.

Having set up The Learning Curve in Delhi just over a year ago, 31-year-old Harvard alumnus Gundeep Singh organises stress reduction workshops in corporate houses. With specialisation in psychometrics (the technique to control one’s mind) as his USP, Singh works on the premise that a stressed mind is low in its ability to take decisions, control its environment and be productive. Says Singh: "Ours is an interactive programme where we start by taking a stress inventory of people and talk our way through group discussions. We also encourage executives to scribble graffiti on walls to let the heat off." Impressed with the effectiveness of the last strategy, Singh plans to introduce a range of stress toys in the Indian markets soon. "Not psychometric tools but fun toys to squeeze and hit and curse every time one feels tense," he chuckles.

But why is the peeved urban Indian mind feeling the need to punch and pinch a toy to feel better? How do you explain the desire to discuss personal problems threadbare with a crowd of strange people? Why the need to delve deep into past births to find meaning in this life? "Probably because, with the struggle to acquire material wealth over, the urban Indian middle class is looking for a grander quest. The bare minimum required to be happy has been attained in the last decade, now it’s time to exercise one’s Right to Happiness. Ergo, the demand to learn techniques to be happy," reasons Parveen Chopra, editor of Life Positive, India’s first body-mind-spirit magazine. If the 15,000 circulation that the journal has achieved in its first six months of publication is any indication, then the time to indulge the mind has truly arrived in India. Even three years ago, not many would have spared Rs 25 to read articles on personal growth and mind healing methods, Chopra vouches.

But then, times have changed, as have the demands on the human mind. "Even getting a geyser fixed is cause for tension these days. Competition begins from age seven. There is wealth but no time to spend it. And the mind is tired," says Triveni Rana of Bharat Nirman, an NGO promoting ancient Indian sciences. "The only way out is inside you," she emphasises. "And mind clinics are basically trying to teach one to do just that—look inside."

In the wrong hands, however, looking inside could spoil many a self-image. In fact, the safety of these techniques would be ensured if the alternative therapists coordinated with clinical psychologists, feels Dr Mohan K. Isaac, Additional Professor in the Psychiatry department at the National Institute of Mental Health and Neuro Sciences (NIMHANS) in Bangalore. "The fact that the patients/clients choose these techniques quite by themselves could be dangerous," he cautions.

However, Isaac qualifies his warning by pointing out that for all those who turn up at NIMHANS to resort to conventional remedies after having tried out alternative therapies in vain, there must be others who find succour in them and do not feel the need to visit the institute. The doctor clarifies his position: "If a patient goes for a therapy with immense faith in it, that itself works on the problem by toning up the immune system to heal the problem. If someone claims to be healed of a problem for which no scientific remedies exist, I would not deny the possibility that his faith in the alternative systems has achieved this."

That’s science giving faith a back-handed compliment. For, faith might be the only pill that cures clients in these times of stress, solitude and scepticism. Faith in the validity of personal well being and growth. Faith that the Feel Good Age has arrived. And yes, faith, that the mind clinics will work on. To make more money. But, most importantly, to make the mind merry.