Don E. Gibbons, Ph.D., NJ Licensed Psychologist #03513
This Blog is published for information and educational purposes only. No warranty, expressed or implied, is furnished with respect to the material contained in this Blog. The reader is urged to consult with his/her physician or a duly licensed mental health professional with respect to the treatment of any medical or psychological condition.

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Tuesday, February 25, 2020

Multimodal Meditation as Your "Higher Power"

Lucille was an active member of Alcoholics Anonymous. She had just celebrated a major  anniversary of being alcohol free when she came to see me for her regular appointment, angry because her husband, a retired police officer who "never took his badge off," had insisted that she personally deliver a set of legal papers to him in another State rather than entrusting them to be delivered by mail. As she usually did, she responded very well to multiversal hypnotic meditation, and left with an expression of blissful happiness.

When I mentioned at her next appointment how much her suggested trip to the Multiverse had changed her mood, she replied, "I thought that it was God."

"I can provide that kind of an experience too," I told her, "but I don't like to push that on anyone unless they ask for it. She nodded in agreement. Since she had grown up as a Roman Catholic, I told her about the teachings of Meister Eckhard a thousand years ago, who preached that a person was like an empty bowl waiting to be filled with the glory of God. He was charged with heresy, but he died before his trial could be completed. Recent Popes, however,  have praised his work; and today, there is even a Facebook page dedicated to the study of his teachings.

I asked her if she would like to feel like she was dissolving into the infinite love of God instead of dissolving into the Multiverse itself, and she replied that she would.  In her next session of Multiversal Meditation, I incorporàted the following suggestion, using the Best Me Technique:

Belief systems. Now, as I continue to speak, you can gradually become aware of yourself standing in front of a pair of large wooden doors, which are the doors of a great cathedral. If you accept each detail of the scene as I describe it, without trying to think critically, your imagination can be free to allow you to experience the situation just as if you were really there.So just let yourself stand there a moment, gazing at the carved wooded doors, as you prepare to enter. [Brief pause.]

Now, as the doors swing open, you first traverse a small area paved with stone, stopping at the font if you desire, and pause before a second pair of doors which leads inside.

Emotions. You can feel a surge of happiness and anticipation as you pass through a second pair of doors and into the dimly lit interior. As your eyes gradually become accustomed to the dimmer light from the stained glass windows, take a moment to look around in wonder at the magnificence of all you see.

Sensations and perceptions. Let yourself breathe slowly and deeply, as you inhale the faint aroma of incense, and listen to the gentle tones of music floating upon the quiet air.

Some distance away from you stands the High Altar, bordered by banks of gently glowing candles. You select a pew and, after pausing to genuflect if you wish, you enter the pew and take your seat or kneel once more.

Thoughts and images. Let your mind flow with the experience, and allow it to fill you to the very core of your being, until you feel as if you are able to hold within your own consciousness an awareness of the entire Universe, and all its beauty. As it does, you can feel yourself gradually becoming aware of the presence of God Himself 

As this Consciousness begins to merge with yours, you can feel the power of His infinite healing energy filling and flooding every muscle, and every fiber, and every nerve of your entire body. And it's as if all of the worry, and all of the tension, and all of the care that you have ever felt are being driven out and replaced by the power of His infinite, unbounded, healing love.

As your own consciousness merges ever more completely with this Infinite Awareness, you feel as if you are able to hold within your own mind an awareness of the entire Universe, and all its beauty ‑‑ infinite, beyond infinity, and eternal beyond all measure of eternity. And in this sense of total oneness, you are able to freely communicate all your deepest thoughts and needs.

Motives. The experience, as it continues, is providing you with all that you had hoped to obtain from it. The serenity and the peace which you find here will remain with you, as a source of deep inner strength which will enable you to cope much more effectively with all of life's problems.

Expectations. You will treasure the memory of this experience as it meets your needs in the future; and each time you return, you will be able to derive new benefits which will meet your needs even more effectively.

We continued to use this format for her weekly visits and she reports that her faith has been greatly strengthened as a result. She is also much more tolerant of the demands of her husband.

if Lucille really believed that she was being absorbed into the mind of God, why didn't this type of sanctification experience turn her into a saint? Regardless of the content of whatever is suggested to you, how you process that content depends upon the backstory that you bring to it. Not every Roman Catholic who believes that they are literally ingesting the body and blood of Christ as they partake of Holy Communion is totally sanctified by the experience. What you do with a suggested experience depends upon both your hereditary potential and what that experience means to you when it is integrated into the total narrative of your life story.