Takehisa Kora - How to Live Well_ Secrets of Using Neurosis-State University of New York Press (1995)

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110W TO
Rive WellSecrets of Using Neurosis

Takehisa Kora
RC Foreword by David K. Reynolds
489 , Translated by Gregory Peterson
is13 3 and David K. Reynolds
1995
©
The Library
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CLAREMONT
SCHOOL OF THEOLOGY

1325 North College Avenue


_ Claremont, CA 91711-3199
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Secrets of Using Neurosis

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Takehisa Kora

Foreword by
David K. Reynolds

Translated by
Gregory Peterson
and
David K. Reynolds

STATE UNIVERSITY OF NEW YORK PRESS


LIBRARY
CLAREMONT SCHOOL OF THEOLOGY
1325 N. COLLEGE AVE.
CLAREMONT, CA 91711-3199

This book was originally published as Do Ikiru KaP, Hakuyosha


Publishers, Tokyo, 1979.

Production by Ruth Fisher


Marketing by Bernadette LaManna

Published by
State University of New York Press, Albany

© 1995 State University of New York

All rights reserved

Printed in the United States of America

No part of this book may be used or reproduced


in any manner whatsoever without written permission
except in the case of brief quotations embodied in
critical articles and reviews.

For information, address the State University of New York Press,


State University Plaza, Albany, NY 12246

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Kora, Takehisa, 1899-


[D6 ikiru ka. English]
How to live well : secrets of using neurosis / Takehisa Kora :
foreword by David K. Reynolds ; translated by Gregory Peterson and
David K. Reynolds.
p. cm.
Includes index.
ISBN 0-7914-2401-4 (cloth). — ISBN 0-7914-2402-2 (pbk.)
1. Morita psychotherapy. 2. Conduct of life. 3. Neuroses.
I. Peterson, Gregory. II. Reynolds, David K. III. Title.
RC489.M65K6613 1995
616.89’14—dc20 94-18942
CIP
10987654321
Coutents

Foreword by David K. Reynolds, Ph.D.


Preface

PART I Views of Life


1. Knowing Yourself
2. Reality Is the Only Truth
3. Phrases for Spiritual Training
4. Views of Life

PART II Unpleasant but Necessary


5. Pitfalls of Neurosis
6. Seven Conditions for a Mentally Healthy Life
7. Self-Awareness of Being Imperfect
8. Adapting the Mind and Body
9. Unpleasant but Necessary

PART III The Essence of Morita Therapy


10. Neurotic Personality Training 79
11. Release from Neurosis
12. The Causes of Neurotic Symptoms 105
13. The Essence of Morita Therapy 119

Index 129
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Foreword

This book was written by the senior Morita therapist in


Japan. Dr. Takehisa Kora was Morita Masatake’s student
and successor to the Professorship of Psychiatry and
Neurology at Jikei University School of Medicine in Tokyo.
Emeritus Professor Kora is now in his mid-nineties and still
active in the affairs of Morita therapy. His small hospital,
Kora Koseiin, is well-known for its long history of inpatient
Moritist practice.
I suggest that Kora’s book be read as a source of
experienced, grandfatherly advice notwithstanding its
scholarly merits. It offers a flavor of the sometimes
dogmatic, yet experienced-based, realistic attitude of senior
Japanese medical men in this field.
Much of the material comes from Kora’s Thursday
lectures for patients and staff at Koseiin. I used to sit with
them twenty-five years ago, understanding little because of
my inability in Japanese in those days, soaking up the
atmosphere of serious truths about the human condition
mixed with occasional humor for release and perspective.
Human wisdom doesn’t change over the years despite
advances in intellectual knowledge.
When Kora uses the word “neurosis” in this volume he
is writing of what the Japanese call “shinkeishitsu” neurosis.
Pure shinkeishitsu neurotics are not seen so often these
days in Japan. Most patients bring a mixture of shink-
eishitsu tendencies and depression or some other com-
bination of symptoms. To some degree, however, we all
Vil
vill / FOREWORD

share some of the shinkeishitsu traits described in this book.


So Kora’s writing is worth reading for its personal value as
well as for its academic medical content.
Shinkeishitsu neurotic traits include tendencies toward
introversion, over-cautiousness, self criticism, self analysis,
perfectionism, idealism, high intelligence, sensitivity,
asociality but not antisociality, worrying, persistence, and a
desire for self improvement. Moritist theory holds that
shinkeishitsu people have normal psychological processes
that have been carried to extremes or misused because of
mistaken ideas about the human condition. Shinkeishitsu
people mistakenly believe that anxiety and fear shouldn’t
exist, that they can be controlled somehow by the will.
Shinkeishitsu people mistakenly believe that they must
always act from a base of self-confidence and inner calm.
Such misconceptions about the reality of human life are
corrected through the re-education provided by Morita’s
therapy. The patient is taught not only by means of lectures
of the sort provided in this book but also by experiential
assignments and feedback from everyday life.
In the West we have borrowed and extended the ideas
from Morita Therapy and another Japanese therapy called
Naikan to form what is called Constructive Living
(Reynolds, 1976-1993). Kora’s book provides Constructive
Living (CL) instructors and others interested in CL practice
with a historical reference point for considering our
intellectual roots. Constructive Living instructors and
students will find much that is familiar uniquely presented
here in the style of a respected Japanese scholar-clinician.
The cultural approach championed in the West has
usually emphasized the control of Nature. We have
succeeded using science and technology to subdue some of
Nature, use it to solve some of our current problems, and to
meet some of our immediate needs. Such an approach
doesn’t work so well with problems of the mind. The East,
with its emphasis on the acceptance and integration with
Nature, does have something worth considering in matters
of the mind. To consider that thoughts and feelings are
natural phenomena, that they need not be resisted or
FOREWORD / ix

conquered, and that they can be accepted like sunshine


and thunderstorms may come as a novel perspective to
many Westerners.
The fact of the matter is that the mind keeps changing;
it is not fixed. So it is difficult to apply static diagnostic
categories to it. It is difficult to treat elements of the mind
and symptoms as though they were things that could be
repaired. More than difficult, it may be meaningless. Please
consider these dynamic Moritist ideas as the wind blows
outside your room and the water flows into your sink and
the fire in your gas pilot light flickers.
Dr. Masatake (or Shoma) Morita (1874-1938) was a
psychiatrist and, I would argue, a philosopher of the early
twentieth century. His contribution to psychiatric medicine
is well-recognized in Japan. With the popularity of
psychodynamic and behavioral therapies in Japan, however,
the current practice of Morita Therapy in that country is
limited but growing again, now that interest has picked up in
the West and in China. The future of this realistic approach
to living called Morita Therapy is bright.

David K. Reynolds, Ph.D.


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Preface

There are many types of people in this world: heroes


and cowards, saints and sinners, the wise and the foolish,
geniuses and imbeciles, model citizens and misfits, the great
and the small. I cannot help thinking of one very important
type: ordinary people. In any case, ordinary people are the
majority in this world. They are the standard, so we can
say that they are ordinary. The structure of human society
is made by these ordinary people; they are perhaps the ones
whose power maintains its stability.
If there were too many heroes, we would have a world
continually at war. A world of saints, however difficult to
imagine, would be boring and humorless. It is said that
Carlyle’s wife grieved over having a genius for a husband.
Many geniuses are eccentric or strange; some are not fit to
be married.
We ordinary people have an infinite variety of per-
sonalities, but we have one thing in common: we can
become capable, full-fledged members of society as long as
we continue to work constructively, even if we are not born
with superior abilities. In some cases we can be much better
than average, or, on the other hand, we can be much worse
than average.
I myself am a mediocre and ordinary person, so I
understand ordinary people better than heroes or geniuses.
Mediocre people have a variety of desires. Some want
money, position, and fame; some want to have peaceful
families; some want to be useful to society by doing good
xi
xii /PREFACE

work. They want to love nature; have time to enjoy


different interests and hobbies; pursue learning and wisdom;
deepen their understanding of the arts; and, if possible, they
want to demonstrate their abilities in their fields. We can
say that the wish to build good character may be common to
anybody.
Thus, mediocre people are somewhat acquisitive. They
have difficulties because they don’t have the abilities that are
necessary to acquire everything they want. If they needed
only money, or only power, or only learning, then things
could be easier. However, they cannot be so eccentric, so
they have many dilemmas. They tend to get mired in their
sense of duty and compassion, and since their hearts are not
as hard as iron, they go this way and that every time they
meet difficulty. That is the way of ordinary human beings.
Ordinary people get entangled in many dilemmas in life
and sometimes cannot demonstrate even half of their
capability. When things go wrong, they pay too much
attention to their own worries and weaknesses, even when
they are objectively insignificant. Thus, they become
obsessed by something, and the more they want to eliminate
it, the more they become attached to it. Eventually they lose
their freedom.
Neurotics are people who are in such neurotic states.
They have such symptoms as irrational fears of relation-
ships with others or of illness, depending on what obsesses
them. There are other symptoms, such as morbid fears of
being unclean, anxiety neuroses, insomnia, inferiority
complexes, feelings of being heavy-headed, and so on.
Although there are various symptoms, the root cause is the
same.
Dr. Shoma Morita made it clear that such symptoms
result from mental processes. A radical form of psycho-
therapy, Morita Therapy, was devised to treat neurotics by
correcting their misconceptions of human nature, and by
making them practice the right attitude toward daily life
without depending on medication or rest.
Dr. Morita himself experienced neurotic symptoms in
his youth; that is, he was also an ordinary man who tended
PREFACE / xiii

to become obsessed. However, he discovered the funda-


mental nature of neurosis, or shinkeishitsu, and succeeded in
developing a cure based upon his knowledge of psychiatry,
his own experiences, and his observations while living with
his patients. Thus Dr. Morita, though coming from an
average standard, built a character that we consider expert,
and we can see his constant striving, even while he suffered
from illness. He was full of human kindness and continued
his efforts to improve himself. He suffered and sorrowed in
times of misfortune, but he was never overwhelmed. He
had a wonderful sense of humor. He was a common,
ordinary man who became great.
I learned from Dr. Morita and succeeded him. My
main work for more than forty years has been the treatment
and study of neurotics [shinkeishitsusha]. In my youth I
suffered from neurotic symptoms, and so I have a sense of
affinity with neurotic patients. Fortunately, with Morita
Therapy, it has worked positively. I am a natural worrier
with various desires and a hard worker with high aspira-
tions, which is common among neurotic patients. The only
difference is that the patients are suffering from their
symptoms at present, while I am a counselor who is trying
to help them become free.
This book summarizes what I actually say to the
patients as a counselor, so there may be some poor writing;
however, its frankness and vividness without reservation
may be a merit. I will be pleased if this book is helpful, not
only to patients who are suffering from neurotic symptoms,
but also to anyone who has neurotic tendencies.
As I just mentioned, this book is based on notes from
my talks. The original talks were all directed toward the
same neurotics, so there is considerable repetition. I
appreciate the Hakuyosha editorial staff for all of the
trouble they took to make the talks into a book.

Takehisa Kora
Kora Koseiin Hospital, Tokyo
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Views of Life
(

An ancient Greek philosopher said, “Know yourself,” and I


believe this is important in any age for personal growth in
everyday life. I have been serving in mental health work for
many years, and have treated many different people with
neuroses and abnormal personalities who have recovered
and returned to society. From long years of experience with
such people I deeply believe that their personalities and their
attitudes toward life would not have been distorted if they
had truly known and accepted themselves as they actually
were—if they had followed the way of arugamama, accepting
reality as it is.

Self-rbwanreness aud the


Deuelspment of Character
What does it mean to know oneself? What is the proper
way of arugamama? Personal development depends upon
the depth of one’s self-awareness. Everyone has good and
bad qualities, and anyone who looks at himself deeply and
honestly knows that he is not perfect. Although it may be
unpleasant, we cannot deny that we sometimes have
3
4 /HOW TO LIVE WELL

unattractive feelings. Let us take jealousy as an example.


This antisocial feeling, which may lead us to hurt others, is a
manifestation of a desire for superiority and complete
possession. People without jealousy are probably quite rare.
Even a great, talented man like Goethe confessed his
jealousy when Schiller won literary fame. There is jealousy
not only in relationships between men and women, but also
among friends and colleagues. It exists throughout society.
Some people are not deeply aware of their own
jealousy. These people speak ill of others, delight in their
failures and misfortunes and actively criticize them. Of
course, I am not talking about constructive criticism. I am
talking about those who try to raise their own worth by
diminishing the worth of others. They do not realize that
such actions come from their own jealousy. If they were
more fully aware of the jealousy inside themselves, they
would be ashamed to express it openly by speaking ill of
others. They would naturally control their ugly gossip, and
we could then call their personalities well-developed.
Soseki Natsume (author, 1867-1916) wrote in one of
his novels that human beings are frightening because they
can become evil instantly, even if they are usually good.
When times are uneventful, the social side of human
character emerges, but under certain conditions an
antisocial side appears suddenly. For example, a politician,
ordinarily a good man, may try to buy votes in an election
campaign. If one is always aware of the fact that he, too,
has an antisocial side, then he may be alert enough to
protect himself from evil in a crisis.

Corncet Self-Evatuation
People who cannot admit and accept their weaknesses, who
believe they are always right, are insufferable. (Of course,
some people suffer from delusions of grandeur, but we shall
not consider such serious mental illnesses here.) People who
have strong feelings of superiority overvalue themselves.
When they have little ability, they become chronic
KNOWING YOURSELF /5

complainers who blame others when things go wrong. We


can see this tendency among self-righteous people who claim
that morality and justice are on their side.
On the other hand, there are some people, including
many neurotics, who suffer from inferiority complexes.
They are not antisocial, and it is a pity that they cannot
apply their full capabilities. Their feelings of inferiority
focus on various shortcomings of appearance, physique,
health, family environment, wealth, ability, or personality.
Although such matters are of little importance objectively,
such people have lost confidence because of their strong
desires for perfection. Everyone who has a desire for
improvement has some feeling of inferiority that can
stimulate him to work harder, so we can say that such
feelings are even useful. When one becomes boastful, his
progress stops.
Hideyo Noguchi (microbiologist, 1876-1927) was born
into an extremely poor family, and a serious burn crippled
his hand at an early age. His handicap stimulated his
fighting spirit, and he went on to become a great scientist.
Demosthenes in ancient Greece (384-322 BC) was a
stutterer, but it is said that he became an eloquent speaker
by training himself. Thus, feelings of inferiority can lead to
constructive change. Some people, however, become
negative and believe that their inferiority makes them
incapable of doing anything, and so they become unable to
exercise their abilities fully. These people are not really
inferior, but they are enslaved by inferiority complexes
because of their unrealistically negative self-images. I
consider these people a great loss to society.

Tuferiarity Compleres and Neurosis


Neurotics most accurately epitomize people who cannot
accept themselves as they really are. These people feel
sorry for themselves and anxiously monitor themselves and
their abilities. For example, when I test those who complain
of poor memory or concentration, I cannot find them
6 /HOW TO LIVE WELL

objectively inferior in any way. Some complain that they


tend to get tired easily, but experiments prove otherwise.
Brain wave tests demonstrate that people who complain of
insomnia often get much more sleep than they realize or
admit. That is why I consider their symptoms less than
what they claim. They tend to judge themselves with
anxious feelings of inferiority, and, therefore, they do not
really know themselves.
However, these people, even with their inferiority
complexes, can be freed from their suffering by developing
more accurate self-images and more self-confidence through
the experience of success. The experiential treatment of
neurosis works in this way. Accurate self-awareness means
knowing one’s true self and knowing that one’s experiences
are not necessarily unique, that is, the knowledge that
something that makes one happy can make others happy,
and something difficult for one can be difficult for others as
well. Such a view of human equality produces empathy and
bonds of solidarity with other people.
Obsessive desires for perfection come from a lack of
self knowledge and, thus, inadequate knowledge of human
nature. By ignoring the known facts of human nature,
these people are always disappointed by their unrealistic
desires. For example, a person who is obsessed with the
desire for perfect feelings tries to feel refreshed at all times.
In fact, however, our daily feelings naturally flow and
change according to internal and external conditions, like
the weather. A person who insists upon feeling refreshed is
like one who hopes to have clear sky all the time; as soon as
he sees a bit of a cloud, he assumes the weather will be
terrible all day. When he feels just a little out of sorts, he
tells himself that he is no good, and he makes himself feel
worse.

Not Perfectionism, but Prychslagical Reality


Perfectionists are obsessed with the way they think they
should be, ignoring themselves as they really are. They
KNOWING YOURSELF / 7

demand conditions in accord with their unrealistic ideals for


themselves, which results in lost confidence since reality
always works against them.
A student was suffering from the inability to read
because of distracting thoughts when he tried to study. His
suffering was caused by his belief that a reader should
concentrate only on his book, that unrelated thoughts
should not occur. Like this student, if one tries to eliminate
digressive thoughts because they are in the way, then the
opposite effect is achieved: one becomes more aware of
them. Again he tries to get rid of them, getting into a vicious
cycle, and then he cannot read at all. This student was
attempting the impossible ideal of not having any distracting
thoughts, fighting against each thought that entered his
mind.
When one is reading, there is a natural rhythm of
tension and relaxation, and when one is relaxed various
thoughts occur naturally. One should accept this inevitable
fact flexibly and continue to read on and off in rhythm.
Thus, when distracting thoughts come to mind, one is not
particularly conscious of them, so they do not interfere. It is
important for people to recognize such psychological
realities and to avoid struggling against them.

Under the Present Couditious


Our mental and physical states continually change. A
person who knows himself recognizes this, and regardless of
whether his condition is good or bad, he tries to do whatever
he can. A normal person’s attitude is to do seventy or eighty
percent of something as well as possible when he cannot do
one hundred percent of it perfectly. Perfectionists, however,
ignore their real selves and cling to the best they have ever
accomplished, expecting to be in top condition all the time.
Their best performances are rare, so they are always
dissatisfied with the present, and they exaggerate the
importance of their minor shortcomings, which worsens
their condition. In some serious cases their attitudes toward
8 / HOW TO LIVE WELL

themselves prevent them from doing anything at all unless


they are in peak condition. These people are true neurotics.
We all have various mental and physical shortcomings.
We can never be satisfied if we look at ourselves only by the
demanding standards of our ideals. Some people try to
escape from reality by making excuses for their weaknesses,
and some people do great work even with serious handicaps.
The best example would be Helen Keller, who had three
serious physical handicaps.
It is important to recognize that we tend to make all
kinds of excuses in order to avoid suffering. For example,
one may escape from attending a meeting by saying he has a
slight cold. He feels guilty just skipping it for no reason, so
he uses a minor illness as his excuse. This is an escape into
illness. On the other hand, when he goes fishing, his attitude
is reversed: he thinks his cold will disappear when he gets to
the sea. If one gets into the habit of using illness as an
excuse, then he becomes a neurotic.

An important part of understanding one’s self is knowing


the nature of human emotions. First, we must admit that
when the waves of our emotions rise in response to
stimulation, it is impossible to restore tranquility by reason.
Even if one wishes to be released quickly from negative
feelings caused by an unpleasant incident, he cannot control
them by willpower. Everyone experiences this kind of thing.
Thus, there is a side over which we have no control, and
there is a side where we have relatively wide room to use
our free will as human beings.
Emotional matters are very often beyond our control.
The adjustment of a train fare can be done on the spot, but
emotional matters are hard to adjust immediately. For
example, when someone with an average income loses one
thousand yen, it is not such a serious matter for him. He
feels bad, but that feeling does not stay too long. If it is
ten thousand yen, the bad feeling stays a little longer. If it
KNOWING YOURSELF / 9

is one hundred thousand yen, it stays even longer. If he


loses one million yen, then he will feel depressed for quite a
long time. Even if he tells himself that he can do nothing
about his loss, which is true, his feelings cannot be adjusted
right away.
Although matters of reason and logic can be modified
very easily, emotional matters are very often hard to adjust.
However, some people are too eager to eliminate these
unpleasant feelings right away. They do not understand the
nature of emotions. Trying to do the impossible complicates
matters by disturbing a natural process and, as a result,
negative emotions stay longer. Moreover, such people suffer
from being too slow in giving up their negative emotions.
The most important characteristic of emotions is that
strong feelings subside with the passage of time if they are
left to run their course. Our lives would be destroyed by
suffering were it not for this phenomenon. For example, if
the pain of a hard blow, such as the death of one’s child,
remained as strong as in the beginning, then no one could
survive the endless pain. In fact, however, the waves of
emotion rise and fall, gradually tapering off, whether we like
it or not. When emotions begin to take over in labor-
management disputes, negotiators sometimes take
advantage of this principle by declaring cooling-off periods.
The fact that emotions fade is a great blessing, but
sometimes it has a negative effect, recognized in such
Japanese expressions as “a nine day wonder.” For
example, when people decide to quit smoking or drinking
after being deeply moved by some experience, some cannot
persist because their powerful emotions fade away as time
passes.
Some people either ignore or do not know this principle
of emotions, and they become desperate when they
encounter trouble, as if it would last forever. They cannot
trust the passage of time. An expert in living knows that,
however terrible his experience may be, his unpleasant
feelings will fade with time, and so he can live with
optimism.
10/ HOWTO LIVE WELL

Outer Self aud Tuner Self


How do people change? How can one change himself into
a better person? In ancient Buddhist terms, “When the
outer facet is tidied up, the inner facet will naturally follow.”
The outer facet is one’s external behavior, and the inner
facet is one’s mental and emotional side. When one lowers
his head in front of a statue of Buddha with his hands
pressed together, then spontaneously he begins to feel
reverent. If he throws his head back haughtily, reverent
feelings do not emerge. We can conclude that, regardless of
the mind, if one first tries to straighten himself externally,
then his spirit changes to fit the outside reality.
When I treat neurotics, I advise them to improve their
form. That makes it much easier to practice. We know that
our athletic spirit awakens when we put on sportswear and
sports shoes. This does not happen when one stands with
his hands in the pockets of his trousers. When we frown,
with our jaws clamped together and our fists tight, it is
impossible to relax. When we smile, our tempers subside,
and when we frown, we become bad-tempered. External
form changes internal moods.
External form includes behavior. It is hard to change
feelings only by thoughts or intentions; they change as a
result of actions. For example, if I am in a sluggish mood, it
is just about impossible to make myself feel invigorated as I
am. But if I take off my jacket, climb up into a tree in the
garden, and start cutting withered branches, then my
feelings are energized by my activity. On a cold morning it
is hard to get out of bed, so if you are going to get
up only
after your desire to get up matures, you will sleep all day.
However, once you jump out of bed, your mood follows
your action and changes completely. That is why no
one
goes back to bed again once he gets up.
If one is going to study only after his desire matures,
then he will find it difficult to begin. He should first just
sit
at his desk, open an appropriate book, and start
reading.
The rhythm of studying is carried by the activity.
First,
make the form without waiting for the mood. Leave
your
KNOWING YOURSELF / 11

feelings as they are and proceed with action first, and then it
is easy and practical to change your state of mind. You
need to recognize and practice such psychological realities in
order to change yourself more constructively.

