Visitor:  We ended with "Know thyself." And, the Western mind has an aversion, it seems, to "Know thyself."

SWAMIJI:  It is because the Western mind does not know what the Self is. "Call a dog a bad name and then condemn it," is an old saying. If you want to criticise a person, find fault with that person first; then, criticise. A person who does not know what the Self is has no right to speak about it, so the Western mind cannot speak unless it defines what the Self is. They have a wrong notion about the Self Itself. What is the Self, according to Western thought? It is the purely physically bound psychological self. This is what they think; but this is a wrong definition. The Self is not sitting inside the body.

Visitor:  The Self to the Western mind is also, oftentimes, just the cognition, the thinking process.

SWAMIJI:  That shows the poverty of thinking. It is very unfortunate. This is not correct. The Self is not sitting inside the body. It is not in the cortex; It is not inside the brain. It is a consciousness, a principle of awareness. Now, why are you bringing this question to me? What relevance has it to your teaching of psychology?

Visitor:  I am a teacher.

SWAMIJI:  You need not bring the subject of Self to the students, because, perhaps, it is not a part of your curriculum.

Visitor:  Oh yes, it is!

SWAMIJI:  Why do you talk about the Self? Psychology does not require a Self. It is a study of mind and reason and emotion. It is a study of the psychic functions, and why do you worry about the Self? Let It be there, or let It not be there. What does It matter to us?

Visitor:  Let It evolve, as It is?

SWAMIJI:  Let the Self not be there at all. What does it matter? Why should there be a Self? Your mind and reason, emotions and psychic operations are there, and you are concerned with these. That is the human being, actually. What you call a human being is a conglomeration of psychological functions. And more than that, what do you find in a human being? What is there in a human being other than this body, and the psychological functions? So, here Western thought ends, and it does not want to say anything more than that, because anything more than that is not visible; it is not perceptible, it is not thinkable, and it is not necessary also for one's life.

What is of utility to life? There is a system of thinking called pragmatism, and utilitarianism. That which works well in life is real, and any other thing is irrelevant, and you can live a happy life without there being a Self. What is the good of thinking of the Self? There must be a point in it. How does the Self come into the picture at all, when you study psychology? There is no Self in psychology. There is only a mental operation. So, I am asking why you raised this question of Self, when It is not a part of your curriculum of studies?

Visitor:  For the Western mind?

SWAMIJI:  Yes.

Visitor:  I am saying that It should be. It should be brought in.

SWAMIJI:  Why should you? Suppose you do not bring It. In what way are you at a loss?

Visitor:  What do you lose?

SWAMIJI:  Yes. What do you lose? You can get along well even without It.

Visitor:  Oh, you can get on well, supposedly.

SWAMIJI:  Yes, yes. So, what is the problem? If you touch It, you will be in hot waters immediately.

Visitor:  Yes. But for me as a teacher, doesn't It need to be touched?

SWAMIJI:  You see, as a personal aspirant, an inquisitive seeker, or a lover of the Ultimate Reality, you may take It into consideration and try to find out what It is; but as a teacher of psychology, It is not necessary. If you are inquisitive, curious, and aspire for higher realities than what are available in this world; if you are not satisfied with anything visible in the world; if you feel that there is something more than this world, that all things are finite and perishable, and therefore, something must be there which is not subject to the process of time; if you seek an endless reality; if that aspiration is there for you, then the question of the Self comes in. But, are you pursuing that line, or are you satisfied as a psychology teacher?

Visitor:  No. I am not a psychology teacher, but I think in teaching in general that people should come to a level of awareness, and dismantle the aversion to knowing thyself.

SWAMIJI:  You must have some training in this Ashram. You have to undergo a course of studies here. This is not a subject for market-place discussion.

Visitor:  No, I understand that.

SWAMIJI:  This is a serious matter. It cannot be easily understood, but once you know what It is, you will never want anything else in the world.

Visitor:  True.

SWAMIJI:  You will be simply thrilled to know what It is.

Visitor:  True. So to have a sense of the Self, my question is, as a teacher, how to develop it in children, and in others - in other teachers who teach teachers.

