Many of us face difficulties in controlling our mental and physical urges. For some it may be sexual libido, for others, it may be attraction to different types of substances, for others, it may be junk food, or spending too much time on social networks or watching useless content. We may also have difficulties in keeping the mind focussed when we are chanting, and doing other things we understand are positive but that requires some self-control we unfortunately seem to lack.
All of these problems have the same origin: the mind desires different things and we struggle to control these urges.
Srila Prabhupada explains that any physical or mental urge goes away if we tolerate it long enough. According to him, even hunger can be controlled by this process, what to say about other things. It may sound simplistic at first, but this approach is something that has beem used quite effectively in modern psychology to treat addictions
The point about different urges is that it’s not something we experience constantly, but rather a series of waves that come and go. We can observe that when we try to not eat for example. At some point, we feel extraordinarily hungry, but after half an hour or so the hunger subsides and we feel kind of fine until the next wave comes. If we persist in not eating these hunger waves become less and less frequent. People who fast for many days usually report that they feel very hungry in the first few days, but after that, they don’t feel very hungry at all. It seems that this same process applies to most urges.
A psychologist called Alan Marlatt developed a whole theory on this that is used quite effectively in treating addictions. Considering the similarities with the process recommended by Srila Prabhupada and other acaryas, and the fact that all our material desires are basically different forms of addiction, that’s something that can be interesting for us.
Often we think that the best way to control mental urges is to just try to suppress the voices inside the mind or try to distract ourselves with something else. However, in his studies, Marlatt found this process doesn’t work very well. Smokers who would be told to use this process would almost always relapse. Instead, the process he found is effective is to distance ourselves from the urge, observing it as a neutral party, embracing the experience, without acting on it. He called this process Urge Surfing.
The analogy is that an urge is just like a wave in the ocean. Waves can be quite powerful, but they pass quickly. Similarly, an urge can be intense but it subsides after some time. Just like we can surf a wave, it’s also possible to surf an urge, experiencing it without engaging in it. If we just try to distract ourselves, however, the urge tends to become more powerful and harder to ignore, just like if we try to distract ourselves from an enemy that is attacking us. When we act consciously on our urges, we can learn to recognize and observe these urges without letting them control us.
His process is based on acknowledging we are having an urge (instead of trying to negate it or distract ourselves) and then paying attention to the feelings without trying to change or suppress them, making a conscious choice of observing without acting on them. During this process, one is recommended to remind himself that such urges are just feelings and not musts. They are just a result of one’s addictions and previous habits, and that whomever uncomfortable it can be, they come and go, just like waves. If we choose to not act on an urge, it will pass on its own.
In one of his studies, Marlatt got together a group of smokers who were trying to quit. They were told to abstain from smoking for 24 hours before the study, so when they came to the laboratory desperate for a cigarette. After sitting them on a table, he told them to take away all distractions (like cellphones) and provided each one with a lighter and pack of cigarettes. He told them to open the packs, but as they finished taking out the cellophane he told them to stop and wait for a few minutes. Then take out a cigarette, and stop again for a few minutes. Look at the cigarette, wait for a few minutes, smell the cigarette, stop again for a few minutes, and so on. This process went on for more than an hour and during this period the participants were not allowed to do anything apart from looking at their cigarettes and writing down on a piece of paper the emotions they were experiencing during the process, and using breath as a source of stability. In this way, the study went on without anyone being allowed to smoke, and by the end, most of the participants related that at that point the urge to smoke had passed.
This intervention was designed to teach them what to do when the urge to smoke would come back, observing the sensations and emotions that would come without giving way to it, waiting until it just would go away. They were told to imagine these cravings as a wave that they were on, that was going to pass if they just kept breathing and observing their thoughts.
After learning this technique most of the participants were able to dramatically reduce their smoking, something that didn’t happen with another group that took part in the study, where the participants were told to just try to distract themselves. Similar experiences were made with people addicted to food and to drugs, with similar results.
Apart from addiction, the same technique can be used to control different types of impulses and emotions, including anxiety. If we just breathe and observe it, it tends to just go away after some time. We all are told to breathe and count until ten to cool off when we are angry, and that’s one rudimentary example of the application of this principle.
The techniques developed by Marlatt appear to be quite similar to the process used by Vaishnavas as well as other transcendentalists over millennia to control their senses, a process based on understanding that we are different from our minds and thus just observing the workings of the mind without being disturbed, just like one would observe the activities of a child without identifying with the mood swings experienced by it.
Another area where both processes show similarities is relapse management or, in other words, what to do when one has a slip and falls back into the addiction. Marlatt’s techniques are based on stressing that relapses should be considered as unfortunate but isolated incidents, rather than an indication that a person is incapable of recovering. His studies showed that when people were instructed to see the problem in this light they were able to continue using the techniques they were taught to continue fighting the addiction instead of giving up. The relapses would not affect their self-esteem and their ability to keep fighting their addiction.
This is also something that has similarities with the spiritual process we are trying to follow. Falldowns in the practice of spiritual principles are not permanent handicaps but rather slips from which one can recover just by sincerely reembracing the spiritual process. Prabhupada mentions that the atonement for someone who breaks the principles or does something immoral is to just go back to a proper situation and continue to practice the spiritual process with renewed effort. Devotees who are shamed and convinced that they are incapable, on the other hand, tend to just give up the process and thus fall permanently.
Apart from the similarities, the process of devotional service also adds an extra dimension to it, by providing us with a higher taste. Not only do we learn to better control our minds, but we can practically see the advantages it gives us in our spiritual practice. As our spiritual practice improves, we experience spiritual bliss, and as a consequence we feel progressively less inclined to give way to the desires of the mind, understanding that they can sabotage the very foundation of our happiness.