Huxiety aud Pacu


I have used the term arugamama already, but I would like to
explain more about it. First, we have to recognize the fact
that we humans are born with anxiety and pain and that
these are necessary for our survival. Although it would
seem better not to feel pain simply because we do not like it,
the sense of pain alerts us to illness or injury where it hurts,
and so it provides a natural mechanism to protect ourselves
from external injuries.
Anxiety, another distasteful feeling, is the same. People
are not the center of nature. Disasters happen every year,
and we are surrounded by hostile microbes that continually
multiply. Also, although human society was created by
humans, it is not made for individuals; so if one does not
make some effort, he will drop out since competition is very
keen. There are numerous threats, such as illnesses,
accidents, poor human relations, and economic problems.
We have to admit that anxiety about such dangers is part of
human life. We make constructive efforts only when we are
motivated by such basic anxiety.
Life stagnates and deteriorates without anxiety and
pain. In sports, the anxiety that one may be defeated by the
opponent builds tension that makes us practice hard. Illness
frightens us, so we observe the rules of health. If we did not
have fear, we would not be able to avoid sudden dangers,
such as an oncoming car. However, since a person who is
obsessed by a desire for perfection does not admit the
necessity and the inevitability of these basic fears, he wishes to
avoid any kind of anxiety and pain. His wish that such
anxiety and pain should not exist does not match reality.
This kind of selfish desire is deceptive: as one becomes more
acutely conscious of anxiety and pain, he may be obsessed
12 /HOW TO LIVE WELL

by it. This is also a mistake which comes from not knowing


one’s arugamama self: the real self in the real world.
A key element of arugamama is to accept our inevitable
physical or psychological reactions as they are, not to deny
or resist the reaction, nor to stumble through by self-
deception. For example, people get frightened when they
climb to high places. They get nervous in front of large
audiences. Their thoughts wander when they study. They
cannot sleep when they have something to worry about. We
all feel sluggish or weary or inferior sometimes.
Arugamama means knowing that such mind-body
phenomena are inevitable and accepting them as they are.
It is important to recognize this arugamama self with
humility.
If, on the contrary, one tries to rid himself of such a
weakness because it inconveniences him, then instead he
becomes more acutely aware of it, and he will end up more
troubled than before. For example, a neurotic who suffers
from insomnia cannot sleep because of the ticking of a
clock, and so he gets up and stops the clock. His attention
stays with the sound because he treats it as a nuisance and
tries to get rid of it. Ordinary people do not resist the sound
as itis. Left to its nature, human attention does not remain
focused on one thing. It moves away without notice, so
ordinarily one does not continue to hear the sound of a
clock even if it is still there.

Hrugamama: Fulfilling the Derre to Tnproue


Arugamama concerns the question of how to accept
sensory
data from events or objects, even when we fear such
stimuli.
The first time anyone tries to jump into a pool from a
high
diving board, anxiety attacks him. This is natural.
So, if
one rejects his fear and decides to dive only after conqu
ering
it, he will never be able to take the first leap.
Trying to
overcome such inevitable fear through mental
activity is
impossible, and the more one tries, the more strong
ly one
becomes conscious of it. This is not arugamama;
it is an
KNOWING YOURSELF / 13

unnatural willfulness. Do not confuse arugamama with


akirame (surrender, giving up].
Akirame means to avoid jumping in because of fear.
Arugamama means to jump in anyway, fear and all. To
jump in only after conquering fear is willful and unnatural.
Moreover, arugamama includes the fact that everyone
is born with a strong desire to improve and develop. To get
on with is the attitude of arugamama, which distinguishes it
from akirame. When one tries to dive into a pool, the
natural fear is as it is: arugamama. Accepting that fear as a
fact and yet diving in, heeding the will to grow, is true
arugamama, unlike the negativity akirame. Likewise, when
one tries to speak in front of a large group of people, if he
accepts his nervousness with the attitude of arugamama,
and, knowing he is tense, speaks without running away,
soon his mind begins to concentrate on the speech, and
eventually his nervousness simply fades away. Even if this
inevitable psychological process is distasteful, I believe that
it is natural and fruitful to accept it and to continue to try to
fulfill the desire for self-development.
I have discussed the confusion that results from not
knowing oneself and the constructive meaning of accurate
self-knowledge. I would like next to mention one more
important point: I would like you to consider what your real
wishes are. Most people can discover that their true desires
are to use their abilities fully and to work for the benefit of
themselves and others.
If you recognize that you have a desire for improve-
ment and development, then you will need to keep working
according to your real wishes, even when you have to
endure hard times. If your real wish is the desire to grow,
your whole life will naturally deteriorate if your way of
living does not go along with this desire. If one is happily
dependent on someone else and lives a lazy and
unproductive life, then he does not have the desire for
improvement, so nothing can be done. As Confucius said,
“Rotten wood cannot be carved.” If you recognize the
desire for improvement in yourself, then there is no other
way than to try to make it happen.
2
Reality 7s the Ouly “uth
Obeyiug Human Nature
Dr. Morita always emphasized that reality is the only truth.
It is important to recognize the facts honestly and to act
according to reality. This is particularly important for
neurotics because neurotic people tend to be controlled by
their emotions. They interpret events with their own
feelings, not recognizing the facts as they are (arugamama).
They tend to respond to their ideas of what should be
instead of what is, increasing their mental contradictions.
For example, concerning human relations, one can
meet some people without any problems, some people in a
reserved manner, and in front of some people one feels a lot
of pressure. An outpatient said he felt great pressure from
two of his colleagues in particular, and he could not do
anything about it. When he was a student, he had the same
kind of strong feelings about certain groups of classmates.
At any rate, everyone has some fear of certain people, but
those with neurotic anxieties about human relations have a
tendency to believe “I should be calm. I should be at ease in
any situation.”
15
16/ HOWTO LIVE WELL

This is not realistic. Our feelings change every time we


meet someone. One feels anxious before a large audience,
and feels stiff and nervous in front of someone whose favor
he seeks: as an ordinary company man becomes nervous in
front of his superiors. A variety of feelings is a common fact
of human nature among ordinary people. To live with a
clear recognition of the fact, to live according to reality, is
arugamama. Dr. Morita said that neurotics who suffer from
the fear of meeting others fight against the reality of human
nature and try to ignore it.

Leue Hecording te Reality


When someone says he feels good or bad today he rarely
knows the specific cause of his mood. That is the reality.
Whether you feel good or bad, you do whatever you can,
and that is the way to live according to reality. If one thinks
he should feel refreshed all the time, then he will always be
disappointed. One who often complains of heaviness in his
head is like a person who thinks the sky should be clear all
the time.
I would like to consider people who have a morbid fear
of cancer. Such people anxiously wonder if they have
cancer, or they are controlled by the feeling that they may
develop cancer, and they are obsessed by such fears.
However, the fact is that they do not have cancer no matter
how much they check. That one does not have cancer isa
fact, but he is controlled by the possibility of having cancer.
People who have a morbid fear of heart disease are
always afraid of dying of heart failure. No matter how
much they check, and regardless of the fact that there is
no
danger, they are controlled by their concern for the
possibility that something might happen. This concer
n is
not based on the facts.
Scientists base their work on facts; if they work by
their feelings, then there is no science. Once a
famous
American neurologist, Baird, called the symptoms
of what
we now call neurosis, “neurasthenia.” He consid
ered it a
REALITY IS THE ONLY TRUTH / 17

result of weakened nerves, which resulted in patients being


over-sensitive and easily fatigued. However, Dr. Morita did
not accept such a theory; instead, he observed the facts and
proved that neurosis is not caused by the weakening of
nerves. He lived with his patients and found that they could
live actively, bear quite heavy labor, and do mental work.
For example, some patients passed their college entrance
examinations while still hospitalized. All of these facts
clearly proved that their bodies and minds were not
debilitated. After all, it became clear that neurosis is not a
matter of weak nerves, and so he rejected the term shinkei
suijaku (neurasthenia) as the name of the disease.
A new neurology was born from the observation of
facts. The symptoms of neurosis show a condition in which
patients are often controlled by their feelings.

Anxiety permeates life. That is a fact. Strictly speaking,


there is no human condition without anxiety, so we might as
well recognize that our fears will be with us as long as we
live. Neither society nor nature is made to be convenient for
us as individuals. Innumerable objects of anxiety exist:
earthquakes, lightning, fires, illnesses, economic and human
relations problems. Therefore, we should think that it is
natural for us to have anxiety.
We live and work with anxiety, which actually has
positive benefits. If there were no anxiety, we would not try
at all. We study because we fear failure, and we keep
ourselves healthy because we are afraid of illness. We make
great efforts and struggle for success because we have the
anxiety of failing in society. Our lives are stimulated by
anxiety, so anxiety has a positive meaning. That is why if
one wishes a life without anxiety, that person surely falls
into internal discord. He always asks himself why he feels
anxious.
We cannot count all the objects of our anxiety. One
characteristic of a healthy person is that he may have many
18/ HOWTO LIVE WELL

fears but he is not obsessed by any one of them. However,


neurotics are abnormal in that they limit the problem to a
particular object and suffer from it all the time. For
example, one who abnormally fears human contact fixes his
attention on his interpersonal relations, while one who
suffers from an obsession with cleanliness fears only
dirtiness. At any rate, it is important not to treat a specific
fear in a special way and to take anxiety as natural.
Therefore, arugamama means to accept such anxiety as it is,
to recognize the facts as they are, and to keep making efforts
according to our basic drives for improvement and
development.
Ss
forse
Plna tual “hatning
Spiris

Munen Muso (freedom from all ideas and thoughts)

Fudoshin (immobility of determination)

Hibi kore kojitsu (every day a good day)

Sanmaikyo (perfect spiritual concentration)

Ware and muga (self and selflessness)

In Japanese there are many phrases which, at first


glance, seem very good for moral training. On the contrary,
if you swallow these words uncritically, they sometimes
cause trouble. If you take the meaning of the phrase hibi
kore kojitsu as simply, “Every day should be a good day,”
then often things do not go the way you want. We have
many good phrases, such as hibi kore kojitsu, and I would
like to consider some of them here.
We hear that we should be munen muso, free from all
ideas and thoughts, when we do things. The extreme state
of munen muso is death, but also in a coma or deep sleep
one’s state could be called munen muso. In practice, since the

19
20 / HOW TO LIVE WELL

human brain works ceaselessly when one is awake, he


always senses something, thinks, feels, and exercises his
will. Munen muso is, therefore, a metaphor; it is, in other
words, nothing but sanmaikyo.
Sanmaikyo is a condition that one and the object of his
attention become one, that is, he “becomes the thing itself.”
In emergencies anyone can become that way under pres-
sure. When a Sumo wrestler is asked how he did it after he
knocked over a strong opponent, he answers that he does
not know because he was beside himself. When he struggles
hard, his mind is in an extremely active condition, and the
object and himself become one, so there was no difference
between subject and object.
By the way, a person with a pure heart can accept
things as they are, so not only during emergencies but also
in ordinary activities he can develop sanmaikyo. He can
taste a cup of tea innocently and be happy with a smiling
face of a child. When he sees a cloud he becomes a cloud,
when he sees a flower he becomes a flower, when he sees a
goldfish he becomes a goldfish.

Fudo
(4sh
Stalle
in Wind)
The meaning of the word fudoshin can be taken as being
calm in any situation, or not being influenced by feelings of
sorrow or joy, and being self-controlled at all times. You
may think anyone would want to achieve this state.
However, if one has fudoshin literally, then what happens?
When a car appears suddenly from the side during his walk,
if he cannot be startled, then he cannot avoid the car
instantly. If one is calm at the death of a loved one, then we
should call him not one who has fudoshin but rather
one
who has no heart.
When I was in the prime of my life, I worked at a large
mental hospital. Eighty percent of the patients were elderl
y
schizophrenic patients. I was shocked to discover that they
did not get surprised at earthquakes or fires, and that
they
PHRASES FOR SPIRITUAL TRAINING / 21

were calm when a roommate hanged himself. Rather than


a good meaning of fudoshin, this is apathy.
One characteristic of a healthy person is that his
feelings change with every situation. If one has anxiety and
pain, feelings of sorrow or of joy, and still takes the road of
improvement with a daily constructive attitude, and if he
can keep this attitude all his life no matter what happens,
then that is a great example of fudoshin.

Ware aud Muga: Self aud Sellesonces


Next there are expressions that mean “selflessness.” During
the war messhi houkou (self-annihilation for the sake of the
nation) was enforced. This was often used by oppressors
to sacrifice people, and it has no place in this discussion.
On the other hand, we also have words with antisocial
meanings, such as gashitsu (attachment to oneself), ga wo
haru (to insist on one’s own way), or other expressions that
refer to selfishness or self-centeredness.
It is said that modern philosophy started at the
discovery of the self, and we cannot deny the existence of
ware (oneself). Even if we deny everything else, ware stays
with us to the end. A literal meaning of muga (nonexistence
of self) cannot exist in fact, so we should take the word as a
metaphor to describe a state of action. The phrase, “to
sacrifice personal interests for the public good,” expresses a
high ethic, and in unusual cases ordinary people reach this
state. Generally, a person does not have selfishness when
he jumps into a river water to save a drowning boy; how-
ever, we are not purely altruistic about what we do in our
daily lives. People have an instinct for self-preservation.
However, we can live in ways that allow us to serve others
and, as a result, this will lead to self-improvement and
development.
No one wants to work for a company that does not pay
a salary. As ordinary people, our attitude is to work hard
for an organization while, at the same time, our work leads
to our own development. If one is too selfish, then he
22 /HOW TO LIVE WELL

becomes antisocial, people avoid him, and he does not feel


comfortable living there. But, on the other hand, if one tries
to contribute and be useful in his present environment, then
he feels more satisfied and comfortable. That is, if one lives
to be useful to others, he realizes through his experience
that his life means the expansion of himself.
Muga is sometimes used with the same meaning as
munen muso or mushin (innocent). There is a metaphor to
describe a good jockey riding a horse: “no man on the
saddle, and no horse under the saddle,” which means the
man and the horse are one body. Another phrase, butsuga
ryoubou, also means that a person becomes one with the
object, the condition of being the thing itself.
If one starts struggling with ware, fighting with the
internal self, then there is no limit. Patients who fear
interpersonal encounters place importance on defending
themselves, so they become very sensitive to what others
think of them. Tanin (others) and ware (self) are opposed to
each other, creating tension. The more one tries to get rid of
ware, the more he becomes conscious of it. When one is
going to have a face-to-face talk, and if he just tries to get on
with the matter at hand, then he will naturally free himself
from self-centeredness. If one can realize the attitude of
being in touch with reality, then his fear of facing people,
which sticks to a small self, will gradually disappear.

Hib Kore Rojitou (Every Day a Good Day)


Last, I would like to discuss hibi kore kojitsu. Everyone
wants every day to be a good day, and many
people
welcome such phrases. However, if one wants to
have the
literal meaning of the phrase, then he is sure to get into
a
contradiction. Our health is not necessarily good all
the
time. According to external and internal conditions our
moods naturally rise and fall, as can be said about
the
weather. Whatever one’s circumstances, if the meaning
of
one’s life is realized by working not for himself but
for
others, and if one is in poor physical or mental health,
and
PHRASES FOR SPIRITUAL TRAINING / 23

does not hurt others in his misery, then his days are good
days. There are some people who have serious illnesses and
yet positively influence the people around them all the time;
but there are others who, although they have objectively
light handicaps, exaggerate their problems and afflict others.
There, depending on one’s attitude, a bad day could be a
good day and even a wonderful day could be a bad day.
I often see plants in the garden around my clinic.
Koseiin has enough plants to become designated a forest
reserve of Shinjuku Ward. There are some very old trees,
and there are many plants that I started myself. I am
especially interested in the ones I planted; I have special
memories of each plant, and when I am in the garden I feel
that I am surrounded by my loved ones. The old man next
door made shelves in his small garden for several dozen
Azalea bonsai and takes good care of them every day. A
person who has something he loves is a person who has
good days. People naturally start feeling love toward
whatever they have nurtured or kept for a long time, such
as plants, animals, humans or personal belongings in
everyday use. The life that is surrounded by cherished
things or people is hibi kore kojitsu, a rich life filled with good
days. There is an even more positive example of hibi kore
kojitsu: a life in which one continues to do constructive work
and sees or anticipates its development. A person with a
creative attitude toward life can have many wonderful days,
but a lazy person can have very few.
People can experience hibi kore kojitsu in a wide variety
of ways: by actions, by appreciating nature or the arts, by
satisfying intellectual curiosity, by loving. If a person can
have many kinds of good days, then I would call that person
wealthy.
Sit: uesi dvoid |
Santana weoolaneapant Peep
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— weerald ela a |
sive iaeara wae hi
oe soils hove wigses r

ae eeMy: rune
5 ce
Pegs. tce
hie

f ies
oy
Tes i epee

| Panes
" : ean
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= ; Soneis
g
Uews of Life
Views of Life Chauge
There is no absolutely correct philosophy of life. It changes
with the times. During the time of prewar loyalty many
people placed great value on patriotism. They were taught
to believe that way by the people in power at the time.
Today few people have such a view of life. In the days of
the samurai, when those who had been wronged could
dispense justice themselves, revenge was considered a great
virtue. If you practice such revenge today, you are going to
get into very serious trouble.
One’s view of life depends on the times and also on
one’s age. That is why one’s outlook at twenty years old is
what it is at the time, not something absolute. You do not
know when it will change, and so you cannot help but leave
the future as your future assignment. When you are in your
thirties, it changes; and in your fifties, sixties, and seventies,
it changes accordingly. At my age I have my outlook, but I
do not know how it will change when I become 100 years
old. (If I am still living at that age, I am afraid I might not
have a view of life since I might be senile!)

25
26 / HOW TO LIVE WELL

When one is a little child, he is not aware of his view of


life, and his desire to sleep and eat precedes everything.
This is the most important thing for a baby, who grows by
sleeping: “Babies who sleep a lot grow a lot.” When babies
are not sleeping, they are eating. When they grow older,
they become interested in the opposite sex, and they
consider their interests important. When some Japanese
women near the age of twenty, they place great importance
on marriage, or they begin to show a great deal of concern
about their appearance. They want to appear as attractive
as possible, which is why they wear make-up. On the other
hand, young Japanese men place more importance on their
study, sports or love. In the prime of their lives they usually
place importance on their work. There are many more
views of life as people age.
Views of life depend on the people who hold them.
Politicians generally have strong desires for power, and they
control others with their desire. Extreme examples are
people like Hitler, Napoleon or Nobunaga. Hitler was a
slave to his morbid desire for power. He would do anything,
no matter how cruel, to satisfy his desire, and that was his
attitude toward life. That is why he was a large-scale
criminal. Everyone has some desire for power, although not
to such an extent.
Some people have very strong desires for material
objects or for money. In extreme cases, there are some who
are like usurers, who are interested in nothing but money
matters, and who have no sense of duty or humanity.
However, all ordinary people desire material possessions
and money more or less. There may be differences of
degree, but we would be lying if we refused to admit that we
had such desires.
Some people have refined desires, such as the desire to
pursue truth by studying, and some of them becom
e
scholars. There are some honorable people who want
to do
good for their society, and they place importance on
living
for the love of mankind, contributing to society.
VIEWS OF LIFE / 27

There are many people who place importance on health. If


one places too much importance on it, he starts worrying
too much, especially if anything goes wrong. If he focuses
only on the state of his health, he becomes like a measuring
instrument for himself. To place such extreme importance
on one’s physical condition is called hypochondria.
Generally speaking, ordinary people, myself included,
do not place extreme importance on any one thing; instead,
we value many things. If you think about yourself, then you
would understand what I mean. You want to have as good
a spouse as possible, you want to have a certain minimum
salary, you want to be healthy; maybe you want to become
great to a certain degree, or you want to have some power
or fame. In this way you have various desires. Such are
the desires of ordinary people.
When their desires are distorted, many people become
eccentric. There are good eccentrics and bad ones. There
are many whose sole desire is for learning. These people
contribute to our knowledge and understanding, so they are
valuable eccentrics. We cannot say they are bad just
because they are different. Our attitudes toward life change
according to what we consider important and, as a result,
our views of life differ.

Revewed With
Views of life in Medieval Europe centered around God.
They believed that God had created heaven and earth in a
week. God’s creation was earth-centered, and among the
living things on the earth humans were at the center.
Naturally they said the heavenly bodies went around the
earth, and on the earth humans were the best. They said,
“God created people in the image of God.”
However, in modern days the theory of creation is
completely reversed. This was caused first by developments
in astronomy. As a result of these developments we now
28 / HOW TO LIVE WELL

know that earth is not the center, that it is only a small


planet that goes around a fixed star, the sun, among infinite
numbers of heavenly bodies. There are about twenty billion
stars in the Milky Way, our galactic system. The sun is but
one of those stars. There are about 100 billion nebulae like
the Milky Way. This is quite amazing, and some scholars
imagine that there are more than 100 million planets that
have the same conditions as the earth. If you look at
humans from this point of view, we are really tiny.
However, we can imagine such things, so we have some
greatness.
The theory that people were made by God after His
image, taught by Medieval theologians, was challenged by
Darwin’s theory of evolution, which was rapidly proved by
fossil remains. Peking man was not an ape, but it looks too
much like an ape to be called a human. Neanderthal man
was human, but many remains of humans in lower stages of
evolution have been excavated. From such stages in the
series emerged modern human beings. Among the living
things on earth humans are probably at the top of evolution
because our nervous systems are especially advanced.
However, the reason we think we are evolved from animals
is that we have many animal characteristics. We can think
of very noble things, but on the other hand we have the
same instincts as the lower animals. The actions humans
perform by nature can be very primitive.
That is why human beings have good points and bad
points. We have social phases and antisocial phases, too.
Old theatrical performances distinguish the heroes from the
villains. Heroes do only good things, and villains do only
bad things. In reality, however, such cases are very rare.
“Villains” sometimes do good things.
Chuji Kunisada, a legendary Robinhood-like figure in
epic tales of Japan, has a positive image because of his
occasional good deeds in behalf of the weak, but he actually
did many bad deeds. He was a gambler, a good-for-nothing.
He was violent and troublesome. In the end he was cruci-
fied, but the Koudan and Naniwa-bushi tales exaggerated the
rare good deeds he performed.
VIEWS OF LIFE / 29

My discussion has gone off the track, but any bad man
has some good facets, and any good man has antisocial
aspects. Soseki Natsume wrote, “Usually a good man does
bad things in a crisis, so one must be on guard,” and when I
read it I was impressed. This is a true story that caused a
controversy in a foreign country: after a shipwreck there
was no food, and the survivors ate human flesh. Of course,
no one eats human flesh in ordinary circumstances, but
people can do even that in a crisis.