SWAMIJI:  That is psychology. Again, you are coming to psychology. You can be a very good student and teacher of psychology without bringing in the Self. Actually, psychologists never talk of the Self. It does not exist, actually. It is a kind of illusion for psychologists. Like David Hume - have you heard of a philosopher called David Hume? And also Freud?

Visitor:  Yes, I have.

SWAMIJI:  They say that there is no such thing as the Self - It does not exist.

Visitor:  Well, I would not agree with them.

SWAMIJI:  And, if you agree with them, what do you lose? If you lose something, then that is a different matter. Many stalwart thinkers of the West hold this view (except a few, of course), that Self is a dubious, conceptual, and hallucinatory existence. Freud and such other people will say that it is an illusion: religion is an illusion, and so God, Self, everybody are bundled up with this illusion, and we can be happy without them. You can be happy without God, also. Why do you want a God? You ask Freud. He will tell you everything about these matters. Do you know Freud's psychology? What does he say about the Self? It does not exist!

Visitor:  Yes. He is vacant.

SWAMIJI:  You ask Freud whether he is existing. Ask him! I can ask Freud himself, "Are you existing or not? Or, somebody else is existing?"

Luciano:  Swamiji, you said that life can be happy in the psychological sense, but experience shows that lives are not all happy.

SWAMIJI:  Everybody is happy; who is not happy? Let me see. Who is not happy among these people seated here? They are all well; they have got breakfast and lunch and good sleep. They have got money. What is wrong with you? Tell me. Let anybody say something is wrong. You have a good job, good salary, good health, and you have got medical attendance; you can travel anywhere. You can have whatever you want. What is wrong with life?

Luciano:  Nothing.

SWAMIJI:  What is wrong with life? Everything is fine. This is what the gross Western mind says: All is well. But, all is not well!

American Visitor:  True.

SWAMIJI:  There is something at the back of it. You are dreaming that everything is well, and the Damocles Sword is hanging over your head, which is not anybody's concern; nobody bothers. Do you know of the Damocles Sword?

Visitor:  Yes.

SWAMIJI:  There is a Damocles Sword called death which can wipe out all values of life in one minute. All your glory, all your study, all your pomp and possession can be negatived in one second by somebody who is called Death. Where is Death sitting? I ask you a question, as a psychologist: Why should anybody die? What is the harm if nobody dies? Let all people be alive.

Visitor:  There is a cycle.

SWAMIJI:  Do you want people to die?

Visitor:  They need to die. It's part of the natural cycle.

SWAMIJI:  Now, do you believe in the existence of Nature?

Visitor:  Oh, yes.

SWAMIJI:  Are you subservient to Nature, or are you independent? You have no free choice? Are you a servant of Nature that you have to obey orders of Nature, and it will kill you, and you can be reborn, also? Are you a slave of Nature's laws, or have you some independence? Tell me. Who would like to be a slave of a law of somebody? Even in political circles, people seek independence. They do not like to be servants of the government. They want independence. Everybody strives for independence. How can you say that Nature is so very hard upon you that it would want to kill you one day? What kind of Nature have you? And, who created that monstrous Nature? Who is that dangerous person who created such a Nature which swallows up everybody? You have to answer these questions, and you cannot simply bypass them. These are the seeds of the beginning of philosophical thinking - questioning and questioning and questioning until you get the answer to every question.

Visitor:  Yes.

SWAMIJI:  I cannot talk to you much. I told you that you have to stay here for a long time and undergo a course, as it were; meanwhile, you can only make some studies, and they will solve fifty percent of your problem. I can give you some literature to study.

Visitor:  Good. I'll do that.

SWAMIJI:  These questions that you are raising and I am talking about are questions of life as a whole. It is not your problem or my problem, it is entire creation's problem. You cannot thrash it out in a minute, you should have time and patience enough, and desire enough to know it.

Visitor:  Yes, I understand that.

SWAMIJI:  Otherwise, if everything is well, be happy.

Visitor:  I cannot stay, but I will leave my heart here with you. Thank you.