Being ptware of Human Nature


If you are aware of what human beings can do in times of
crisis, then you can become a well-developed person. A
person who always believes that he is right is troublesome.
If one thinks that whatever he does is right, then he tends to
blame others when things go wrong. In Christianity a
person who is obsessed with the idea that he is always right
is called a Pharisee. A truly refined person does not think
he is the only one who is right. If you examine yourself,
then you would know it well. That is why it is necessary to
understand human nature from different angles.
You may feel fear in front of other people. If you
assume, “When I meet people, I have to be calm in any
situation,” or, “When I study, I should be able to con-
centrate without having any other thoughts in my mind,”
then that is a false idealism and an attitude of perfectionism.
Reality itself does not cause such complications.
If you are well aware that your own condition varies
like the weather, and that it is human nature to change, then
you will not be enraptured when you are in good circum-
stances, and you will not need to be too pessimistic in
adverse situations. You should recognize the fact that your
circumstances are flowing and changing, and you should do
whatever you can in the situation. Therefore, even if you
have neurotic symptoms, it is important not to feel too easy
in good circumstances or too pessimistic in times of
adversity.
NW

| olla

ae sy
aN ee
y Sa 2
Part 2

Uufpleasaut
but
5
lssis
alNeuro
Pitfof
Exaggerating Miner Physical Disorders
When you feel a heaviness in your head, you naturally feel
depressed. Although it has nothing to do with intelligence,
everyone has similar tendencies, depending on the occasion,
and your mental vitality is reduced in such circumstances.
It is not good to think of this kind of condition as a sign of
serious illness or to worry too much about it. If we compare
this condition to that of a machine, we can say that the
machine has some friction and needs some grease. On such
an occasion you must trust that it is going to improve and
you must wait for that time.
One’s physical condition can be good or bad depending
on the day. In my case, when I have a meeting until late, I
feel tired the next day, but I do not consider it an illness. It
is no good to think of illness whenever your physical
condition is poor. Although it is within the limit of normal
physiological change, if you pay anxious attention to it by
thinking of it as illness, then, as if you are hypnotized, you
start thinking about it more and more. It becomes a vicious
cycle. Even if you feel some physical disorder or have some
33
34 / HOW TO LIVE WELL

weak physical condition, you should strive to do what a


healthy person would do.

The “Only 7" Compler


Everyone feels afraid of other people sometimes. Recently I
went to a university class reunion. Among the eleven
people present, who were all about my age, a man sitting
across from me is practicing medicine in Tokyo. He asked
me, “Although I am okay when I am drinking, I tremble
when I am not drinking. Am I an alcoholic?”
I said, “An alcoholic stops trembling when he drinks,
and trembles when he does not drink, but in your case you
tremble only in front of other people, right?”
He said, “Yes, I am practicing nagauta (long epic
songs), but I decided not to attend a training meeting where
I would have to sing in front of other people.”
I asked, “Why?”
He said, “When I participate, I shorten my life,” but, in
short, he probably has a fear of other people. I see him
often at meetings, but I have never noticed that he had any
such anxiety. He also said that he could not write well in
the presence of other people.
At the class reunion we were all comrades; so many
interesting stories came out. One said, “Since I was young,
I have been a poor talker. Even in front of women I like, I
have never been able to express myself. Too bad.”
I asked him, “At your age you are all right now, aren’t
youP”
He said, “Even now it is the same.” He can live his
everyday life normally, but in special circumstances he
cannot do well unless he drinks. He has a house he is
renting out, and he wants to raise the rent since he has
not
done so for many years. He cannot tell the tenant when
he
is sober, so he does so after drinking. When he drinks too
much, he says too much and things do not go right, so he
tries to moderate his drinking. If he keeps on, he will
become an alcoholic.
PITFALLS OF NEUROSIS / 35

He may think he has an abnormal fear of interpersonal


contact, but no one can detect it. I found out only after he
told me. However, a person who fears contact with others
thinks everyone else knows it, so when his hands tremble a
little, he is really ashamed and thinks that everyone is
looking down on him. I do not pay special attention to my
nervousness, so I do not care whether my hands tremble or
not. He makes an important issue of it, so he gets nervous
and his hands shake. If he could think the purpose of this
meeting were to drink, he could drink even with his
trembling, and then everything would be all right.
When you write, your purpose is to write legibly. As
long as your writing suits its purpose it is fine, and so
whether your hands tremble or not is related merely to the
act of writing. If you get on with meeting your objectives,
everything will surely work out to achieve your purpose.
When you catch a ball, if you look at the ball, then it is
okay; if you look at your hands, all the time worrying about
how to use them, your attention strays away from the ball,
and you will drop it. As long as you are looking at the ball,
your hands move naturally to catch it without your con-
scious awareness of their movements.
When you pick up a cup, as long as you get on with the
purpose of picking it up, then your hands move the shortest
distance to grasp the handle. You are not aware of your
movements one by one, but as long as you get on with the
purpose, they will all harmonize. That is why you will be
freed from self-centered obsessions naturally if you lead a
reality-centered life and strive positively toward your goals.

Distorted Self-Defense
The personality of a nervous person is a self-centered
defensive mechanism, and he strains every nerve to protect
himself. When this becomes a habit, it results in distorted
character traits. When we live in this society, we have
various objects of anxiety because the society is not
especially made for our convenience. In companies neither
36 / HOW TO LIVE WELL

fellow workers nor supervisors are necessarily your best


friends. Even if a student likes sleeping late in the morning,
no school will change the starting hour from 9 o’clock to 10
o’clock. Everyone has to discipline himself to get up early.
In addition, there are unexpected traffic accidents,
earthquakes or other natural disasters, pollution and
thousands of different illnesses. We have anxiety about
surviving such calamities, and this anxiety is a basic
condition for all human beings. Even if one is not conscious
of his anxiety, he still has it. If we do not have anxiety, we
cannot protect ourselves from danger.
The objects of anxiety are countless, but each person
places the most importance on something different. Some
people are concerned only about their health, and some
worry about the fears they have when they meet others.
When you hear of unfortunate incidents, then you may fear
that such things may happen to you. In this way, even one
person considers different threats important, depending on
the time and the place.
A spoiled person feels free at home, but once he is
outside he feels great pressure from his surroundings. He is
like a pampered greenhouse plant in that he feels strong
opposition when he encounters the air outside. That is why
a person who has been spoiled at home tends to have
neurotic symptoms: his anxiety intensifies when he goes
outside. Outside circumstances may be inconvenient for
him very often, and it is nearly impossible to fight back
against each one of them.
When you think of your own ability, it is never
sufficient, and you have many weaknesses. Health is the
Same: not many people are tough enough to resist all
diseases. Also, there are many inconveniences in one’s
social environment, whether in the family or at work.
There are many such things wherever we are, and so it
is
very difficult to deal with all of them well.
A neurotic person in such a case tries to make as few
enemies as possible, and he selects one shortcoming as the
cause of his problems, believing that he would feel all right if
he could eliminate it: “If only I did not feel this heaviness
in
PITFALLS OF NEUROSIS / 37

my head,” or, “If only I did not fear others.” He wants to


make it as simple as possible because of the principle of
economy in the functioning of the human mind.
The objects of anxiety we humans have are innumer-
able, but a neurotic person selects that which is the most
inconvenient to him and thinks everything is going to be all
right as long as he gets rid of it. He sometimes chooses a
ridiculous one, and even a simple obstacle can be seen as an
especially threatening one for him. For example, when he
reads a book, he sees his nose and feels it is in the way of his
reading. He perceives the presence of his nose in his visual
field as bad. Everything would be fine without this. It is
simple: he thinks he should not look at his nose; however,
because he thinks he should not look at his nose, his
attention is directed to it. This mental interaction is contra-
dictory: he tries to simplify his problem, but instead he gets
trapped by it.
People who are anxious in the presence of others try to
make their problem as simple as possible; they think it will
be solved as long as they do not fear having a red face, or as
long as they do not feel nervous in front of others, or as long
as they do not have strange facial expressions. As these
examples show, they try to focus on one detail.
The morbid fear of illness functions in the same way.
We normally dislike all illnesses, but a neurotic limits the
object of his fear to only one, such as cancer, venereal
disease or Hansen’s disease (leprosy). It probably seems to
him much easier to deal with as long as he limits the object
of his anxiety to only one. However, since he focuses on
this one, his attention often goes to it, and the result is a
reverse effect. This happens because, as I stated before, the
distortion of the personality lies at the base of a person’s
neurosis. The distortion is to seek his own security in a self-
centered way, and the negative defense mechanism with
which he tries to protect himself from the outer world
becomes chronic. Such a basic personality distortion
causes his desire to simplify his defense by focusing on only
one object.
38
/ HOW TO LIVE WELL

The Meaning of Clinical Morita Therapy


How can we cure such problems? Understanding the
theory can be a clue for restoration, but a neurosis cannot
be cured easily by mere understanding. That is, the
distortion of one’s character cannot be straightened by
simply comprehending the nature of the problem. Thus, one
must change his attitude toward life as a whole.
Our personalities cannot be changed substantially
merely by understanding with our minds. To change
significantly we need to change our attitudes toward life in
general, to acquire an attitude of being in touch with the
reality of the outside world instead of being in touch with
only ourselves. In the case of outpatients who are treated
by Morita Therapy, there is no other way but to explain
such points; but more serious cases of neurosis cannot be
cured easily by using only such psychological procedures.
That is why Dr. Morita began to cure neurotics by full-
scale inpatient treatment. In this case the patients not only
understand mentally, but also hospitalization itself signifies a
change of environment that can become a turning point.
That is, if a patient stays in the same environment as before,
then his conditioned reflexes cause him to do many things
from force of habit, so it is better to change his environment
in order to get him away from his old habits. If it is a special
environment, an environment that is made to be convenient
for treatment, then it is much better. The mere fact of
changing one’s environment by moving into a residential
program has significance as part of the treatment. The
simplest effect is a temporary reaction to the limits of
hospitalization, but that reaction disappears as soon as the
patient is released to go home. This example shows that
some patients can be influenced by just changing their living
conditions.
Not all neurotics can be cured by simply a change of
environment, but it helps to a certain degree. Changing
one’s environment by entering the clinic, including a
required period of isolated bed rest, is different from mere
understanding. During their first week in the hospital
PITFALLS OF NEUROSIS / 39

patients are required to rest in bed without doing anything


else. Bed rest means to rest their tired minds and bodies.
Moreover, they feel bored while they are resting in bed since
there is little stimulation and no outlet for action. Then the
desire for action increases, and the wish to do something
accumulates. That is why they respond sensitively toward
the stimulation from the environment when they finally do
get up. They may have fresh attitudes toward the outside
world, which they have disliked up to that moment. Also,
confinement in bed means having nothing to do but think.
They have time to think of themselves and think directly
without escaping from their pain. They cannot avoid their
suffering, so they feel that they have to face themselves.
Keeping a journal after getting up also helps them to
reflect upon themselves, and writing about matters of the
outside world helps them to get into contact with reality. Of
course, it also helps their doctors know the condition of the
patients better, which results in better communication
between doctors and patients.
In addition, there is a group living experience that is
used as a form of treatment. Living in a group means that
one cannot have his own way, so he becomes socialized.
Neurotics, people who tend to be obsessed, lack sociali-
zation. This lack stands out especially among those who
heretofore have been allowed to have their own way. When
one has to live among many other people, he is not allowed
to be selfish and just go his own way. Therefore, he
naturally tries to refrain from asocial or antisocial attitudes.
This is what it means to be socialized.
Next is work therapy (sagyo ryouhou). This is also an
important part of Morita Therapy. By working, a patient
can cultivate the attitude of doing things related to the affairs
of the outside world. He stops being concerned only about
himself, and his attitude becomes more receptive. Also,
work therapy means to him that, even with his handicaps,
he can experience working or playing if he tries. Working
and other activity suits the real nature of human beings
because our bodies are made primarily to be active. Our
brain cells are always active, thinking or feeling something;
40 / HOWTO LIVE WELL

we cannot stop thinking when we are awake. Action makes


a human being become the authentic self he can be.
As I stated just now, changing not only the mind, but
also changing the character constructively as a whole is
useful for treatment. Some people call Morita Therapy
gajoku ryouhou (isolated bed rest therapy), but it is not only
that. Neither can we call it Sagyo Ryouhou (work therapy)
just because it involves work. You may call it arugamama
ryouhou if you interpret arugamama in many different ways,
but just reciting “arugamama, arugamama,” in one’s mind
does not work as treatment. To practice an arugamama
attitude is important. Morita Therapy is a total approach
which combines treatments that change one’s physical and
mental condition constructively.
Changing your character does not mean understanding
only with your mind, but also confronting the outer world
directly in practice. By doing so you can acquire attitudes
toward life that help you to adequately manage your affairs
in the real world. This is most important, and as long as you
practice it your symptoms will naturally fade to almost
nothing, even if you just leave them alone. If you wrestle
with your symptoms, the harder you try to get rid of them,
the more they will stick to you. Accept your symptoms as
they are, and, as I said before, if you try to get in contact
with the outside world, and recover the wholeness of your
personality from the distortions of a self-centered defense
mechanism, then you will improve naturally without even
knowing it.
6
Seven Cauditiours for a
WMeutally frealthy Life

There is a man who suffers mental anguish over riding


trains and buses because he thinks his stomach does not feel
right. He says that his stomach fills with gas when he
stands, and that he starts having pain around his heart and
feels terrible. Hearing him, it would seem that there is
something wrong with his stomach and intestines but, in
fact, this person does not have any organic disorders. Then
why does this symptom come about?
The first thing that comes to mind is that, as the term
psychoneurosis indicates, mental problems appear in the
body. Once there was an outpatient whose neck was
crooked although he could move his body. Like pictures of
people in ancient Egypt, his body faced the front while his
face looked sideways. Orthopedic specialists could not find
anything wrong with him. This was a special case, but it
could be called a kind of psychosomatic disorder.
Our stomachs and hearts are controlled by autonomic
nerves. Since the emotions and the autonomic nerves are
centered in the same location, autonomic ataxia occurs
when a mental imbalance leads to an autonomic nerve
41
42 / HOW TO LIVE WELL

imbalance. Different persons have different symptoms, but


those which appear in one’s heart are called heart neurosis;
stomach disorders, such as gas noises, constipation or
diarrhea are called stomach neurosis. The symptoms are
different but they all stem from the same cause, which is a
psychosomatic disorder. When you have such a disorder, it
is important to live a healthy life even with the symptoms
present.

Continueto Do Something Useful


The first condition of a sound mind is to be able to keep
doing constructive work, to continue to do something useful.
This is different from doing it sporadically. A lazy person is
not mentally sound. Being able to keep doing constructive
work requires quite a lot of patience, as well as an active
spirit.
It is important to do constructive work because we do
not live alone. We live in community, in relationships with
others around us. In concrete terms, the clothes that we
wear, the food that we eat or the houses we live in are not
things that we made by ourselves. All of them were made
by other people. We depend on others for our living. That is
why we should contribute to others in some way, and those
contributions make us full-fledged human beings. A person
who cannot contribute to something other than himself
cannot be called a mentally sound person. Of course, if
someone cannot do it because he is physically ill, then that is
a different matter.

See and Judge Thingsas They rbre


The second condition for a sound mind is to be able to see
and evaluate things as they are (arugamama). If one sees
things wistfully or pessimistically in an unbalanced way,
then it is hard for him to act appropriately whene
ver
necessary.
CONDITIONS FOR A MENTALLY HEALTHY LIFE / 43

When one is obsessed with something, his perception


becomes distorted by the thing that obsesses him. For
example, a person who is anxious about contact with others
is obsessed with his symptoms, so he is very concerned
about the opinions of others. He wonders whether someone
may speak ill of him or dislike him. When he sees others
talking, he thinks that maybe they are talking about him.
When others are laughing, he worries that they might be
laughing at him. In these ways he relates events to himself
and passes judgment, even though he has no way of
knowing the facts. On the other hand, to leave what you do
not know as something unknown is what it means to see
things in the arugamama way.
The person who is obsessed with anxiety about illness
always questions whether he has cancer, or whether he is
going to get cancer. If one is in this condition, we cannot
say that he is healthy. After various checkups, if one is
diagnosed as having neither cancer nor any special
likelihood of getting cancer, then that is a fact; so he should
clearly recognize and live according to that fact. That
acceptance is healthy, but if one does not recognize such
facts, and worries about whether he has cancer, then that
means he cannot see things as they are.
Some people are too optimistic and see things only
wistfully, but if it exceeds certain limits, we cannot say that
they are really healthy. At first sight they may look
cheerful, but they have difficulty adapting themselves to
reality. One mental disorder, mania, makes people
extremely optimistic. They feel that their ability is very
great, they interpret things according to their wishes, and
they end up failing. Such persons may feel good, but
objectively they are not healthy. To be able to see things as
they are is the sign of mental health.

Shane the Yoys aud Sorrows of Others


Being able to love others: to rejoice in their happiness and
feel sorrow for their misfortunes is the third condition for
44 /HOWTO LIVE WELL

being a healthy person. Heartless people, cruel criminals,


and people who practice antisocial acts that harm others are
not healthy. It is common for humans to think that what is
hard for one is hard for others, and what is pleasurable for
one is pleasurable for others. That is why we do not like to
see others suffer, and we are happy to see others happy.
This is the social nature we have. People who are poorly
socialized think everything is all right as long as they
themselves are all right; they are only concerned about
themselves. They become antisocial and asocial. As I
mentioned before, there is social solidarity, and we exist in
relations with others. One of the characteristics of a healthy
human being is to have the social motivation not to harm
others, not to trouble others, but to feel joy and sorrow with
other people.

Arave Self-Control aud Self-Reflectiou


Fourth, it is absolutely necessary for healthy people to
have self-control and to examine themselves. Some say that
people with strong beliefs are healthy, but people with strong
incorrect beliefs are troublesome. Of course, it is better to
believe something with a degree of certainty, but bigotry is
no good. There are people with strong beliefs who try to
control everything with one thought, one obsession. The
person who suffers from delusions of persecution is a typical
example. He cannot reflect upon himself and discover that
it is a delusion. It is necessary to be able to reflect on what
one is doing and determine whether it is antisocial or not, or
reflect on what he is thinking and know whether it is
healthy or unhealthy. For ages it has been said that one
who cannot reflect upon himself is not a wise man. This
maxim is certainly true.

“lake Respousibdlity
for Your rbctiaus
The fifth condition for a sound mind is to be able to
take
responsibility for one’s actions. A small child cannot take
CONDITIONS FOR A MENTALLY HEALTHY LIFE / 45

responsibility for his actions. That is why if a little child


behaves in an antisocial way, he does not have criminal
responsibility and is not subject to legal punishment.
Similarly, people with serious mental handicaps or those of
unsound mind are not held responsible for antisocial
behavior because they are considered very ill.
In the past, when a drunk committed crimes he did not
remember later, it was believed that he did not have to take
responsibility because he did not have a sound mind at the
time; but today this is not so. Such a person may be the
kind who becomes violent every time he drinks. He repeats
such actions and still keeps drinking, and so he is considered
responsible. Conversely, when a person does not take
responsibility, it is just like admitting that he does not have a
sound mind or is still an immature child.
A full-fledged adult can take responsibility for his
actions. Therefore, if a person does not take responsibility
for his actions then he is not a real adult.

Ge Hlexible
The sixth condition is to have mental elasticity and
flexibility. In the Analects of Confucius there is a saying,
“A wise man is not a pot.” That is, a pot is convenient, but
it has only one use. A teacup is good for drinking tea, but it
is not very useful for anything else. A clock is useful to
know the time, but it has no other use. A car is the same,
and it is very convenient, but humans have to drive it. If the
decisions are left to the car, then there is no flexibility. On
the other hand, however trivial it seems, living things do not
bump into electrical poles when they walk. In other words,
they are flexible.
Among humans there are some who are obsessed or
controlled by one idea, having no flexibility in their
stubbornness. Once they decide something, they think they
are absolutely right, and no contradiction can change them.
Such inflexibility cannot be called mentally healthy.
Paranoia is a condition in which one is obsessed with one
46 /HOW TO LIVE WELL

idea and nothing else. This is in no way considered a


healthy condition.

Understand
Humor aud Enjoy Life
The seventh condition, and this is something I especially
want to add at the end, is the importance of understanding
humor and enjoying life. Being serious is all right, but there
are some who are serious and not interesting. A lack of
humor does not necessarily make one unhealthy, but if
possible it is better to understand and appreciate humor.
One who cannot appreciate humor sometimes flares up
when someone plays a joke on him. People cannot even
tell jokes around such a person. People need some latitude
to tell each other jokes and to make fun of each other.
Humor in life is like a lubricant. It can make contact
between people gentle and amiable rather than being cool
and instrumental.
Only with the freedom to enjoy life can people be rich
and happy. I think we can enjoy things infinitely if we have
purity of heart. For instance, autumn has various natural
scenes and objects that we can enjoy, such as chrysanthe-
mum blossoms, colored leaves, and the singing of wild birds.
We can enjoy reading books which satisfy our intellectual
curiosity. Or we can listen to music, appreciate fine arts or
enjoy sports. In any case, it is necessary to have the
freedom to enjoy life.
In this way a healthy person has many kinds of traits,
but among them some are more important than others. To
be able to keep on doing constructive activities is the most
important among them. Without this characteristic one
cannot be called a complete, authentic person.
In addition, our personalities vary. For example, some
people are good at speaking and some are not. Some people
speak well and often, but being taciturn does not prevent
one from being fully adult. There are many great people
who are taciturn but, on the other hand, there
are some
who fail because they speak too much. There are
some who
CONDITIONS FOR A MENTALLY HEALTHY LIFE / 47

are able to serve others by talking a lot, but there are others
who make slips of the tongue and who hurt the feelings of
others by talking too much. In this way, it is usually better
to have various abilities, but it does not matter too much if
you do not have them. Being good at drawing is better than
being poor at it, but even if you are bad at it, that fact does
not mean you are unhealthy.
I have enumerated many general characteristics of
healthy people. If you think about these conditions in
everyday life, then you will have an awareness of how you
should live and what you should do to be a healthy person.
If there is something contradictory inside yourself, then you
should reflect upon yourself to find out what is wrong or
overdone, and then you can become a healthy person if you
control yourself.
It is a basic principle for a neurotic person to live a
healthy life in order to become healthy. Living a healthy life
means that we should apply our abilities and approach the
outside world with correct attitudes. Neurotic symptoms
cannot be cured by resting. In other words, if you lead a life
filled with the desire to do, see, listen, and know, and if you
are actually practicing what you desire and you feel you do
not have enough time, then on the whole you are leading a
healthy life. If you avoid struggling with and trying to
eliminate or escape from your symptoms, and if you keep
such a healthy life, then eventually your symptoms will
disappear.
In Zen there are such expressions as tongo (sudden
enlightenment) and zengo (enlightenment that comes
unnoticed). Tongo means to gain enlightenment suddenly
for a particular reason: suddenly your frame of mind opens
up. This kind of thing occurs once in a while, but you can-
not expect it to happen. Zengo means to gain enlightenment
by gradually accumulating it, hence enlightenment occurs
even though one is not aware of it. Neurosis is cured in this
way.
While you steadily lead a healthy life, one day you look
back and realize through your experience that you are
nearly freed from old limitations caused by your symptoms.
48 / HOW TO LIVE WELL

This realization becomes another stage of your enlighten-


ment. Gradually the experiences of your healthy life
accumulate and lead to even greater development. We can
say that neurotic people can attain enlightenment in this
way.
7
Self-rtwarencss of
Geiug Tmperfect

“My Facial Expressions Disturh Others”


Many people who are anxious in their encounters with
others are afraid that they give others negative impressions
by their facial expressions. There is no way of knowing
what others think, but this idea takes strong hold of them.
They suffer from various anxieties, becoming obsessed with
such fears. Their obsessions may focus on their body odors,
the shapes of their faces or heads, and so on, but as long as
they keep their obsessions, they cannot be cured.
Once there was a man who felt badly about the back of
his head protruding. When I asked the reason, he told me
his story. In his junior high school there was a teacher
whose nickname was “charcoal-engine car” because the
back of his head stuck out. The charcoal-engine cars used
when there was no gasoline during the war had big humps
in the back where they burned charcoal. Since the
teacher’s head had a bump in the back, his nickname was
“charcoal-engine car.”
49
50 / HOW TO LIVE WELL

The young man noticed that he also had a bump in the


back of his head when he touched it. “This is terrible, I also
have become a “charcoal-engine car.”
It weighed heavily on his mind, and he started feeling
that everyone was looking at his head. Strangely, he had
never felt self-conscious before, but once he started
worrying, he felt everyone looking at his head. You
probably realize that his feelings were purely subjective.
Finally he went to a surgeon and asked him to scrape
off part of his skull. He said the doctor had given in to his
incessant demands and had done the operation. I could not
tell whether the doctor had actually removed any tissue or
not, but the man was relieved at the time.
However, this did not solve his problem. This time his
sister said, “Your jaw is sticking out.” He was worrying
about his jaw when he came to me. He said, “Doctor, my
jaw is weighing on mind, and I feel everyone is looking at
me.”
He had stopped worrying about the back of his head
since he had undergone cosmetic surgery, but now he began
to think about his jaw. He asked, “Doctor, should I scrape
off part of my jaw?” If he did, he would have a blank face
without features, like the surface of an egg, a comical sight.
As you can see in this example, any incident can lead a
neurotic into worrying about something that he has never
questioned before. He suddenly thinks that everyone is
paying attention to him, looking down upon his strangeness.
In his case, the neurotic symptom of worrying about the
back of his head was only temporarily improved by surgery;
he simply changed the object of his anxiety.
The cause of his apparent improvement by surgery,
and of the reappearance of his symptoms, was that his basic
mental attitude had not yet developed properly. He did not
really get well. He had surgery, and he seemed better, but
that was only superficial and temporary. His inner
tendency was a distortion in his personality, the tendency to
protect himself, and it had persisted in spite of the surgery.
This self-centered defense is a personality distortion.
He was only interested in protecting himself, so he was very
SELF-AWARENESS / 51

sensitive to stimulation from the outside world. “How do


others see me and think of me? How do I look to other
people?” Such matters really worried him.
Instead of attending to the reality of the outside world,
he had an attitude of trying to protect himself from the
stimulation, and so he became over-sensitive as a matter of
course. His fundamental attitude had not been cured, so
even if one symptom was eliminated, another one soon
appeared.
Another man was cured from the fear of venereal
disease, but soon developed cancer phobia. After many
blood tests he understood that he did not have venereal
disease, and his fear of it disappeared. Then he soon started
worrying about getting cancer. This means he had some
distortion in his personality in which his fundamental
attitude was to protect himself intensely, even if his
superficial symptoms disappeared by some chance. When
such a tendency is not cured, if one superficial symptom
disappears, there is a possibility that a patient will develop
another symptom following some incident. That is why
neurotic symptoms will also disappear if one’s personality
distortion disappears.

The rérrogauce of Social Aruriety


Neurotics are somewhat dependent upon other people, and
they worry about what others think of them. Yet the
opinions of others are often hard to assess. Although they
do not understand the opinions of others, still neurotics tend
to believe that others think them strange or look down upon
them. They try to defend themselves from the judgments of
the world. In extreme terms, people with strong social
anxieties think that no one should ever think badly of them.
Seen from the other side, we can say that such a psychology
is arrogant. The psychology of not wanting others to think
badly of them means, in other words, that they want to be
seen as perfect individuals. Properly speaking, they should
be more humble. It may not be advantageous to have faults
52 / HOW TO LIVE WELL

and weaknesses, and sometimes others may dislike us, but


nothing can be done about that. It is better for people to
believe that they are all right as long as they do the best they
can do.
Another objection to this social anxiety is that one
places more importance on his public image rather than his
real self. He believes it is sufficient that others see him as
good, regardless of his true character. Extended to ex-
tremes, it is no good to be seen as stupid by others although
it is all right to be stupid. In any case, placing excessive
importance on one’s public image leads him to fear real
contact with other people. That is why he cannot easily
disclose himself as he is.
It is natural to care about the opinions of the world,
and it would be strange to be totally unconcerned. If no one
cared about the opinions of others, society would fall into
chaos. However, this is strictly a matter of degree; some are
neurotic and some are within normal boundaries. Anxiety
about interpersonal relations is necessary to a certain
degree. However, if one becomes too sensitive to accept the
idea of others disliking him even a little, he suffers from
disappointment, making himself depressed.
On such occasions he should disclose himself as he is
and strive toward his immediate goals, even with his fear of
people, his timidness or his nervousness. When one is giving
a speech, for instance, the first consideration should be the
content of what to say at the moment and how to say it
clearly. It is important to leave feelings as they are at the
time, whether they are good or bad.
I was afraid of other people when I was young. I think
I probably spoke very awkwardly in front of people. I used
to memorize everything I was going to say because I did not
want to make any mistakes. Far from going smoothly, it
usually went just the opposite. My feeling when speaking in
front of a group was different from when I was at home
thinking. If I got off the track by accident, then it was
different from what I had memorized, so I would become
confused.
SELF-AWARENESS / 53

In such cases it is not necessary to memorize the entire


speech; all that is necessary is to commit only the outline of
your talk to memory and to speak according to the outline.
If you try to speak from rote memory and make one mistake
you get all upset. A plan that is too detailed is much harder
to follow, so you tend to get disgusted with it right away.
Since neurotic people have strong desires for perfection,
they make detailed plans in order to avoid mistakes, but
then they cannot carry them out. If you simply outline your
plans, then you should be able to put them into practice.

Neurotic Symptoms
and

Among people who complain of insomnia and fear of


interpersonal contact there are some who continually take
medication. They say fear attacks them when they stop
taking their medicine. This is a kind of conditioned reflex.
To be released from such reflexes they have to practice self
control while gradually decreasing the dosage.
I would like to discuss conditioned reflexes briefly.
This is a theory which Pavlov developed, but we can often
see conditioned reflexes in everyday life. In the evening my
dog barks and jumps on me, but he does not act that way in
the daytime. In the evening I usually take him for a walk,
so he probably imagines taking a walk when he thinks of
evening. This is a conditioned reflex toward time.
A dog salivates when it sees meat. If you set a large
cover over the dog at that moment, the salivation stops
immediately. The mental influence over salivation is such
that there is no appetite when anxiety is strong; the dog is
now more concerned with the cover, and the work of the
gastrointestinal system, including salivation, stops. At
Koseiin we use a chime to announce meal times, so when
we hear the chime, our mouths water. To break this
conditioned reflex we could repeatedly withhold meals after
the chime. Then the reflex would not occur when the chime
rang.
54 /HOW TO LIVE WELL

Neurotic symptoms tend to become like conditioned


reflexes. A person with an anxiety neurosis has an attack in
a streetcar. He feels afraid, wondering whether he will be
able to see a doctor when he is so close to dying. After he
has such an experience, the same feeling occurs every time
he gets on a streetcar. This is a kind of conditioned reflex.
It takes time to cure conditioned reflexes. When I quit
smoking, it had become like a conditioned reflex. I had a
habit of smoking right after waking up in the morning, so I
wanted to smoke when I woke up, even after I had stopped.
It was the same way after meals. This desire continued
over a period of several weeks.
To cure something like conditioned reflexes you must
leave such responses as they are and live your life positively
and constructively without being controlled by them, nor
escaping from them. Then it does not matter even if you
have such reflexes. The responses lose their potency,
gradually diminishing to nothing.

One of my university friends could not resist memorizing


the prefaces of textbooks before examinations in anatomy
and other subjects. It is necessary for students to memorize
a great deal; however, the fact that he could not resist
memorizing even prefaces showed his obsessive perfec-
tionism. Sometimes it is necessary to look at the larger
picture.
If one tries to perfect the details of something, he puts
too much energy into it to do anything else, and the whole of
his life becomes imperfect. For example, a person obsessed
with cleanliness washes his hands constantly. He
successfully cleans his hands by washing them, but he
cannot do anything else. When he touches anything even
slightly, he cannot but wash his hands again. His life
becomes very incomplete overall. One always needs to
change according to the situation, sometimes attending to
details as necessary, sometimes performing in a rough-and-
SELF-AWARENESS /55

ready way. Sometimes when one is busy, he roughly


completes something that he usually does with great care.
Of course, it is not good to do everything in a rough-and-
ready way because the quality of one’s work may suffer.
We often hear of the error of overgeneralizing. If one
tries to apply the same generalizations to everything, then
contradictions will surely occur. When psychoanalysts try
to attribute the cause of neurosis to repressed sexual desires,
many contradictions arise; sexual desire is only one of an
infinite variety of human desires. If one tries to apply one
rule to everything, contradictions increase. That is why it is
said that “The mind changes according to the cir-
cumstances, and the way it changes follows Buddha’s
teachings.” If one does not try to adapt to the changes of the
outside world, then it is difficult to live. If one tries to apply
the same principle to everything, then contradictions will
occur. To apply one’s own principles to everything is a
subjective, self-centered attitude. To adapt oneself to the
conditions of the outside world is an objective, reality-
centered attitude toward life.
‘ 7 ft ec ae ee A g M4

C ‘deoetans Velen a Ati, 9 ee a e eee


5
aud Gody
the Minding
pAdapt
When You rire at a Loss, Move 4rhead
Many people suffer from anxiety in their relations with
other people. They want to be able to speak naturally
without becoming too nervous in front of groups of people.
They also worry too much when they talk with someone
personally. They get tired, and it becomes painful for them
to talk with others at all.
Patients who suffer from abnormal fears of inter-
personal relations are the largest in numbers among
neurotics in Japan. Everyone has the same kind of fear,
and these patients are only slightly different from normal
people. Especially giving a first speech is painful for anyone.
I did not like it at all when I was a student. I tried to escape
from it as much as possible, and that is why I could not
improve. This can happen to anyone, so it is nothing
special. If you ask ten ordinary people, eight or nine of them
would say they do not like talking in front of large groups. It
is something we all must endure. Once you get used to it,
you can do it without feeling too much pain.
There are a few who simply love to talk in front of a
crowd, but such people do not necessarily speak well. Some

SY!
58 / HOWTO LIVE WELL

who do not mind talking in front of people often give


mediocre speeches because they feel that they can talk
about something without first giving it deep thought. I am
not a good speaker, so I did not, at first, even try to speak
well, but I tried very hard to improve the substance of my
speeches. It is important to think carefully and to
emphasize speaking with good content rather than with
good style. Even if one is very eloquent, a dull story can
never be anything but dull.
It is human nature to become nervous in front of many
people, and one cannot eliminate such nervousness from the
beginning. The first objective is to talk as clearly as
possible, even while one is nervous. I paid attention to that
principle. I came to the point where I never even thought
about being calm when speaking in front of many people. I
do not even think about or hope to speak calmly because it
is natural to be nervous to a certain degree. This is an
arugamama attitude: accepting it without running away.
When such an occasion does not match your ability at all,
there is nothing you can do, but otherwise it is better for you
to choose to do it.
Neurotic people tend to be very cautious and negative.
They do not act unless they have confidence. However,
people acquire confidence gradually through their
experiences; it does not always exist at first. In the
beginning they confront obstacles without confidence.
When you wonder whether you should do something or not,
it is better to do it. Of course, if it is wrong or too difficult,
there are cases when you should not act. However,
normally when you wonder if you can do something, you
can. If it is impossible in the first place, you would not even
wonder. Neurotics often escape from things they are
capable of doing, saying they do not have confidence. It is
not good to be so negative. That is why neurotics so rarely
employ the abilities they have.

RKauket Newys: “Euerything Pertains te We.”


When one suffers from a neurotic fear of eye contact (shise
n
kyofu), he strongly feels the gaze of people near him and
he
ADAPTING THE MIND AND BODY / 59

averts his gaze from others, disrupting his concentration on


what he is doing at the time. There are also some who
suspect that all environmental sounds or conversations
among others pertain to themselves. Although they cannot
hear clearly, they think everything is related to them.
In fact it is not so, but they imagine that everything has
something to do with them. They are so concerned about
protecting themselves that they find the outside world
oppressive. That is why they become wary when others are
talking, suspecting that these people are talking about them.
They cannot have the attitude of arugamama; that is, they
cannot leave what they do not know as unknown. When
others are laughing nearby, they think these people are
laughing at them. They tend to think that way especially
when they are anxious. Such perceptions are overdone, and
they can be considered somewhat morbid tendencies. It is
psychologically healthier to think it is all in your imagina-
tion: that is, others are talking nearby, and you do not know
what they are talking about because they are not talking
loudly.
Therefore, the correct attitude is to leave the unknown
as itis. It is wrong to try to settle it either way. Neurotics
tend to relate everything to themselves, which is a self-
centered attitude. That is why they are not in touch with
reality when they talk with others. The reality is the topic of
the dialogue or the business matter being discussed. They
should get on with the matter, but their attention goes to
themselves. They are always concerned about the opinions
of others, such as what others think of them or how others
see them. The psychology of interpersonal anxiety is
nothing but being enslaved by the perceived opinions of
others, and so they become very sensitive. They do not get
on with the topic or business matters. Instead they focus on
themselves and listen to others halfheartedly. That is why
they probably fail to hear so often. They cannot come up
with topics, either. Moreover, they become increasingly
confused when they face others. The important thing is not
self-awareness of their own feelings but an attitude of being
in touch with the reality outside themselves.
60 / HOW TO LIVE WELL

Auman Ceiugs rlre Aedaptable


Fundamentally our minds and bodies are meant to be
active. It is natural for a healthy person to be bored after a
week in bed because our real desire is to exercise our
abilities in dealing with the outside world.
There is a phrase, munen muso (freedom from all
thought), but this is merely a symbolic phrase. When one is
doing something intensely, his mind becomes one with the
object itself. This is called munen muso, but actually it is not
really munen muso. Rather, this is a state in which one’s
mind is acting fully. We use the phrase symbolically. In
fact, our brains are made so that we cannot help but think
or feel something when we are awake.
Our bodies are made to be active. In medicine the term
atrophy refers to something becoming weak and withered
when it is not used. That is, if one does not use his body, his
organs gradually weaken and become atrophied. Muscles
that are not used become atrophied. When one is in bed for
a long time, muscles shrivel. It becomes hard to walk.
They develop if used, so the leg muscles of athletes usually
develop remarkably. When one kidney is taken away, the
other starts working twice as much. In this way a function
develops greatly if used, and it withers away if not used. In
the same way our brains should be put to work.
Work makes one tired, and it becomes necessary to rest
the parts that have worked. In everyday life there is little
meaning in wasting time while one is awake. When one has
done mental work, he should follow it with physical work,
allowing his brain to rest. After work that requires heavy
use of one’s arms, light manual work will allow arm muscles
to rest. In this way, by changing work, the human body
does not require special times of rest besides those needed
for sleep.
Human organs are made to be active all the time. Our
hearts work without stopping, even while other organs are
resting. Anyone knows that if our heart stops, that is the
end of us. Living things are made that way. To make our
minds and bodies active is the way it should be, so it is not
good to leave them idle.
ADAPTING THE MIND AND BODY / 61

Humans belong to the most developed class of living


things. We have the greatest ability to change according to
the environment. That is why humans can live just about
any place. We can live in very cold places near the North
Pole, and we can live in very hot places, such as on the
equator. Compared to us other animals are not as flexible;
lions, for example, cannot live in cold places. Very flexible
living things have the ability to live any place because they
eat anything. Sparrows eat both cereal grains and insects;
they are omnivorous, so they can live and breed in many
climates. Some birds that live in tropical jungles come to eat
only certain kinds of food. Due to the abundance of food
they take to selectiveness among the extravagance. Then, if
such food happens to disappear, they may perish because
they have little adaptability.
Humans should change and adapt themselves to
changes in nature. Otherwise, they cannot do good work.
Sometimes we find people who do not understand that
reality. For example, a patient was watering garden plants
right after it had rained. When I said, “They are wet with
rain, so you don’t have to water them any more,” he
answered, “No, doctor. I made up my mind to water them
once a day.” He was trying to apply an inflexible principle
to the outside world. (Actually, there should be subtle
changes in watering potted plants. For example, unglazed
pots dry out much more quickly than glazed pots.) Just as
one decides how much water to give a plant according to the
actual dryness of the soil, you cannot do truly good work
unless you change adequately according to necessity. It is
useless to try to control the outside world by your principles
and your opinions. It is all right to have ideals, but trying to
control the outside world by inflexible principles leads to
stupidity.

Nature, Soctety, and Human Vudividuals


In the first place, the natural world is not made especially
convenient for human beings; nature already existed and
humans came afterwards. That is why life-threatening
62 /HOW TO LIVE WELL

bacteria spread if left to nature. In the past, even during


wartime, more people died of contagious disease than
because of war. For example, during the Crimean War
more deaths were caused by contagious diseases rather than
by the conflict itself. When we plant flowers or vegetables in
a garden and leave them alone to nature, they will probably
be destroyed by weeds or insects. That is why we have to
cope with nature, and unless we change appropriately we
cannot adapt to it.
Human society is made by people themselves, but it is
not made especially convenient for individuals. There are
many competitors, and if left to natural processes you
cannot adapt to it. We have to adapt ourselves according to
the circumstances. In fact, we are actually making
adjustments all the time.
For example, we Japanese have an immense variety of
ways of bowing when we greet people; but, if one decides
that bowing always should be done in a particular polite
way, then it becomes odd. In principle one should be
courteous and try not to hurt the feelings of other people.
Such a principle should be valued, but the actual way of
bowing should be flexible. It is improper to make a certain
polite bow one’s motto or to greet even small children with
formal polite expressions. In practice it depends on the
other person’s circumstances. For example, when the other
person is in a hurry, it is no good to repeat polite bows. On
such occasions it is all right to greet someone simply. In
cases of exchanging formal greetings, such as on New
Year’s Day, we greet others very politely. A person should
modify his behavior according to the situation; otherwise he
may have many awkward encounters.
Therefore, if one insists that something always should
be a certain way, he cannot adapt. He should change
himself according to the situation, as others do uncon-
sciously.

Unreliable Evaluation and Tutelligence Testing


Humans tend to think that standards are very convenient.
In fact, life has become more convenient through the use of
ADAPTING THE MIND AND BODY / 63

artificial standards. For example, in government offices the


daily working hours are fixed. They could not increase
their productivity if some workers began at seven in the
morning and others began at eight at night. That is why it is
necessary to make certain standards. Children below a
certain age may use public transportation for half fare, and
other such standards are established.
There are also standards for intelligence: someone with
an IQ below 70 is considered mentally retarded. However,
even if such a standard is imposed, one may question a
score of 71 or 69. There is no strict boundary since it is only
an approximate standard. Many years ago, in the psy-
chiatry department at Tokyo University, someone studied
what had happened after ten years to people who had been
diagnosed as mentally retarded. The results were very
interesting, and while reviewing them I felt that, after all, the
value of a human being cannot be measured by mere
intelligence tests. There were many cases of people whose
IQ scores were under 70, so-called mentally retarded people,
who were doing great work. Among them there was, for
example, a man who had completed only elementary school,
but who was employing men with higher diplomas.
Therefore, it is wrong to say that someone’s intelligence
is inferior or superior by the results of their school records
or ‘their intelligence tests. A school record is only a partial
sign of human ability; it is not the whole. There are many
people whose intelligence is supposedly superior, but who
still cannot do good work in society. It is the same among
doctors. I know, because I have been a doctor at a uni-
versity for a long time. Some who were very bright at the
university are not popular at all when they practice
medicine. Many doctors who are prospering and building
big hospitals are people whose university records were not
very good. My students are the same. There is one who
once failed the medical board examinations, but he went on
to build a big hospital and is now doing very well.
The capacity for activity among people, their attractive-
ness and such do not appear in school records. There is a
typical example in my home town. A man who was ahead
- 64/ HOW TO LIVE WELL

of me in junior high school was given a model student


award since his school records were very good. He
graduated from Tokyo University Medical School, became
a professor at a district medical school, and then started a
private practice in his home town. He was a very bright
man, but he did not have a large practice at all. He
struggled for several years, but eventually he had to go to
work for another hospital.
In my junior high school there was another student
whose grades were so poor that he failed. He used to say, “I
cannot do well at school because there is something wrong
with my nose,” and he went through cosmetic surgery. He
said he was all right later, but he failed again. After all, his
poor school record was not due to his nose. In many cases it
is wrong when one attributes his failure or success to this or
that cause. The same man later graduated from a medical
school, studied several more years at a university, and
meanwhile he received his certificate and started practicing
medicine. He developed a large practice. He even became
the president of a medical association. Given that there are
such people, it can be said that academic ability and the
ability to act practically in the world are different.

Falu
tu General
re Practice,
Succesas a Scholar
s
One cannot judge a person’s value by looking at only one
side of him. Just the opposite of the previous case, there was
a teacher who did not have much success as a general
practitioner; however he became a very great scholar.
Professor Tahara, who specialized in pathology at Kyushu
University, is the case I have in mind. This professor
discovered the fascicle [bundle of nerve fibers] that transmits
stimulation to the heart, and now his name is recorded in
anatomy books in reference to Tahara’s Fascicle. He was
very good academically, but he was not popular as a general
practitioner after his graduation from Tokyo University.
Even we, his students, could guess from hearing him that he
ADAPTING THE MIND AND BODY / 65

had not been popular as a general practitioner. When he


was giving pathology lectures, he would say something like,
“This disease sometimes can be cured and sometimes
cannot be cured. Some people die from it.” He spoke very
bluntly, so of course he would not have been popular as a
general practitioner. (Translator’s note: In Japan, doctors
rarely disclose bad news directly to their patients. It is
considered wrong to tell someone that he has a fatal disease,
for example. Most doctors would disclose such information
to a member of the patient’s family.) However, he later
went into the academic world since he could not succeed as
a general practitioner, and then he exercised his tremendous
ability. Human beings have many kinds of abilities; some
have opportunities to apply them, and some do not.
Hokinoichi Hanawa (1746-1782), the great Edo Era
scholar of classical Japanese literature, was blind. In those
days blind men ordinarily practiced music. Even today
there are great blind koto players, but in the past there were
many masters of the koto among the blind. However,
Hokinoichi Hanawa was not good at music. He was tone
deaf and simply had no talent at all. At last, he devoted
himself to study, and then he displayed great ability. Since
humans have a variety of abilities, even if one does not
succeed in using one of them, he may do well using a
different ability.

Beware of Perfectioniam
Nevertheless, it is no good to keep changing jobs by
criticizing one’s present work. Once I had an outpatient
who had changed jobs three times. She would quit a job
before she even got used to it. She would quit within two
months or so, complaining, “This job does not seem to suit
my personality,” or, “It is too difficult for me.” Some quit
working after a year, saying that it is too difficult or
something, but there is no way that they can get used to a
job in only one year. Some people quit when they feel that
their superiors are cruel or that they are not kind enough to
66 / HOW TO LIVE WELL

take time to teach them. If the job does not fit them at all,
then it may be better to quit, but no one can adjust in a short
time. When people do the same work for ten years or so,
they become experts. There are many hurdles to overcome
before one gets used to one’s work. You have to realize
more fully that society is not made especially for your
convenience.
If you are too concerned about yourself only, you be-
come very sensitive. However, if you deepen your interest in
the outside world, then you will be freed from self-centered
obsessions. It is important to place emphasis on dealing
with the reality of the outside world, regardless of your
feelings. Since feelings change like the weather, you should
do what you have to do, whether your feelings are positive
or negative, leaving them as they are.
When the desire for perfection is strong, one tends to
say, “I cannot do it well enough.” This is the worst possible
attitude. Perfect conditions are rare, and so even if we can
do only fifty or sixty percent of something, we do it. Every-
one wants to do something perfectly, but if his expectations
are too high for his abilities, his efforts will result in
disappointment every time. It is good to expect just a little
above your average ability, so aim just a little above normal.
For example, if you are going to play mini-golf at Koseiin,
and your normal score is 25, then you should aim for 22 or
23 today. If you aim for 18, you will be greatly disappointed.
Your adaptation to the outside world should be based
on reality. Contradictions increase rapidly if you try to
apply your own principles to the world. There is a dif-
ference between the way the world should be and the Way it
is. It is wonderful to have high ideals, but you should think
of an ideal as something that comes much later. The reality
is that you are far below such high expectations.
When one has neurotic symptoms, the gap between
idealistic standards and actual ability widens by attention to
ideals. As one becomes cured of neurosis, he reduces the
gap between his ideal standard and his actual ability,
learning a more practical view of human life.
G
Uuplearaut
but Necessary

Views of Equality aud Views of Unigueness


The most common form of neurosis is an abnormal fear of
interpersonal encounters. However, people who have
symptoms of this neurosis tend to think they are special, and
when they think they are special they suffer even more.
This principle is true in general, not only for neurotic
symptoms. If you think that you are the only victim of a
tragedy, then you feel very unhappy, but when you suffer
misfortune together with others you do not feel as des-
pondent. For example, you would feel very unhappy if your
house were the only one lost in a fire, but during the war all
the houses in the neighborhood were burned, and in that
case everyone felt some solidarity. In such a case you
would feel less miserable than if only your house had been
destroyed.
The fear of other people is very common, and if you are
ever hospitalized in Koseiin, you will know that, indeed,
there are many people who have this fear. To be able to
appreciate that your problems are shared by others is a
spirit of equality (byodo-kan). If, instead, you think that you
of
are the only one who is suffering, you have a spirit
67
68 /HOW TO LIVE WELL

discrimination (sabetsu-kan). That is, when others appear to


be talking calmly in front of people, it is discriminatory to
think that you are the only one who feels nervous. People
who discriminate in this way do not sympathize at all with
those who can talk in front of people. Ordinarily we
sympathize with others when they speak before people,
thinking that they must be suffering because we ourselves
suffer when we do it.
When, in the spirit of discrimination, we see another
person studying, he seems to be studying easily. On the
other hand, when we study it is very difficult, so we do not
sympathize with others at all when we see them studying.
We think they are fortunate to be able to study so easily.
Ordinary people do not think that way. They know that
they study by suffering and enduring hardships, so when
they see others studying, they admire them, thinking, “They
are studying hard although they must be suffering from it.”
That is the spirit of equality.
In the first place, human nature gives us much in
common. There are individual differences, but we had
better realize that human beings have quite a lot in
common. The differences are comparatively fewer than the
commonalities, so that which you do not like is usuall
y
something others do not like, either. Some like drinking
very much and some hate it, but instead of emphasizing
such individual differences, we should stress what
we have
in common. Otherwise we can feel neither compassion
nor
sympathy toward others. Sociability means to recogn
ize
and value the common elements of human nature, and
by
doing so we develop as social beings.

Huriety Neurssis aud the


Hutonsmie Nervous System
Some people are very afraid of going out, compl
aining
that they cannot breathe or that their hearts
race; in fact,
they almost never collapse, they merely feel that
they may.
This is nothing but a pattern of anxiety neuro
sis. Anxiety
UNPLEASANT BUT NECESSARY / 69

neurotics tend to be controlled easily by their feelings. When


they have anxiety about collapsing, their sympathetic nerves
become tense, and their pulse quickens. They naturally
start thinking that they may have heart failure at any
moment, and they fear dying. This, in turn, makes their
anxiety stronger, so their hearts beat even faster. Sympa-
thetic nerve tension or autonomic imbalances occur. They
begin to experience various symptoms. Some break into a
cold sweat, some experience trembling of their hands and
feet, some feel powerless in their limbs. Some feel the rush
of blood going up to the head, and some feel the blood
rushing down from the head; there is a great deal of variety.
The stomach and the intestines are controlled by the auto-
nomic nervous system, so when one has fear, the functions
of the stomach stop or one loses his appetite.
Many people have committed suicide at Kegon Falls in
Nikko. I actually saw the dead bodies once. When I went
sightseeing in Nikko, I looked into the bottom of the
waterfall and saw two dead bodies on top of a rock, victims
of a double suicide. They had been pushed out from the
waterfall. They were far down from where I was, so they
looked very small. Nikko is a famous place for suicide, and
people who want to die gather around there. Mihara-yama
in Oshima is the same. There are several other places
which are famous for suicides in Japan. That is why in
such places innkeepers can more or less tell, “This person
came here to die.” Usually when people arrive at an inn,
they have large appetites and eat a lot, but people who go in
order to commit suicide do not eat much. Once they decide
to die, they have no appetite. Their digestive fluids do not
appear and their stomachs stop working. They feel heavy in
the stomach, and they probably do not feel like eating. I
once heard from an innkeeper in Nikko that he watches out
for such people, thinking, “This person may commit
suicide.”
People have individual differences, but they are all alike
in their fear of symptoms. People who fear interpersonal
encounters say, “Those with heart anxieties are nothing.
They know they are not going to die no matter how hard
70 / HOW TO LIVE WELL

their hearts beat. We who are afraid of meeting people have


real problems because we have to contact others every day.”
However, people with heart neuroses would say, “Those
who fear contact with people complain that they have a
hard time when they see others, but their bodies have
nothing wrong. They are not going to die from it, but if my
heart stops, that is the end of me. How terrible!” Neurotics
do not understand the seriousness of each other’s problems,
and they tend to think other persons have foolish symptoms,
but they are very serious about their own symptoms. If they
can merely recognize that their own symptoms are also
objectively comical, then they have made great progress.

Symptoms rbre Subjective


There are various neurotic manifestations: some people
have various physical symptoms, and some have anxiety or
pain, as in obsessive neurosis. However, every symptom is
fundamentally something that can occur to any ordinary
person who, wishing he did not have it, can then make it
special, reject it, and become more conscious of it as a
result. That process becomes a habit. Whenever he meets
the same kind of occasion, such symptoms may occur like
conditioned reflexes. However, the symptoms are purely
subjective, and the reality is not really such a great cause for
alarm.
The reality is within the ordinary physiological or
psychological range, and there is no need to attach great
importance to it. To take such matters too seriously is
against the principle of reality being the only truth. Of
course, facts have some truth in themselves, but everyone
experiences such facts as stomach disorders, heavy-headed
feeling, tension or a rapid pulse. Those are facts, but to take
them too seriously is a failure to recognize the realistic range
of experience as truth.
A boy who once came to Koseiin when he was 17 or 18
years old was very afraid of agricultural chemicals. I
suppose it was a kind of mysophobia, a fear of unclean-
UNPLEASANT BUT NECESSARY /71

liness. Personally, I think it is natural to be afraid of them.


We do not fear agricultural chemicals enough, which is why
pollution is spreading and causing harm. I should say we
have to be afraid of agricultural chemicals. We should make
the use of them stricter, control the amount of use, and
prohibit those that are dangerous. These suggestions all
come from the important thought that agricultural
chemicals are fearful and dangerous. However, in his case
it went too far. He strongly believed pollution existed where
there was no danger. He could not eat fruit or vegetables
without carefully washing them. He felt that they were
covered with chemicals, and he washed them with soap. He
would use up one bar of soap in only three days.
There is a necessary psychological process for humans.
It is the feeling that agricultural chemicals are dangerous, or
that heart failure is frightening, or that other people cause
anxiety and so on, and to a certain degree it is necessary.
Such feelings are not given needlessly since we can still say
that fear is necessary for human beings. If we did not have
fear, I do not know how many more people would die in
traffic accidents every day. When a car is rushing toward
you, you will be run over if you are perfectly calm and
collected. Since you have fear, you try to avoid it instantly.
If you have no fear of illness, you will not keep hygienic
practices. If you have no fear of other people, then you may
start speaking without reserve in front of anyone.
Some people have an illness called mania. They really
do not have the slightest propriety, and they speak without
reserve. They are very sharp and quick thinking, so their
listeners cannot tolerate them. Such people may also speak
the truth, which many people do not want to hear. When
such people are in mental hospitals, they vigorously attack
nurses verbally. They say extremely severe things and
make the nurses angry. The nurses retaliate, and then you
cannot tell which are the patients. Such patients have no
fear of facing others.
As I mentioned above, something like worrying about
illness, which is a neurotic symptom, is necessary for all of
us human beings. It is necessary but unpleasant, like a
72 / HOW TO LIVE WELL

necessary vice. And so everyone wants to accomplish


everything without strain, study effortlessly, meet others
without nervous tension, and be free of anxiety no matter
what their physical condition. We think of these things, but
inevitably we cannot deny the truth. The more we think of
such matters, the more we worry. We worry double: we
worry about worrying. We wonder, “Why do I worry so
much?” Ordinary people care about these things. Never-
theless they do whatever needs to be done, so they become
free from them without awareness.

Tuconvencence: The Raat of Tuveution


When we begin to do something, we sometimes feel very
weary. When the weariness becomes worse, we do not
want to do it at all. At that time we think, “I wish I did not
have this feeling of inconvenience.” We think we would be
able to work at ease, and work more efficiently, if we did not
feel bothered by the inconvenience of doing something.
However, we can understand that this psychology of weari-
ness is necessary after all. If we did not feel that something
were troublesome, we would not invent all the devices that
increase our productivity. Only since we have felt bothered
by inconvenience has automation developed rapidly. Push-
button automation has eliminated the need to handle many
objects one by one, and such devices were born from the
feeling of inconvenience. It is very troublesome to carry
bricks one at a time, so wheels were invented from thinking,
“Is there a way to carry many of them at once somehow?”
The ancient Inca empire is considered a Stone Age
culture. I understand that they made castle walls using very
large stones, but that they did not have wheels at that time.
So I think they must have had a very hard time. I wonder jf
they had the feeling that it was very troublesome.
I suppose wheels were invented from the hint that one
can move heavy things by rolling them on poles. Once
wheels were invented people could carry several dozen
bricks at one time. Then perhaps they felt it was less
UNPLEASANT BUT NECESSARY / 73

troublesome. It was still troublesome to move the wheels by


themselves, so they had cows and horses pull them. Then
they had to take care of the cows and horses, so they in turn
became troublesome. So next they began to use steam,
electricity or gasoline. Many inventions have appeared from
the feeling that something was troublesome.
I have heard that Thomas Edison was once a railroad
flagman. Although Edison wanted to study and read, he
had to watch for trains all the time. It was very troublesome
to watch all the time, so he wanted to automate the signals.
That is how railroad signals were invented. If there is no
possibility of invention, then one just has to do troublesome
things with the knowledge that they are annoying.
If you try to do troublesome things without acknow-
ledging that they are inconvenient, then you get into mental
conflict by thinking, “Why do I find this so annoying?” You
may develop an inferiority complex, thinking you are inept.
If there is no possible convenient way of doing something,
then there is not much you can do about it, so you endure
the work while acknowledging that it is inconvenient. If you
try to do it at ease without thinking of it as troublesome,
then you get into a mental contradiction.
Most toilets today can be flushed, so they do not smell
so bad, but all toilets in the past were foul-smelling. You
could not clean a toilet without having the thought of how
terrible it smelled. But one would get used to the smell while
doing it, and the feeling would disappear. Likewise, if you
try to do something repulsive without thinking of it as
repulsive, then you get into a contradiction. Repulsive
things are repulsive; you do them anyway. As time passes
you often end up not feeling repelled that much anymore. If
you try to do it without thinking it repugnant, when it is
primarily repulsive, you develop an inferiority complex by
thinking, “Why do I feel this way? Others can do it easily,
but I have to do it very reluctantly.”
Arugamama means to do undesirable things as un-
desirable. You may do it nervously or cautiously, but you
get in touch with the present reality and go along with it.
74 |HOW TO LIVE WELL
Understanding, Practice, aud Martery
In most cases you cannot escape from the psychological
processes that accompany certain things you do, so you do
what needs to be done by leaving your feelings as they are
and by understanding that such feelings are common. You
do not try to change your feelings, but you proceed, along
with your feelings, to the work that faces you. This is the
attitude of arugamama, which is important to realize and
practice.
It is important to see reasons in all matters, but it is
more important to master something through practice.
Even if you understand something in your mind, it does not
mean you have mastered it. Of course, it is natural that if
you understand something, it is easier to practice it. When
you are told to do something you have not understood, it is
very often hard to do. It may become easy to do when you
understand it. At any rate practice is important; an
armchair theory is of little use.
Neurotic persons do not act because they do not have
confidence. Many of them are concerned about their lack of
confidence, but no one has confidence in that which he has
never done before. For example, even if I were told to cut
someone’s hair by becoming an apprentice to a barber, I
would have no confidence. If I did it, it would be a great
nuisance to the person whose hair was cut. You have to
practice such things, and gradually you will be able to do
them. Then you gain confidence. Barbers do the same
thing every day without thinking about their confidence;
however, they do not do their work confidently in the
beginning.
In the case of swimming, when people first go into the
water, they do not have confidence in being able to swim.
You simply move your arms and legs, floating or sinking.
Then you get used to being in the water, you lose your fear,
and you discover that you can float if you move your hands
and feet. That is how you learn to swim naturally. I
learned how to swim when I was in primary school because
there was a stream nearby, but I do not know how I learned
to swim. While I was flailing my hands and feet, I became
UNPLEASANT BUT NECESSARY / 75

capable of swimming without knowing it. Then I started


doing diving and such.
Neurotics avoid trying to do things because they do not
have confidence, so they tend to become very negative.
However, if they run away because they doubt themselves,
they will never have any confidence. They do not make any
progress unless they try things that they think are a little too
difficult. People with anxiety neuroses should go out when
they have occasion to do so. People who have an abnormal
fear of facing others should meet people who are especially
hard to deal with if they have business with them. By
actually doing it they learn that they can do it. They
naturally discover that something they considered difficult is
not such a great thing after all.
It is important to understand through your own
experience, not just by understanding in your mind. There
is a big difference between what one understands in theory
and what he understands from experience. No matter how
it is explained, one cannot know what water is. He does not
understand even if he is taught the elements of water and its
molecular formula. But, once he puts his hands in water, he
knows very clearly, “Ah, so this is water!” Such is actual
experience.
While you are doing something, even something you
consider difficult, it is not beyond your ability as long as you
are doing it. It is important to have such experiences. If
you do not like to talk in front of many people, it is normal.
You get nervous doing it knowing you attract the public
gaze. Unless you get nervous, unless you get a little tense,
your brain does not react well. Also, your body does not
work actively either.
When you are in an exciting situation you need the
power of your muscles. Your brain has to work quickly.
Your blood pressure goes up. Your pulse accelerates in
order to meet the demand. Therefore, if you are concerned
only about the fact that you are nervous, or if you think you
should not get tense or blush in front of people, then these
reactions are impediments. In fact, however, such reactions
are natural. Accept them. You will feel a lot better.
Instead of hindering you, they can make your brain work
76 / HOW TO LIVE WELL

even more actively. Accept all of these as physiological or


psychological reactions given to you from necessity and
keep on moving ahead. You must not think they should not
exist just because you do not like them.
Pat 3S

“The Ersseuce of
Morita “lherapy
70
Neurstic Pernonality “hacning
_ I would like to base this chapter on a neurotic person whom I
_ know very well: myself. This patient was born in the year Meiji
32, or 1899. A difference of one year has made me a relic of the
19th century.
I was born in the countryside in Kagoshima Prefecture.
My father was from pure Kagoshima stock, and my mother was
from Tokyo. My family, a medical family, had only two
children, my elder sister and I. As the only son I was spoiled.
There were many books in my house, and so I began to
read a lot at an early age. Compared with other children in my
class, I had a clear head full of knowledge. However, I was very
immature in practical matters. The disparity was enormous. I
could not do what other children, who seemed inferior to me,
could do much better. On one hand I had an inferiority complex,
and on the other I had a superiority complex in learning. I
suffered from this contradiction since I was very young.

Vuperiority Compler and the


Beginning of Neurotic Symptoms
In middle school I had my likes and dislikes among the
various subjects that we studied. It might have had some-

79
80 /HOW TO LIVE WELL

thing to do with my environment, but I had a willful


personality so I worked hard at studying my favorite
subjects but not at studying those that were distasteful to
me. Especially in military training there was an army drill
instructor who often picked on me because I was a perfect
target. Whenever he ordered me to face right, I would turn
my head left. He used to say, “Kora doesn’t even know
right from left. Even a cow knows right and left, so Kora is
worse than a cow.”
I was bad at army training exercises. I hated doing
something without knowing the reason for doing it. I could
not understand why we had to line up and go right or left, or
why we had to make double lines. Also, I used to daydream
during the class because I had a vivid imagination. That is
why I did such stupid things in practical matters. I did not
even know the order of presenting arms, and so I was often
punished by being ordered to stand and practice.
The teacher was so uneducated, even in the eyes of
middle school students, that he sometimes said strange
things like, “After you go to go march...” or “Taking
bathing takes away your fatigue.” At first I was impressed
with his polite way of speaking, thinking, “Indeed, to ‘go to
go march’ makes you tired, and ‘taking bathing’ feels good.”
He also said things like, “When you go out scouting, you
sometimes have to use your four-legged four legs,” or,
“There is one lone tree over there.”
He said such things so often that I gave most of my
attention to his way of speaking. That’s why I couldn’t tell
right from left sometimes. He scolded me so often about the
same things that I yawned, which infuriated him. Every
time the military drill period neared, I started having heavy
feelings and pain in my head. Such bodily symptoms arising
from psychological problems are now known as psycho-
somatic disorders. Nevertheless, I still attended every class
in spite of the pain, something a weak-willed person would
not have done.
From that time on I began having neurotic symptoms
and became afraid of facing people. Once when we had to
choose someone to give a speech, it looked like I would be
the one. I had to manage not to be chosen, so I tried to read
NEUROTIC PERSONALITY TRAINING / 81

awkwardly when the teacher called on me. I tried to prove


that I could not give a speech in order to avoid being elected.
I received second place in the election, so I did not have to
give a speech. In that way I began to suffer real agony in
speaking in front of groups of people.
Interestingly, however, my school conduct improved
after I started having neurotic symptoms. The school
records had three ranks of conduct: High, Middle, and Low.
Until then I used to receive ‘Middle’ every time, which
meant that my conduct was pretty bad. In the fourth and
fifth grades I received ‘High’ in conduct, not because I had
become a serious pupil, but because I had become quiet due
to my symptoms.

Spirctual Enlightenment tu Suffering


After graduating from middle school I entered Dai-Shichi
High School in Kagoshima City. In the beginning I lived in
a dormitory. Pupils came from all over Japan, perhaps
because the entrance examination was held in Tokyo.
Having come alone from a country school, I had
difficulty adjusting. A variety of symptoms began to appear.
I always felt heavy-headed. Everyone wore a school cap
then, but I carried my cap in my hand because I felt a weight
on my head when I put it on. I had severe headaches some-
times, and I suffered from insomnia. I felt fatigued. I could
not concentrate. I was afraid of facing other people. I
suffered from many such symptoms.
I wrote down all my symptoms and took the list to the
school doctor. He told me to tell the school that I should
rest and not study because I had shinkei suijaku (nervous
prostration). I remember him giving me a tranquilizer. The
theory of shinkei suijaku in those days was that a variety of
symptoms were caused by nervous breakdown as a result of
overwork. Since shinkei suijaku was caused by overwork,
naturally I should rest and not study. Because of his
diagnosis I did not study at all for one semester. In fact, it
was hard for me to study anyway.
82 /HOW TO LIVE WELL

However, instead of being at ease not doing any


homework, I became more frustrated when I saw other
students studying. I still had to take the examinations at the
end of the term. Since it was not my real intention to idle
away my time without studying, my insomnia and other
symptoms became worse.
When I entered high school my school grades were
very good, but by the end of the first semester my grades
were far down, as I had feared. In my desperation I thought,
“This is terrible. I don’t want to stay back one year. I had
better do whatever I can. I have nothing to lose. I don’t
care even if I go crazy because my shinkei suijaku gets
worse.” That was the worst time for me, but I studied,
although I knew that my studying was not efficient.
However, when the results of the examinations was
announced, my record was much better.
That is how I attained enlightenment. The school
doctor had been wrong to advise me not to study. First, I
discovered that it was not true that shinkei suijaku would be
cured by not studying. Moreover, I realized that I could
study in spite of such symptoms, and that whatever I did
resulted in something, even when I thought I was doing it
inefficiently.
However, I was in a trying situation. Even now I
remember taking my list of symptoms to the doctor. Many
patients come to me with such lists. After I began to
specialize in psychiatry, I found a passage in a German
textbook which said, “Every patient who comes to a doctor
with a piece of paper is a neurotic patient.” I was one of them.
Although I attained some enlightenment that way, it
did not mean my symptoms improved. I was still afraid of
facing other people, but the other students did not know that
I had such fears. I did not say much because I did not want
to talk to people. I looked aloof from the world, and the
other boys in the dormitory gave me the nickname
“astronomer,” indicating that my head was in the clouds. I
was not aloof with enlightenment, but I looked smug
because I did not want to meet or talk to anyone. In many
cases other people are not aware of our fears.
NEUROTIC PERSONALITY TRAINING / 83
Htuanreness of Mistaken Desires for Perfection
When I experienced such symptoms I attained a certain
degree of awareness of their nature, but I was not cured.
Not knowing what else to do, I read different kinds of books
and concluded, “This must be caused by my weak will. My
first problem is to strengthen my will.”
I wanted to become a Christian, so I read many books
about Christianity and listened to sermons by Rev. Danjou
Ebina and Rev. Masahisa Uemura. It is not easy to enter
into faith merely to cure neurosis. I could not find faith, so I
started reading books about materialism. Materialism had
good reasoning, and it was convincing, but it was far from
solving my immediate problems. There was a time when I
was deeply inspired by reading Bergson’s Creative Evolution.
Sympathizing with Nietzsche’s Superman, I thought, “All
the people in the world are fools.”
Although I explored ideologies, I was still passive in
practical matters. I didn’t act fully because of my various
symptoms. That is why, as I mentioned before, I tried very
hard to strengthen my will. The method I took was to
sneak out of the dormitory around two o’clock in the
morning. At that time Dai-Shichi High School was located
at the bottom of a hill called Shiroyama, where statesman
Takamori Saigo had committed ritual suicide. On this hill
behind the school was a forest. Big camphor trees grew
thick, and the dense forest was dark even in daylight. I
would walk there alone, determined to become a person
who could keep his self-control no matter what happened. I
was far from fearless. I was startled every time an owl
hooted. I took that walk several times, but I could not get
rid of my fear no matter how hard I tried. And I tried very
hard, even though I was still afraid. It was not easy to walk
alone in the middle of a forest at two o’clock in the morning.
I did other things to train my will. For example, I tried
to climb mountains, intentionally leaving my canteen and
lunch behind in order to test my tolerance of pain. I also
tried bathing in cold water throughout the year.
84 /HOW TO LIVE WELL

None of these things helped at all to cure my symp-


toms. In the beginning I had thought they were caused by
my weak will, but as a result of my trials I proved to myself
that I was not necessarily a weak person, that I could do
these things if I tried. Nevertheless, I could not be freed
from all of my symptoms.
During my first year at Kyushu University I was
afflicted by a skin disease. The skin all over my body
became very dry, and it started to flake off in a white
powder. There was no specific medicine for it, and I
suffered for one year although I tried all kinds of remedies,
including going to hot springs and such.
While I was suffering from the skin disease, my
neurotic symptoms did not appear. In fact, when real illness
is present, neurotic symptoms fade away. After one year I
started to get better, so gradually I returned to the uni-
versity. Though the neurotic symptoms were getting better,
I had not completely recovered.
This weighed heavily on my mind. When I examined
myself, it seemed that my greatest fault was that my desire
to be perfect was very strong, that I was obsessed by thoughts
of how I should be. I believed, for example, “I should go
into deep sleep right after getting into bed,” and, “When I
study I should not have distracting thoughts, but everything
should flow smoothly into my mind,” and, “My head should
be clear and refreshed all the time,” and, “I should always
feel good.” Such desires to be perfect were strong; I was
always obsessed with the way I should be. However, reality
does not work that way. Even within one day one’s moods
vary. When we study we sometimes recall what we did the
day before or imagine what we should do next, and often we
cannot devote ourselves totally to reading.
When one is facing another person, he stiffens and
becomes nervous because he wants to make a good impres-
sion. He has some fear of the person because he does not
want to be rejected. Nowadays young people have dates
more freely, but in those days young men became very
nervous and stiff when they met young women. I was that
way, and I felt I would not be able to love anyone all my life.
NEUROTIC PERSONALITY TRAINING / 85

I had desires like, “I should be poised in the presence of


whomever I meet,” or “When I give a speech in front of many
people, I should do it calmly without getting nervous.” I
tried to control everything by my own willful desire for “the
way things should be,” which was so strong that the con-
tradictions in my life grew. I came to realize that the
strength of my obsession prevented me from seeing and
accepting reality. I could not see in an arugamama way.
Until then I had eagerly longed to attain harmony and
peace of mind. I was always yearning for harmony and peace
in works of art and literature. I came to the conclusion that
such longing was keeping me from seeing my obsessed inner
self. I gradually came to the understanding that all kinds of
pain, anxiety, fear, irritation or disappointment are
necessary, and that it is impossible to be free from them as
long as we live. When I read the journal that I kept in
those days, it clearly states such understanding. I could not
learn from Dr. Morita then, but I can see that I was
moving closer to Morita Therapy’s arugamama without
being aware of it.

Responsibility
as a Doctor of Paychiatry
In our final years of medical school we gradually began to
practice clinical psychiatry: we actually saw patients. I
began to feel responsibility as a doctor for the first time.
Until then I had spent my time reading books or trying
foolhardy training exercises solely to solve my own prob-
lems. When I started clinical practice, I realized that as a
professional doctor I would have to know illnesses, so I had
to study medical science more seriously. From that time on
I began to study very hard. Eventually my school records
improved, and I graduated at the top of my class. At any
rate, I was moving in a practical direction.
Having experienced various kinds of neurotic suffering,
after graduating from university I chose to pursue a career
in psychiatry. This career would give me more opportun-
ities to contact patients whose afflictions were similar to
mine.
86 / HOW TO LIVE WELL

After I finished my one-year study of psychiatry, I had


a chance to give a speech about it at a general meeting of the
Psychiatric Association. I was still afraid of facing people.
My speech was only for ten minutes, but the fear of
speaking in front of many professionals was so strong that
the content of my speech did not matter to me. I could not
listen to the speeches of the five or six speakers before me,
and I gave my speech with terrible stage fright. However,
when I asked an older colleague, he said, “If you can do that
much the first time, that’s great.” Nevertheless, I wondered
if it had been good enough. This incident shows that I still
had some symptoms of my fear of other people even after
my graduation. I began to give lectures to nurses and
students, and it seemed I had chosen the profession to which
I was least suited.
Two years later Professor Mitsuzo Shimoda (1885-
1978), who practiced Morita Therapy at Kyushu Uni-
versity, came to fill a new position on the faculty. He rated
Morita Therapy very highly. In his book, Saishin Seishinbyo
Gaku [New Psychiatry], written with Professor Naoki
Sugita, he praised Morita Therapy, stating that, “It reached
unfathomable heights in Oriental Medicine.”
I was interested in psychoanalysis and read many
books about it, but through my experience with patients I
believed that it was too difficult to practice. Professor
Shimoda introduced me to Morita Therapy.
I came to Tokyo in 1929 and began to study under Dr.
Morita. In 1937 I succeeded him as Professor at Tokyo
Jikei University School of Medicine as a professor. In 1939
I established the Kora Koseiin Hospital and started the
work of curing neurosis. The foregoing is my case history.

Following
the Desireto Tnprov
aud Develo
ep
I had a strong desire for perfection; yet I was very timid. At
that time I thought nobody was more worthless than I. I
greatly envied heroes and strong people. I always worried
why I wasn’t born to be a hero or a strong man, but now I
NEUROTIC PERSONALITY TRAINING / 87

do not think that way. I came to appreciate the fact that I


am timid. I cannot do good work if I am not meticulous.
However, a neurotic is too careful about protecting
himself. He tends to be too defensive, so stimuli from the
outside world becomes very oppressive. He is like the
cowardly soldiers of Heike during Japan’s feudal era who
heard the sound of waterfowl and panicked because they
mistook it for an enemy attack. If one is interested only in
protecting himself, he becomes too sensitive. However, if
one uses the fact of being scrupulous or being timid in
dealing with the outside world, it can become a virtue.
Unless one is scrupulous he cannot do good work.
I mentioned before that one’s anxiety intensifies if he
remains idle, without studying. Why do you feel insecure if
you live in idlenessP If you think carefully, it is obvious that
one has a desire to improve and develop, so it is against his
true will to be idle. That is why he becomes insecure. A
person who does not become insecure or stays carefree
about being lazy is worthless from the start.
It is good to consider carefully whether you have a true
desire to improve and develop yourself. If you realize that
you do have such a desire, and if that is your true will, then
you must bear your suffering. You have to keep trying in
spite of the insecurity. There is no other way. If you find
that you really do not have any desire for improvement and
development, then there is nothing you can do. Confucius
once said that one cannot carve rotten wood. Likewise, if
the human material is no good, nothing can be done if one is
lazy. However, as long as we desire to improve and grow,
eventually we settle down and do what needs to be done,
bearing our insecurity and pain.
My mind was torn. I did all kinds of things, but I
believe I kept trying thanks to my desire to improve and
develop. In any case, I have been the kind of person who
feels insecure about being lazy, so I have been able to grow
in this manner. Now I think I have come this far without
too many failures because of my neurotic character, and I
am thankful for it.
88 / HOW TO LIVE WELL

I received Dr. Morita’s teaching, and I, too, have


treated many neurotics. I have written many articles,
presented papers on the subject at conferences, and
published English articles in foreign magazines as an
attempt to reform psychiatry. Now Morita Therapy is
widely recognized, proving that our efforts have been
worthwhile. We want as many people as possible to be
satisfied with their lives.

Pleribility to r¢dapt ta Reality


As I mentioned before, we cannot remove insecurity or pain
from our lives. It is inevitable. We cannot do anything
about it. The reason is that nature and society are not made
to suit our convenience. Nature existed first and people
came out of it, so of course nature is not made for people. If
we leave plants without care, weeds will take over or insects
may harm them, no matter how hard we may try to make a
flower garden. That is why we have to apply fertilizers, pull
weeds, and exterminate harmful insects. Society was made
by people, but not necessarily for the convenience of indi-
viduals. We cannot change our natural and social environ-
ment the way we want to, so we have to make efforts to
adapt ourselves.
Therapy for neurosis means to learn to change and
adapt according to the way nature is rather than thinking
about how it should be. Of course, it is fine to have ideals,
wanting life to be a certain way. However, neurosis cannot
be cured if one has a faulty idealism or perfectionism or if
one has an attitude that hinders adjustment to reality
because of obsessive concern for the way things should be.
Confucius said that a wise person is not a thing. Cer-
tainly a wise person is not a mere thing. Things are very
convenient. For example, spectacles are very convenient for
us old people. Loudspeakers are convenient when we speak
in front of many people, and glasses are good for drinking
water. However, these devices are worthless for other
purposes. Even a car crashes unless someone drives it.
NEUROTIC PERSONALITY TRAINING / 89

However, living beings have the characteristic of


changing themselves according to the circumstances of the
outside world. Even lower animals change themselves.
Dogs have lower intelligence, but they do not bump into
electrical poles when they walk. That is the difference
between living things and machines. We change according
to changing circumstances, and neurotics can also free
themselves from their obsessions.
Essentially, having a neurotic personality is not a bad
thing. Neurotics have a desire to improve, and their wills
are not weak. However, they expend much of their energy
protecting themselves, and they are oversensitive. If they
develop an attitude toward life that emphasizes managing
outside matters instead of paying so much attention to their
own feelings, then they become free from their obsessions.

Obsession aud Greaking the Smoking Habit


Neurotic people are overly dependent upon their feelings.
They confuse their emotions with the facts. Once I had a
patient who was afraid of needles. She always felt that
there were needles falling nearby, and she could not relax.
Wherever she walked, she was afraid. The needles existed,
not in fact, but only in her imagination. She was controlled
by her emotions.
There was also a person who was afraid of cancer. He
visited doctor after doctor. Even when they said he did not
have cancer, he thought they might be wrong. He could not
have peace of mind. His behavior was controlled by the
feeling that he might have cancer. As in these examples,
neurotics change their attitudes and behaviors according to
their feelings. Obsessive behavior means that, on the one
hand, people do unnecessary things controlled by these
insecure feelings. On the other hand, obsessive inhibition
means that people do not do necessary things because of
their symptoms. Neurotics tend to regulate their attitudes
and behaviors according to their emotions. That is why I
always say, “Put your feelings aside, and do what you are
supposed to do as a matter of course.”
90 /HOWTO LIVE WELL

At first it is difficult. It is hard for people who dread


uncleanliness to stop washing their hands more than
necessary. They feel uneasy, with a sense of unfinished
business. They cannot rest until they do it to their
satisfaction. They say that they can neither be at ease nor
start other work unless they finish performing these
obsessive actions.
But obsessions occur as a result of feelings. Such
feelings become habitual. They are like conditioned
reflexes. There is nothing one can do about them. Here is
another example: I started smoking when I was eighteen or
nineteen years old. I liked it then, but ten years have passed
since I quit smoking. When I quit smoking I had a difficult
time for a while. In this situation I wanted to smoke
excessively, according to the laws of conditioned reflexes.
If you have a habit of smoking, you impulsively want to
smoke when you get up. Also, when you are stuck in your
writing, you really want to smoke on such occasions. You
cannot do anything about the desire to smoke. It happens
inevitably and cannot be stopped. You can, however,
endure the desire without smoking. Obsessions are the
same. The fear of cancer or the fear of uncleanliness
attacks your mind all the time. You cannot do anything
about it. You can control your actions freely, but you
cannot control your feelings.
As I said just now, you cannot do anything about the
feelings of wanting to smoke or wanting to practice
obsessive behavior. However, you can control your
behavior. For example, if there is a delicious meal in front
of me when I am hungry, I cannot do anything about
wanting to eat it; it happens inevitably. However, I am free
to eat or not to eat. Even if I want to eat, I can leave it
without touching it by telling myself, “It belongs to someone
else.” On the other hand, I can choose to eat it because I
can ask permission later. I cannot do anything about
wanting to eat, but I am free to choose whether I will
actually eat or not.
It was very hard for me to quit smoking, but I have
never smoked during the ten years since I quit. I gradually
NEUROTIC PERSONALITY TRAINING / 91

forgot the taste of cigarettes and now I do not feel any urge,
even when someone is smoking around me.
Obsessive behavior is the same way. At first it requires
a great deal of endurance to avoid practicing obsessive
actions. It’s important to hold on and move ahead. If you
keep repeating more positive behavior several times, then it
becomes less painful to endure. After a month or two you
may still feel the urge sometimes, but it goes away
unnoticed. Obsessive ideas become ordinary distracting
thoughts. Of course, anyone feels bad when he thinks about
the possibility of getting cancer, but that kind of thought goes
away unnoticed.
On the other hand, if you continue with obsessive
actions, and if your attitudes change accordingly, obsessive
ideas become more and more powerful. But if you continue
to do things naturally, without being controlled by obsessive
ideas, then your obsessions lose their power. They simply
become distracting thoughts. The cure of neurosis follows
this process.

Hrugamama
It requires a great deal of effort to discipline a neurotic
personality. Your efforts should follow your desire to grow.
This is arugamama. Arugamama means, as defined above, to
recognize the facts as they are and to follow your desire to
improve and develop yourself.
Everyone has a desire to be lazy, to have an easy time.
If you are going to start something only after your desire to
be lazy disappears, then your chance to do it may never
come. Although everyone has a desire to lead an easy life,
arugamama does not mean following your desire to be lazy.
Arugamama means to restore your true will.
Your true will is to strive to improve yourself, to do
what you are supposed to do, even if you have a desire to be
lazy. Do not resist your desire to be lazy, but leave it as it is.
You have a will to improve. Act according to your true will.
That is the real meaning of arugamama. In short, to
92 / HOW TO LIVE WELL

discipline a neurotic personality means to understand the


true meaning of arugamama and to learn from experience.
(7

Arow to Eliminate Self-Ceuterneduers


I was born on January 18th, 1899. By some strange
coincidence Dr. Morita was also born on January 18th. I
feel that this was an act of Providence. Because Dr. Morita
was born in 1874, there is a 25-year difference in age
between us.
I have been treating neurosis for a long time. Although
in my advanced years I have little energy for the direct
treatment of neurotics, I feel that I can never get away from
Morita Therapy as long as I live.

Neurotic Self-Defeuse
The self-centeredness of neurotics differs somewhat from
the positive egoism with which some try to earn profit even
at the expense of others. Neurotic self-centeredness is the
negative kind with which they try to protect themselves.
They sometimes trouble their families as a result of neurosis,
but they rarely take antisocial actions. Because they are
interested only in protecting themselves, and live as if they

93
94 / HOW TO LIVE WELL

were confined in small places, they become asocial. Among


those who fear interpersonal contact are some who are in
their twenties though they live like old people.
They narrow their perceptions and concentrate on
protecting themselves, so they tend to become very cowardly
and sensitive. As a result of their singular interest in self-
defense, they feel threatened by stimuli from the outside
world. The outside world, whether natural or social, is not
made to suit them. Few things are as they want them to be,
leaving many unsatisfied desires. They become more and
more sensitive to outside threats.
Moreover, neurotics who strongly desire to be perfect
find various mental and physical defects in themselves. Of
course, these defects are not so great objectively, but they
believe them to be very serious. They constantly scrutinize
their own mental and physical states. They look at them-
selves anxiously, thinking they may find something wrong.
They are like measuring instruments for themselves. This
shows the self-centered attitudes and lifestyles of neurotic
people.
In this way, they begin to think that they cannot adapt
to the outside world, and they begin to suffer from feelings of
inferiority and helplessness. As I say often, everyone has an
inferiority complex, but neurotics think they have especially
serious and fatal defects, even if others think nothing of
them. This neurotic way of thinking with its feelings of
inferiority proves that they actually have superiority
complexes. If they simply felt inferior, they would be
satisfied by withdrawing into the present negative state.
However, since they have superiority complexes at the same
time, they suffer from dissatisfaction. They want to be able
to act as full-fledged members of society, so they suffer
deeply with their feelings of inferiority. They also have self-
centered attitudes, so they think they are the only ones who
have such special mental and physical defects. That is, they
are obsessed with the idea that they are singled out and
bound by their “unique” faults.
RELEASE FROM NEUROSIS / 95

“The Symptoms
of Others Losk Odd
I have found a great number of interesting symptoms
among the patients who have come to see me. An example
is the following dialogue with a patient:

[P:] Doctor, when do you wear a hat?

[D:] When it’s hot I wear one to avoid the heat.

[P:] How about when it’s cold?

[D:] Yes, I sometimes wear one to avoid the cold.

[P:] How about wearing a hat to avoid dust when I am


cleaning my roomP

[D:] I guess it’s all right to wear one to avoid dust.

[P:] How about when I am cleaning in the next room?

This strikes me as comical, like a cartoon. Another


patient asked me how dirty a handkerchief should be before
washing it. The spectacle of a patient who fears unclean-
liness so much and uses water so often that the water bill
multiplies is like something from a comic book.
A patient once asked me, “Doctor, should I keep my
upper and lower teeth together, or should I keep them
apart?”
“Why do you ask me such a question?”
“Because I look absent-minded if I keep my teeth
apart, but my jaws get tired if I keep them together.” This is
really silly, too. If you ask me what I am doing with my
teeth, I really don’t know.
Another patient asked me how often I swallow my
saliva. I couldn’t answer. I swallow when I am not aware
of it. I am not conscious of it at all, so I can’t answer the
question exactly. He thinks about it all the time and asks
himself, “Should I swallow now or wait a while?”
96 / HOW TO LIVE WELL

There are many more such cases. A twenty-one-year-


old-woman who is now independently working as a full-
fledged member of the community had a fear of emitting
body odors. Patients who fear their own body odors are
fairly common. They usually believe they have halitosis or
other offensive body odors. In fact, I have never seen a
patient who smells unusual, but the woman believed she
was giving out gas all the time. I asked her, “Can’t you tell
whether you give out gas or not when you are taking a
bathP”
She answered, “I don’t think I give out gas when I am
in the bathtub.” She hated her flatulence so much that she
covered her anus with a band-aid. You can say this is also
a comical situation.
There was a twenty-year-old man who came to see me
and complained about his eyebrows. He was wearing a
headband to hide his eyebrows, even though it was a hot
day in summer. The headband looked really strange to
other people, but he did not care.
There was a patient who feared Hansen’s disease, and
he said, “Doctor, I am scared to walk under a tree right
after a rain.” I asked why, and he said, “Little birds perch
on tree branches. The little birds perch any place, so their
feet may carry Hansen’s bacilli. So, the branches where
little birds perch may have Hansen’s bacilli. Thus the
raindrops that fall from the branches may have Hansen’s
bacilli. That’s why I am scared to walk under a tree right
after a rain.” His argument seems to be perfectly logical,
but it is petty.

Relating Everything to Oneself


The symptoms I have mentioned seem especially peculiar,
but the mechanism of these obsessions is the same as with
other symptoms. They happen to be obsessed with some-
thing. It would be good if they could understand that the
mechanism that causes their symptoms is the same as that
which causes others’ symptoms, but they don’t understand
RELEASE FROM NEUROSIS / 97

it. When they hear stories of others, they think that they are
comical and that these other people are stupid, but they don’t
find their own symptoms funny at all.
Once I wrote an essay with the title, “A Serious
Comedy.” In it I stated, “If you think others’ symptoms are
funny, that means you are looking at them not emotionally,
but objectively and logically. When you see your own
symptoms, they are not funny, and you really suffer.” Of
course, we doctors cannot deal with symptoms as humorous
because we have to treat them, and we do feel sorry for the
patients. However, if patients can understand that the
mechanism of their symptoms is essentially the same as that
underlying others’ comical symptoms, if they can see their
own behavior as equally comical, they will be quite free
from the symptoms. To be able to see themselves humor-
ously means that they can rise above their symptoms to a
certain degree.
We humans have a lot in common, but there are
individual differences within the commonality. We Japanese
find novels written by Germans or Americans interesting.
We also think The Tale of Genji and The Tale of the Heike are
interesting. Doesn’t it prove that the humanity of all ages
and countries have much in common? That is why it is
wrong to be self-centered and think that no one else has
such symptoms as yours. If you recognize the fundamental
mechanism as the same, even if the individual symptoms
seem different, and if you free yourself from the self-
centered feeling of being so unique, and establish a sense of
equality with others, we can say that you have made great
progress.
Neurotics are interested only in themselves: they
habitually interpret everything, even accidental things, in
relation to themselves. In Japanese there are terms such as
jiko kankei zuke or kankei nenryo, which mean neurotics
interpret everything as related to themselves. In addition,
they interpret things negatively rather than positively. When
someone is talking at a distance, they assume that he is
talking about them. When someone clears his throat, they
think it is intended for them, or when someone is laughing,
98 / HOW TO LIVE WELL

they think he is laughing at them. People who fear their


own body odor think a person next to them doesn’t like
them when they see that person rubbing his nose a little.
Or, when they get a train, they think everyone is looking at
them. This is an attitude that is obsessed by self-centered-
ness. That is why I often say, “You are conceited. Who is
going to look at someone like you, who came from who
knows where? To be stared at by someone you would have
to work like a one-man band.” However, they do not
understand what I say.

Self-Oxiewted and Reatity-Onrieuted rbttitudes


Symptoms caused by self-centeredness have numerous
characteristics. Since neurotics continually live in strained
circumstances, various symptoms appear. They take ques-
tions of little importance as serious, and they are always
concerned about themselves. I call such attitudes self-
oriented.
How can people be released from such self-oriented
attitudes? The answer lies in practicing and mastering an
attitude of being in touch with the outside world. This is
called a reality-oriented attitude, which means, in short,
liberation from self-centeredness.
Since neurotics have egocentric attitudes, they think it
is foolish to work. Work is very good for the treatment
of neurosis, and it is one of the main elements of Morita
Therapy. However, some work only because they want to
cure their illness. Their attitude shows that their main
concern is themselves. “I did this much work, but I have
not been cured yet.” It is as if they are checking a cutting
they have planted by pulling it out every day and saying it
does not have any roots yet. It may be inevitable to think
the work they do is for their treatment, but it is important
that, once they start to work, they should forget about the
treatment and try to fulfill the purpose of the work itself.
Dr. Morita was ill in his last year, and he was in bed
upstairs. Whenever he heard a patient sweeping a room, he
RELEASE FROM NEUROSIS / 99

would say, “That patient is getting much better,” or, “That


patient is not improving.”
I asked, “(How do you know that?”
He answered, “A person who is not improving works
mechanically. He works with the attitude that as long as
the work gets done, it’s okay. But a person who is getting
well changes his pace because he is paying attention to what
he is doing. That is, when he is cleaning different parts of a
sliding door, he varies his motion, and so the sound is
different.”
An attitude that is in touch with external realities and
an attitude to work mechanically for treatment are different.
One day a patient was cutting a hardwood log with an old,
dull saw. His work was very inefficient. I asked him,
“What are you going to make?”
He answered, “I am not making anything.”
“Then why are you doing itP”
“T am doing it to cultivate my patience.” If someone is
working to train his power of patience, then in most cases he
is working for himself. It proves that he is not in touch with
what he is doing.
There was a wisteria trellis where flowers bloomed
beautifully. One day a patient was sitting on a rock under
the trellis. I asked what he was doing. He said, “There is
no end to my work when I am sitting here. Every time a
wisteria blossom drops, I pick it up and throw it away.” I
could see there was no end to his work, but it was not neces-
sary for him to clean the wisteria blossoms one by one
because the fallen blossoms are quite exquisite. In the tea
ceremony they sometimes intentionally drop fallen leaves or
flowers after cleaning the ground. He did not have to
discard the wisteria flowers. His attitude came from
mechanically thinking that he simply should work; it was
not based on reality. He was not trying to fulfill the purpose
of things.
Some people theorize about everything, but Dr. Morita
used to talk about the importance of sensory experience. It
means that if you use your senses as you work, you may
produce better results. For example, when you look into a
100 / HOW TO LIVE WELL

mirror, it just doesn’t feel right to see a stubbly beard, so you


shave.
At one time a lily was blooming in my garden. I
thought the stem would break at any moment since it was so
thin. So I asked a patient, “Please prop up that lily because
it looks like it might fall down.” I looked at it after he had
finished. He had tied the lily to a short log that was ten
centimeters in diameter. That was proof that he was
confined by theory instead of using his senses.
Once Dr. Morita talked about being one with the thing
itself. For example, when you see a ten-yen bill blowing
away in the wind (in those days a ten-yen bill had great
value), you try to catch it by jumping up instantly. That is
the mental attitude of being one with the thing.
Tanbanokami Yagyu (a great swordsman) once sent a
letter to the monk Takuan in which he talked about the
attitude of being alert. He said it means that you answer
“Hai!” [yes] immediately when your name is called. If you
answer, “Haaaa---i,” after you pause to wonder why you
are being called, that is no good.
An attitude of being one with the thing means that you
become one with the stimulus. When dealing with the
outside environment, you make it your sole purpose, and
then you do not keep asking unnecessary questions about
purpose. As a result, work therapy supports treatment, but
if you are going to work solely for treatment from the
beginning, then, as just mentioned, the work can be very
mechanical and inefficient.

“fe “lake rection aud Secome Socialized


In the case of studying, some people decide to start studying
only after their desire to do so fully matures. Those people
are usually not good at studying. Study [benkyo] in Chinese
characters is written as endeavor and force. It is not
necessarily very interesting or fun. So if you want to start
studying, you simply must act first. No matter how you feel,
just sit at the desk, put a book in front of you, open it and
RELEASE FROM NEUROSIS / 101

read. By such actions your willingness to read may


gradually mature.
On acold winter morning it is very hard to get up. So if
you are going to get up after your desire to do so fully
matures, then you are going to be late. If you have to get up,
just jump out of bed regardless of your feeling, and then
your desire to stay in bed a little longer disappears. Thus,
your feelings change according to your behavior. With
work it is the same way: act first. If you start to work after
your desire to work fully matures, then you become a lazy
person.
Also, when you work, if you start doing whatever you
find easy to do, then you gradually develop a rhythm of
activity while you are doing it. If you try to work on a
difficult problem from the beginning, and have a hard time,
you may give up the whole job because you do not want to
do it. If you leave a difficult part until later and start an
easier part first, then you get into a rhythm. At the end you
can often break through the difficult part.
I would like to discuss reality-oriented attitudes toward
conversation. A person who fears interpersonal contact
becomes obsessed by his own existence when worrying
about what people think of him, how they see him, how he
speaks, the expression of his eyes, whether his face is red,
and so on. It is difficult for people to place importance upon
two things at the same time, so a person who is self-centered
and who cares about his own image cannot listen to others
well. He cannot find conversational topics, and he is
especially confused when he must face others. Reality-
based conversation means to leave one’s fear of people as it
is, and to try to get on with the topic by asking questions
according to one’s desire to learn.
When one is self-centered, he tends to withdraw into
himself. It becomes hard to keep any kind of social life.
That is why many people are so asocial. In my own case I
was far from being practical, perhaps because I was the
only son of a doctor. I read many books, and I knew much
more than my junior high school classmates, but I was very
poor at dealing with practical matters. As I mentioned
102 / HOW TO LIVE WELL

before, I had a hard time because of it. From my own


experience I can say that people should have as much social
life as possible.
One of the objectives of our inpatient treatment is
socialization. Patients in our hospital live with more than
ten others. They cannot avoid becoming socialized thanks
to the many occasions to be together for work or play. That
is one of the advantages of inpatient treatment. The self-
centered attitude among neurotics comes from being poorly
socialized in many ways. It is important to have as many
opportunities as possible for socialization.
For example, if you are a student, I think it is good to
join a club activity that you think you can do. It is impor-
tant to do group sports and become active and useful in your
club. If a person becomes useful in his environment, then
people begin to value him. This is the same in a family, in a
school, or in society. There is a saying, “A laggard hesitates
to ask for a third serving.” It means that a lazy person is
someone who, because he is dependent and useless, feels
insignificant and restrains himself from asking for a third
serving. It is important for a human being to be useful
wherever he is. If he becomes worthy, he will be freed
naturally from his self-centered attitude. He will begin to
feel comfortable with the fact that he is alive. Others
recognize him, the boundaries of his activities expand, and
he himself becomes greater.

“fe Enrich One's Life


as a Whale
I once wrote a book called The Problem of Love [Aijo no
Mondai). If there is no love, a person’s life becomes very
empty. This is very important; a life without love is very dry
and poor, even if one has great wealth and power.
How does love come about? Of course, with only the
idea “I should love” one cannot love easily. One day a
school teacher came and complained to me, “I know I
should love all the students equally. I am suffering because
I cannot do it no matter how I try. I don’t think Iam quali-
RELEASE FROM NEUROSIS / 103

fied to be a teacher.” I think the idea of loving everyone


equally is wrong. If fifty children are present, they have all
kinds of personalities. Some are dirty, some are cute, some
are naughty, and they are all different. Some are amiable,
and some look mean. There is no way you can love them
equally. So accept your feelings as they are. If you dislike
someone, accept that as a fact. If you think of amiable
people as likable, that is all right, too. However, as a
teacher you have to educate all of them. Even if you do not
like some, you still have to take care of them, so you do it.
While you are taking care of them, you gradually begin to
like them. This is a natural development.
We have a dog who was given to us by Dr. Abe, the
Koseiin Hospital director. Dr. Abe did not know what to do
with the dog, so he gave him to me. It is a mongrel without
any special good points. His fur is long and looks dirty. I
am ashamed to walk him, but he loves to walk. When he
sees me in the evening, he barks for me to take him for a
walk, so I feel that I must take him out. Although he is an
ugly dog, I feel love toward him after many years of taking
care of him. We wanted to have a handsome dog. Once we
bought such a dog, but the two dogs did not get along with
each other. We gave up the handsome dog, and we still keep
this ugly dog. In this way caring brings out love naturally.
As with the school teacher I mentioned before, a
feeling of liking or disliking someone is there from the
beginning. You instantly like some people for no special
reason, and dislike others the same way. However, even if
you have to associate with these others reluctantly, you may
eventually find them better than you had thought. There is
a saying that a mother loves her foolish son most. When
mothers take more time caring for their children, they
usually start to feel love toward them, no matter how bad
they are. That is the natural way.
It is important to take good care of things, too. Recently
I have felt that handling things roughly can lead to the
destruction of human love. Dr. Morita valued things highly.
He used to talk about using things to their limits, giving
them new life. You become more attached to the things you
104 / HOW TO LIVE WELL

have used for a long time. In that sense I often see foreign
people cherish the furniture that their ancestors used.
It is the same with plants. I like plants, and I take care
of many different varieties. Of course, some people think
that it is much easier to have a gardener plant fine plants,
but I think you have a special attachment to the ones that
you plant yourself. If you water and fertilize them yourself,
your love toward the plants deepens.
By taking care of people or things or animals or plants,
and by trying to nurture them well, you will surround
yourself with people and things that you love. I believe that
is the meaning of a rich life. An abundant life starts when
one is free from self-centeredness, being thankful for day-to-
day life.
To be freed from neurotic symptoms, you should
become actively involved in what is happening around you;
try to take care of things in the outside world, and deal with
them well, regardless of your feelings. If you develop a life
attitude that values these things, your symptoms will
disappear naturally. When you try to fight your symptoms
head-on, the harder you work at treating them, the more
you get trapped by them, and you will end up with nothing.
Instead, if you try to improve your whole life, your
symptoms disappear naturally. I believe that this is the way
to be free from the self-centeredness of neurosis.
(2
“See Causes of
Neurotic Symptoms

Symptoms
aud the Course of “heatment
Dr. Shoma Morita’s theory of neurosis is already widely
known, and the overall picture is made clear in The Complete
Works of Shoma Morita (Morita Shoma Zenshu, 7 Volumes,
Tokyo, Hakuyosha, 1975). Rather than discuss Morita
Theory itself, I will focus on my understanding of neurosis
and the course of treatment derived from his theory,
emphasizing the unique characteristics of Morita Therapy.

Adaptation rburiety
Nature existed before people, and it is not necessarily made
to be convenient for us. Every year natural disasters occur,
life-threatening bacteria spread. If you plant seeds, the
plants are attacked by harmful insects or weeds if left
neglected. The society in which we live is made for us to
live comfortably, but it has many defects. It is definitely not
made for your own convenience. School does not begin late
105
106 /HOW TO LIVE WELL

for students who cannot make it on time, and not all of your
colleagues or your superiors have good feelings toward you.
You can find limitless objects of anxiety in human relations,
the economy, the insecurity of politics, pollution, illness,
wars, traffic accidents, and so on.
We imperfect human beings who live in such anxious
circumstances have many physical and mental weaknesses
or defects. When we look upon ourselves, we often feel that
we have various weaknesses in our health or personalities
or abilities. I believe we all share a basic anxiety connected
to human life: our concern about whether we can adapt to
the natural environment, which was not necessarily made
for our convenience, and to society, which is not especially
in favor of us. We wonder if we can survive.
This adaptation anxiety differs in degree among
individuals, and there are many differences in our objects of
anxiety. Even within the same person the strength of
anxiety differs, depending on internal and external circum-
stances. It seems that the degree of adaptation anxiety also
has something to do with one’s predispositions. Some
people are cheerful and naturally optimistic, and some are
gloomy and natural worriers. Even though we cannot
ignore the fact that predispositions may influence anxiety,
generally it has much more to do with acquired circum-
stances. Professor Mitsuzo Shimoda took this position in
the early days of psychological research.
Recently the environment in which neurotics have
been brought up has been regarded as important, but Dr.
Morita did not show much interest in this. When he treated
neurotics, he did not care about their childhood environ-
ment, which nobody could change. When patients were told
that the way their parents educated them contributed to the
occurrence of their neurotic symptoms, some of them placed
the responsibility on their parents, turning the blaming of
their parents into everyday work. Placing blame on
something they cannot control does not help their progress
at all. It is important to improve the family environment to
prevent the further occurrence of neurosis, but we should
CAUSES OF NEUROTIC SYMPTOMS / 107

keep our eyes out for patients who exaggerate its signi-
ficance.

Sel-Ceutered Defensiveness aud


the Objects of rburiety
When adaptation anxiety is very strong, it is natural to have
a self-centered defensive attitude because of brooding about
one’s physical and mental condition and vigilance toward
the outside world. If that kind of defensive attitude becomes
habitual and chronic, it is a character distortion or
deformity. Specialists who see neurotic patients recognize
that they try to defend themselves day in, day out. When
one is planning a course of treatment, it is important to keep
in mind that the cause of neurosis is based on this character
distortion, which is a self-centered defensive attitude.
Morita Theory focuses on trying to train the patient’s
character as a whole.
Human feelings themselves do not have any direction.
Nevertheless, we often experience the fact that a feeling
attaches itself to something when a patient is pushed about
by anxiety or depression. Some depressed patients exag-
gerate the significance of simple constipation and become
pessimistic, regarding it as fatal. Some regard insomnia as
serious. In “pseudo-depression,”’ if patients cannot find
something to worry about at the moment, they get depressed
about some small failing several years in the past, something
they cannot reverse. When neurotics feel strong adaptation
anxieties following an unpleasant incident, their insecure
feelings concentrate on the incident as an anxiety object,
and become set as superficial neurotic symptoms. For most
ordinary people such incidents are insignificant, simply
common experiences.
A student whom I treated suffered from the symptom
of being unable to continue reading a sentence because his
eyes kept trying to read the next sentence. Anxiety about
one’s nose protruding is the same kind of thing. When one
pays attention to something, it is common that the thing
108 /HOW TO LIVE WELL

attracts more attention. Symptoms become hardened when


patients have defensive attitudes that are strong in adap-
tation anxiety. They are very sensitive to anything that
prevents them from doing what they want to do. They are
controlled by repulsion-negativism, which leads to what Dr.
Morita called kikko sayo (psychological antagonism or
psychic interaction).
If you pay attention to a thing in the outside world or a
mind-body phenomenon of your own, you become con-
scious of its existence, but it disappears if you leave it as it is.
That is a normal psychological process. However, if you
consciously try to exclude it as something disadvantageous
for you, then it gets fixed there and becomes a symptom.
Why does it become a symptom? Because there is a prob-
lem in one’s basic attitude. The superficial differences
among objects of anxiety are not important, whether they
are manifest as fear of interpersonal contact, fear of
uncleanliness, feelings of heaviness in the head, insomnia or
illness phobias.

74 “Theory of Defensive Simplification


I would like to address the fact that neurotics try to reduce
the number of objects of anxiety. As just mentioned, there
are numerous things that can be objects of anxiety, but a
neurotic patient chooses to care about only one kind of
illness on which to focus. Normal people are not overly
concerned about illness, but even if we care, we do not
limit our concern to only one illness. On the other hand,
neurotics characteristically pay attention to only one kind of
illness, such as syphilis, cancer, Hansen’s disease or mental
illness. When their attention moves to cancer from syphilis,
then they don’t care about syphilis at all.
People who fear interpersonal contact tend to
specialize by worrying about blushing or the effects of their
eye behavior upon others, or by feeling restless because of
the gaze of other people. Even among patients who fear
that they have body odor, many select only one kind of odor,
such as anal, genital, underarm or breath odors.
CAUSES OF NEUROTIC SYMPTOMS / 109

How should we interpret this kind of phenomenon?


We can say that in our actions and thoughts, whether we
are conscious of it or not, we desire to achieve our goals
without much labor, using the principle of least effort. It is
very difficult to avoid or to defend ourselves from everything
that can be objects of anxiety. We have too many enemies,
and we are too powerless to deal with all of them. You can
imagine how strong this helplessness could be among
neurotics, who have self-centered, defensive attitudes.
So how do they solve this difficult problem quickly?
According to the principle of least effort, they narrow their
attention down to one target, consciously or unconsciously
thinking that if this one problem is solved, then everything
else will be all right. Thus, they focus on one thing related
to their unpleasant experience in everyday life. They think
that everything will be all right as long as they can get rid of
it. This may look easy superficially, but it is a pitfall that
leads to a mechanism which Dr. Morita called “a contra-
diction in thoughts,” psychic interaction or antagonism.

Making
the Means the End
If you look at psychological processes from different angles,
you will notice many interesting facts. I would like to
discuss a patient’s symptom of being unable to read because
of distracting thoughts. Such thoughts could be specific
ideas, or they could be a symptom in which his attention
drifts toward things on the desk other than the book he is
trying to read. If he thinks this tendency is an obstacle and
simplifies the problem by thinking that he must merely
eliminate his extraneous thoughts for his study to go
smoothly, then his efforts come to have a reverse effect. His
efforts to rid himself of his random thoughts result in more
awareness of his thoughts, and it becomes even harder for
him to read. It is a vicious cycle.
When we read, we do not usually concentrate totally
from beginning to end. Distracting thoughts inevitably
appear, but we simply accept them and continue to read,
110/ HOWTO LIVE WELL

although our minds sometimes drift away. We do not


usually try to resist our thoughts, so we do not have to be
too conscious of them. However, for one who has an
obsessive fear of distracting thoughts, avoiding such
thoughts becomes his main purpose. The avoidance leads
him away from his immediate objective of reading a book.
That is, originally the thing which should be merely a
means to an end replaces the main purpose. This mistaking
of the means for the end pulls him off the constructive right
track and leads him into chaos.
Let us consider the dialogue of a patient who fears
interpersonal contact. The immediate concern in a dialogue
should be the topic or the business at hand. Such a patient,
however, is obsessed by self-centered thoughts of what the
other person is thinking about him, how he looks, his own
blushing or his facial expressions, or his awkwardness. In
short, he is obsessed with himself. As a result, his imme-
diate objective is replaced by the idea that he should not
have such fears.
As a basic principle of human psychology, one cannot
focus attention on two things at the same time, so such
people cannot hear others or contribute topics when they
are confronting others. As a result, they become confused.
Making the means the end exacerbates the difficulty of
adaptation.
Moreover, the fact that a patient focuses only on his
object of anxiety, thinking that ridding himself of it will solve
all of his problems, will lead him to the thought that the
object is great enough to threaten his very existence.
However, the symptom that he regards so seriously is
objectively a trivial matter, developed from the primary
desire to live.
I consider this phenomenon a matter of making a
partial weakness into a disaster because the patient regards
it as a life-or-death matter. This kind of thing happens
especially to youngsters. We often find a youngster who
thinks he is worthless because he is not good at math-
ematics, or because he cannot get into the school he wants,
so his whole life is irreparable. I should say this is a neu-
rotic attitude.
CAUSES OF NEUROTIC SYMPTOMS / 111

I think an “estranging process” helps to explain the


formation of neurotic symptoms, too. If an alien substance
enters a human organ, an inflammation surrounds the
substance. Even if it does not go into the organ, but merely
adheres to it, we feel uncomfortable until we grow accus-
tomed to it. We experience this when we wear false teeth or
glasses for the first time. As we get used to them their
strangeness disappears and they become one with us. When
we interpret this strangeness more widely, I think it helps to
explain the formation of various conflicts of human
psychology.
Saliva is a necessary substance and basically a part of
the body. It does not feel alien. Nevertheless, there is a
symptom in which a patient is always conscious of the
existence of saliva in his mouth and experiences it as an
alien substance. Such a patient worries over the problem of
how much saliva is collected, and then whether he should
swallow or spit. He experiences his own saliva as an alien
substance. The same kind of mechanism happens with
mental phenomena as well.
We perceive our bodily functions as normal, not as
something alien. Nevertheless, these functions are not nec-
essarily pleasant; they are rather unpleasant fairly often. If,
because of anxiety or disgust, we treat our normal
psychological and physiological functions as alien or try to
rid ourselves of them, we will become obsessed by them.
When I talk to patients, I use other explanatory terms
like rettokan tousha (inferiority complex projection), or tathi
shigeki (unnecessary comparison of stimuli), and I explain to
them that these have certain functions to create neurotic
symptoms. I think these explanations help patients to see
into their own psychology.

Ptrugamama
tn the Course of “heatment
When we treat neurosis, we tell the patients that it is not an
organic disease. We explain different examples of symptoms
so that they can understand the nature of their neurosis
112 /HOWTO LIVE WELL

better. We make it clear that, judging from their symptoms,


there is no other way to be released than by acquiring
arugamama. | have already explained arugamama before, so
I will discuss it only briefly here, using for an example the
fear of interpersonal contact.
If an anthropophobic patient avoids other people, it is
giving up, not arugamama. Some give up trying to meet
other people and stay home, and so there is no way they can
be cured. They create artificial fears that confronting people
is effeminate. Or they decide to gather up their courage and
see others calmly by repressing their fears. As I have
mentioned many times before, this approach produces the
contrary effect of making them more acutely conscious of
their fear of others. If one already has such tendencies, he
reflexively feels afraid of facing people, and it is close to
impossible to rid himself of this fear. If he is going to have
contact with other people only after his fear disappears, then
he can never break through his obsession. What he can do
is face people regardless of his fear or nervousness. This is
the reality of arugamama.
A girl had been told by a doctor that she should give in
to her anxiety and wash her hands as often as she wanted.
Under this kind of guidance her symptoms worsened to the
point where she had to have her mother wipe her bottom
after going to the toilet. This is not genuine arugamama.
Suppose a patient compulsively wipes his glasses at
work because they have dust on them. In this case the
obsession is the urge to wipe away the dust, and the
compulsive action is to wipe. The impulse of wanting to
wipe emerges as a reflex that has already become an
irresistible, obsessive phenomenon. If he is going to quit
only after this impulse fades away, he will never be freed
from his compulsive behavior.
To bear an obsession is very hard. The easiest way to
alleviate his immediate suffering is to behave compulsively,
but such behavior does not solve anything. Even if he
cannot prevent this obsession from appearing, there is still
room to use his free will to control whether he acts on his
obsession. When you are captured by such a symptom, you
CAUSES OF NEUROTIC SYMPTOMS / 113

cannot do anything about the occurrence of the obsession of


wanting to wipe the dust from your glasses, but you can
resist taking the action of wiping if you bear the suffering
and make an effort. Leaving the obsession as it is and, at
the same time, ceasing to behave compulsively, then acting
on a constructive desire to live a healthy life—this approach
is the real arugamama.

Wontar “Desire to Live”


Now I would like to take up the issue of Morita’s
“desire to live” [sei no yokubou]. I understand the meaning of
this desire to live as the desire to live better, the desire to
improve and develop. We could debate the question of what
is improvement and what is development, but for now please
just accept it with your common sense. Affirming the desire
to live expresses Morita’s optimistic view of life.
This desire to live exists in human beings as a basic
drive. The adaptation anxiety which I mentioned before is,
so to speak, the opposite side of this desire. If there is no
desire to live, then there is no adaptation anxiety. To try to
improve and develop according to the desire to live is the
way of arugamama. In the case of obsessional neurosis,
arugamama means to leave the occurrence of obsession as it is,
and, following the desire to improve and develop, make
constructive efforts without obsessive behavior. This attitude
is totally different from giving in to obsession.
A person with a fear of facing others should have
contact with people while enduring his fear. A person with
anxiety neurosis can nervously get on a train. A person
who feels heaviness in his head can do whatever he can,
even with the handicap of his symptoms. After having the
experience of doing things while experiencing their
symptoms, for the first time they can have confidence. The
symptoms begin to lose their power, becoming ordinary
occurrences which sometimes happen to mind and body.
The treatment of neurosis, especially obsessive neu-
rosis, is very much like the practice of giving up smoking, so
114/ HOWTO LIVE WELL

I would like to talk about my experience of quitting


smoking. I started smoking when I was a high school
student and became a very heavy smoker. I stopped
smoking ten years ago, and I have never smoked since. I
had tried to stop before then. One of the reasons that I did
not succeed was that the harm of smoking was not clear to
me then. However, it became clearer that smoking is
harmful for health. Statistics showed that it shortens the
span of life. I also had bronchitis. So I decided to quit
smoking. However, the power of several decades of habit
was so strong that the impulse to smoke attacked me
strongly, and I could not do anything about it. If I had
waited to give up smoking until after this impulse went
away, then I could never have stopped. I was supported by
the desire to live, which meant that I wanted to keep my
health. Having the desire to smoke and trying to endure it
was a great pain, but as the days went by, gradually the pain
disappeared. Eventually, continuing to avoid smoking even
started to give me pleasure. Smoking and neurotic
symptoms are different, but I think the psychological
process of overcoming them must be similar.
In this connection I remember the story of Mr.
Hyakuzo Kurata’s (author: 1891-1943) experiences. One
day I met Mr. Kurata at Dr. Morita’s house and heard his
story directly. He had days of facing blank writing paper,
not being able to write any sentences, because of his strong
obsession. We call it compulsive behavior when someone
does something unnecessary because of obsession. Failing
to do necessary things because of obsession is called
obsessive prohibition. Mr. Kurata’s obsessive prohibition
lasted quite a long time, and his financial situation was
becoming critical. Eventually he felt so desperate that he
had nothing left to lose. Then he began writing. He found
out that he could write. The work he did at that time was a
short story called “Fuyu Hototogisu.” He thought it was
one of the best of his works. What he said deeply impressed
me. He used the paradoxical expression “cured without
being cured” because he could write despite his
obsession. That is, leaving the obsession as it was
CAUSES OF NEUROTIC SYMPTOMS / 115

(arugamama), he wrote from his fundamental desire to


write and grow. That attitude is arugamama.

Mortta Vhenapey:
7t “fetal Method of “hreatment
We talk to the patients, as stated before, and we guide them
in the practice of arugamama. We try to use therapeutic
methods that cure physical and mental disorders by means
of psychological processes, but that is not the entirety of
Morita Therapy. It is often insufficient to merely clarify the
pathology, help patients understand the treatment plan, and
guide them in practicing it. It is sometimes necessary to
conduct the inpatient treatment that Morita practiced.
We use a combination of clinical methods, which include
an environmental change by hospitalization, the patient’s
absolute confinement in bed, physical work and games,
communal living, journal guidance, dialogue, and so on.
Neurotic symptoms are responses to the environment,
even though such reactions may be more or less indirect. It
is well known that reactions to physical confinement
improve just by transferring patients to freer environments.
Although not that drastic, the change in environment by
hospitalization helps free patients from the idleness that
allows them to be selfish. Also, this new environment has
both a warm, friendly, family-like atmosphere and the
strictness of a hospital. Absolute confinement in bed means
rest and recuperation. It also cuts off the psychic
interaction of confronting suffering and worry. At the same
time it is expected to have a psychological influence of
increased boredom from inactivity, hunger for stimuli, and
the building of a desire for activity.
Living in groups (usually from 10 to 20 members)
encourages inpatients to socialize. Those who have felt they
were unique can realize directly that there are many people
who have the same kinds of symptoms. Group life helps
them to be free from the sense of discrimination they have
felt up to now, and they begin to acquire a perspective of
116/ HOWTO LIVE WELL

equality. They make more effort, encouraged by the progress


of others.
Keeping a daily journal in which a doctor writes
comments deepens the relationship between the doctor and
the patient. The doctor’s comments help the patient to
reflect on himself, and the journal helps the doctor to know
the patient’s condition better. The same can be said about
the dialogues between doctor and patient.
Physical work and games free patients from their self-
centered defensive attitudes by helping them become aware
of the outside world and events happening around them.
They can gain confidence in being able to keep active, even
with their symptoms. It helps reduce the power of their
symptoms. To live a healthy life means to be positively
active in mind and body. A healthy lifestyle is the way to
health, in mental health, too.
As mentioned above, the Morita way of clinical
treatment is a total treatment approach that combines
various methods to help eliminate patients’ symptoms,
increase their adaptability, and foster constructive attitudes
toward life. Therefore, we can see that calling Morita
Therapy merely a hospital confinement therapy, a work
therapy or a diary therapy may invite misunderstanding.
Each of these methods may be called psychiatric treatment
in a broad sense, but individually they are too limited.
Morita Therapy inpatient treatment consists of all these
elements. They work together complementarily within the
whole system.
Neurotic symptoms include obsessive fear of inter-
personal contact, insomnia, heaviness in the head, fear of
not completing something, and so on. If both patients and
doctors look at the symptoms superficially they tend to try
temporary measures of treatment. They draw the hasty
conclusion that the purpose of treatment is achieved as long
as the symptoms disappear. However, as I said in the
beginning, the roots of the apparent symptoms lie far deeper,
in the distorted personalities of patients. It is necessary to
look at these roots in order to treat neurosis. Therefore, I
believe that using only such methods as explanation,
CAUSES OF NEUROTIC SYMPTOMS / 117

persuasion or suggestion is insufficient in more serious cases


of neurosis.
Morita Therapy works on the whole personality, and
it tries to increase adaptability and have patients practice
constructive attitudes toward life. In addition to psycho-
logical procedures, it incorporates other methods that serve
this purpose, too. I think this is one of the main charac-
teristics of Morita Therapy.
At present psychiatric therapy is in the process of
development. No method yet has effectiveness as great as
the chemical treatment for tuberculosis, for example. How
will psychiatric treatment develop from now on? I imagine
that the most effective mental treatment must be one which
incorporates and synthesizes the best of various treatment
methods in a total system.
2 hy ae
--wanaitjet
& ere mm
Tatas print eaihirs
( aeaarag etiateegeter ee:
ice et wolibGalod aah,
thee eatdessa rpencen gris

BPi.a a to
rzre aie
ae Nie:i ies SHie
Sey
d BRE oh

Beagoannapiori
s ng ae nisi are mul rod its
ae das lade ot the a5
virgin Bp
irae y rathecnis 25 teepeepuots Ve
seephheey ved he: peace af iT
88 FE yah yan alias
st
= ie
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15
“She Essence of
Wlerita “lherapy

Obsession
aud “freedom
I often see magazine articles about the experiences of people
who were cured by Morita Therapy. However, I rarely see
the publication of stories written by people whose neuroses
were cured by other therapies. I believe that this is another
characteristic of Morita Therapy that distinguishes it from
other mental therapies; that is, people who are cured by
Morita Therapy do not keep their experiences only to
themselves. They want to share their experiences with as
many people as possible. They hope that their stories will
help or guide others. They cannot have this kind of desire
while they are obsessed with their symptoms.
Yesterday I received a letter that was ten pages of
small, closely written characters. It was from a female
school teacher. Although her name and address were on an
enclosed return envelope, the letter was not signed. She
begged me to send a response, and she also strongly
cautioned me not to tell anyone. If one is obsessed, that is
the way one behaves.
119
120 / HOW TO LIVE WELL

A policeman whose fear of interpersonal contact was


cured by hospitalization at Koseiin contributed the detailed
story of his experience to a magazine called Jikei, which is
published by the police department. There is a world of
difference between the state of mind of that kind of person
and one who does not want anyone else to know about him.
I suppose many people who read this book have neurotic
symptoms. I think that when you can announce them in
public, that is the time when you are greatly relieved of your
symptoms.
There are quite a few neurotics who think only about
themselves. Once one of my patients cut his foot on a piece
of glass in the garden when he was working in bare feet. He
came into the dispensary for treatment. Of course, it was
unfortunate that the broken glass was there in the first
place, but I asked him, “What did you do with the pieces P”
He said he had left them there.
I said, “That’s no good. You are only concerned about
your own injury. If you leave them there, others may get
hurt. Why don’t you pick them up and throw them away?”
He had a skeptical look on his face, but he wrote in his
journal, “Today I got injured; moreover, I was scolded by
the doctor. But after long thought I realized that he was
right.” When a patient is only concerned about himself, his
obsessions worsen. This is the distortion of self-defense.

Whe Desire to Live


I have often spoken and written about the essence of Morita
Therapy, but I suppose good things should be planted in our
minds repeatedly. There are not very many methods in the
treatment of neurosis, so what is said all sounds just about
the same. However, things discussed often become your
own flesh and blood. You may say, “Not again!” but please
bear with me and keep reading.
The first main point of Morita Therapy concerns the
desire to live. The desire to live is not limited to human
beings, but common to all living things. When I visited
ESSENCE OF MORITA THERAPY / 121

Manazuru the last time, I went to a cactus park. Cactus


plants grow where there is little humidity, so they have a
mechanism to avoid dehydration as much as possible. The
cactus gradually evolved to adapt to desert climates. To
prevent dehydration it became a pole-like body by making
its surface area as small as possible. Bodies that hold a lot
of water tend to suffer from foreign invasions. So cacti have
thorns. Although it is not conscious itself, it evolved that
way because of the survival of the fittest.
Camels are fit to live in the desert, where there is no
water, and so they have one or two humps. The humps
hold a lot of fat that can become a source of energy and
water. The camel’s nostrils droop down so that the sand
does not get into its nose during sandstorms. Its splayed feet
keep it from being buried in the sand.
Like the cactus and the camel, plants and animals
apply their ingenuity in various ways to live in their
environments. Of course, such lower animals or plants do
not consciously use their inventiveness to adapt themselves.
They adapt naturally because of natural selection. The
desire to live in human beings goes beyond such funda-
mental mechanisms, having progressed to a higher level; we
want to live better and to prosper. That is the characteristic
of the human desire to live.
A neurotic person has an especially strong desire to
live. However, there is definitely a fear of death on the
other side of this desire to live. These are the two sides of
the coin. If there were no desire to live, there would be no
fear of death. Therefore, some neurotic symptoms show the
fear of death itself, and many symptoms are indirectly
connected with the fear of death. The fear of illness is an
obvious example, but if you interpret the fear of death in a
broader sense, this applies to neurotic symptoms as a whole.
Sometimes one cannot adapt to the outside world in his
present mental and physical condition, and he is afraid that
he may be rejected by his society. To him that means the
same as his death in a broad sense, for his social anxiety is
connected with the fear of death. In this way people who
have a strong desire to live usually have strong adaptation
122 /HOWTO LIVE WELL

anxieties even if they are not conscious of their fear of


death. wy
If we do not accept things as they are, and if we try to
rid ourselves of them, then our minds tend to stay with
them. That is why we become obsessed by them. A man
could not help but listen to the sound of falling rain, so he
got up in the middle of the night and put straw mats
wherever raindrops fell. Another man could not stand dogs
barking, and so he asked his father to drive them away with
a stick every night. What an undutiful son! The stronger
one wants to be rid of something, the more it sticks to him.
Ordinary people do not pay much attention to such sounds.
They usually accept them as they are. Of course, they may
think it is a minor nuisance, but they accept it as it is
because they can’t do anything about it.
If people let go of things naturally, their attention does
not stay in one place too long. It wanders away, so although
the sound may still be there they do not hear it. That is our
normal attitude. Even people who are obsessed by their
symptoms have normal attitudes toward everything except
the thing concerning their symptoms. They are not in any
way different regarding other psychological or physiological
matters.
When one tries to eliminate something that he thinks is
blocking his desire to live, or tries to resist or rebel against it,
the fight against this thing becomes his main purpose in life.
Realistic, direct action to achieve his goal of living becomes
paralyzed. Since human psychology cannot place impor-
tance on two things at the same time, if one strives to
eliminate obstacles, then he neglects his efforts to satisfy his
primary desire to live.
A person who fears relations with other people worries
about what others think of him, or how his facial
expressions appear, or whether he is blushing when he faces
others. If he is acting upon his real desire to live, then he
can get on with the business at hand, but instead he is
enslaved by the opinions of others, and his mind focuses on
himself. His main purpose becomes fighting against his
psychological tendencies in order to eliminate them. He
ESSENCE OF MORITA THERAPY/ 123
neglects the real purpose of dialogue, which is the topic or
business matter at the time. When he is in the presence of
others his mind is in chaos. I call this tendency “making the
means into the objective.”
In any case, he thinks of the means as his purpose.
When he reads books, he thinks he should not have
distracting thoughts because they get in his way. That is, his
main purpose becomes the elimination of stray thoughts.
That is why he is conscious of his random thoughts one by
one. Ridding himself of his distracting thoughts, which
should be a means, becomes a purpose, replacing the real
purpose of reading. Cases of neurosis are usually like this.
No one likes illness, and so it is natural to fear it; how-
ever, for someone obsessed by hypochondria, avoiding
illness becomes the greatest purpose of his life. Why does he
think he shouldn’t be illP Because he can’t exert his ability
fully. Because of his desire to live, it is unsatisfactory to be
ill, and, therefore, he shouldn’t be ill. This is the natural
psychology of the reverse side of wanting to live. One who
does not catch diseases is not necessarily a superior human
being. If that were the case, then perhaps pigs can be placed
as higher animals than humans since they do not get food
poisoning, regardless of what they eat.
Dr. Morita was sickly and mostly bedridden in his last
year. Even then, in the times when he did not have a fever,
he used to write. Despite the considerable effort he did his
work according to his condition. When he had a little fever,
he read. When he had a little more fever, he listened to
someone else read. He did what he could do depending on
his condition.
Shiki Masaoka (poet: 1867-1902) had a very serious
illness. Spinal caries gave him sharp, nearly unbearable
pain. In his last year he was bedridden. He could not even
turn over in bed. In this condition he produced great work
by dictating it to someone. If avoiding illness is the only
purpose of human life, then Shiki Masaoka and Dr. Morita
were insignificant people. Of course, the premise is false so
the conclusion is false, too.
124 / HOW TO LIVE WELL

Course
of “reatmeut
Regarding the course of treatment, you probably know the
gist of it from what I have already mentioned. Neurosis
arises from anxiety about being unable to adapt. This
anxiety is the reverse of the desire to live. The more one
tries to eliminate anxiety, the stronger it becomes. All
efforts result in a reverse effect. There is no other way than
simply to accept anxiety with humility.
Moreover, symptoms typically bend one’s mental
tendencies into one direction over a long period of time.
Obsessive ideas appear every so often. A person who fears
interpersonal contact experiences fear as a reflex before he
actually meets someone. A person who has a fear of unclean-
liness has a desire to wash his hands every time he sees
certain objects. A person with anxiety neurosis suffers
severe anxiety attacks every time he gets on a train. The
symptoms of a neurotic person occur habitually, and they
attack almost automatically.
The urge to smoke attacked me irresistibly when I
renounced tobacco. We can assume that neurosis is the
same kind of thing. Therefore, it is useless to try to resist it.
Not only that, resisting yields the counter result of being
more strongly obsessed. There is no other way than to
simply accept it as it is. This is the first policy of treatment.
The next important point is the desire for growth and
development. The symptoms occur as irresistible reflexes,
so leave them as they are and strive according to your desire
to grow. I often use the following example: Fear attacks
inevitably when one tries to jump into a swimming pool
from a high diving platform. One who does not have any
fear is exceptional. If one avoids jumping in because of his
fear, then he does not have a strong desire for development.
He is one who gives up easily. One becomes a weak-willed
person if he gives up too easily.
I often watch sumo wrestling on television. There are
some wrestlers who quickly give up, and they quit fighting
as soon as they are pushed. However, it is not good to hold
ESSENCE OF MORITA THERAPY / 125

on to the impossible either. For example, you can’t change


the past. However, it is worse to give up too quickly. If you
give up everything too easily, then you become weak-willed.
A neurotic’s problem is not that he leaves a job unfinished,
but that his fear makes it difficult for him to act, and so he
thinks everything will be all right as long as he eliminates
the fear. Such becomes his reasoning. He thinks fear is in
his way, and he wants to eliminate this obstacle. So with all
his might he tries to overcome his fear. However, fear
naturally accompanies the desire to live, so one cannot do
anything about the fear which comes inevitably when he
jumps into the water the first time from a high diving
platform. Fear can’t be resisted.
If one tries to avoid his fear, he gets into the dilemma of
trying to do the impossible. If he is always concerned about
his terror, always wonders why he has it, always grieves
about it, he develops an inferiority complex, a querulous
attitude. In his mind there is always conflict. Although he
wants to improve, he still cannot rid himself of his fear, and
that is a contradiction in reality. When the contradiction
becomes acute, he becomes neurotic.
What about a healthy attitudeP When one wants to
jump into water, if he has such a desire for growth and
development, then there is no alternative but to bear the
fear. There is no other means but to jump in with his fear.
He can do that. He can jump even though he cannot
eliminate his fear.
One has a relatively wide latitude of action, however.
A person who fears contact with other people should have a
smiling expression in front of others according to his real
wish to be liked. His desire is to avoid making a bad
impression on others. I tell him, “When you see people
smiling, you feel good, so why don’t you smile at them?”
But he insists, “When I feel bad because of my fear, there is
no way I can smile.”
Facial expressions are made by muscles we can control
freely. That is why we can say, “cheese,” when our
pictures are taken in order to have smiling expressions.
Therefore, even if you feel bad, or if you have a headache
126 /HOW TO LIVE WELL

because of a slight cold, you can smile when someone comes


to see you. You have freedom of action.
When you have obsessive thoughts, you cannot freely
control the occurrence of the thoughts themselves, but if you
endure them you can control unnecessary actions which
normally accompany your obsessive ideas. You cannot do
anything about the impulse to wash your hands, but you can
endure it. Obsessive ideas arise uncontrollably, but you can
control your attitude toward them and take constructive
action. To do it you need endurance. All humans are made
to bear pain to a certain degree; otherwise, we could not
keep the right course.
There are quite a few things we have to bear in order
to live. If we try, we surely can pursue constructive efforts
in spite of wanting to take the easy way out.

“fe the Degnee “Shere Te rburiety


There Te Possibdlity
Neurotics can succeed in constructive actions if they try.
They have strong desires for improvement, and their desire
to live is strong. The result is that they rebel against
obstacles and develop neuroses. One characteristic of
neurotics is that they have innately strong desires to
improve their lives.
Therefore, there are many who have overcome neu-
rosis and who are well established in society. The former
patients of Koseiin Hospital made a group called Keyakikai.
Among them are presidents of large corporations, capable
civil servants, engineers, and war veterans with many
medals. Of course, rising up in the world is not the only
purpose of life. Nevertheless, there are quite a few who can
live well as full-fledged members of society because they
have an innate capacity to do quite a lot if they try.
I always say to my patients, “Do you really want to get
better and improve yourself? If not, you do not have to
come here, and you do not have to listen to me. There is no
need for you to try. Think seriously.” Then they tell me
ESSENCE OF MORITA THERAPY / 127

they want to make a decent living, but they are obsessed by


the idea that they have to do something about the obstacles
which block the achievement of their goals. Nevertheless,
their real desire is to improve a great deal, and they want to
exercise their abilities.
Please consider carefully whether you really have the
desire to live or not. Then you will surely recognize that
you have such a desire to utilize your abilities fully. People
who have neuroses have such desires; they are not innately
weak-willed, nor can they become worthless.
They cannot be satisfied living as weak-willed people.
Therefore, if they continue life without constructive work
because of their neurotic symptoms, they begin to dislike
themselves. They do not like themselves because they are
leading dissatisfying lives that do not meet their real wishes.
If they are living in ways that satisfy their true needs, then
they can feel delightful joy, even with painful or distressing
experiences.
People with neurotic symptoms, especially those with
obsessive behavior, can live constructive lives, even with
their symptoms. They can live happily. They can believe in
themselves and have confidence.
Dr. Morita frequently used to talk about the desire to
live. Unlike Freud, Dr. Morita was basically an optimist
who believed in the growth and development of human beings.
Freud said that humans are wolves to other humans. He
even wrote of the death wish. He could not optimistically
trust the progress and development of human society. He
strongly believed that instinct was very cruel. Dr. Morita’s
basic theory is that people wish to live, and moreover, he
affirmed the desire to live constructively in his work. He
was fundamentally optimistic.
Dr. Morita’s doctrine is based on believing in the desire
to live, the desire for growth and development. This means
that you can grow and develop. I can assure you beyond
doubt that you can become a useful person in society if you
master Dr. Morita’s theory and put it into practice.
When you are young, your past is short and your
future is very long. You may not have done many things in
128 /HOW TO LIVE WELL

the recent past, so you have not been able to recognize your
own capabilities accurately. You have not yet done much.
When you have done many things, you unexpectedly
discover things that you can do, but you cannot really trust
your abilities when you have done little. That is why you
have a lot of uncertainty in your future. Given your short
record of past performance, no one can guarantee that you
will be able to cope with your long future.
When one becomes my age, he has done just about
everything he can do. Sumo wrestlers often retire after they
reach thirty, saying they have done enough and that there is
nothing more to do. My state of mind is something like
theirs. I know my abilities more or less. I know it is not
much more than what I can see now, so I am at ease.
However, I cannot expect that much development in my
future, so I am forlorn in that sense. When one is young, he
has great anxiety about his future, but that future is
attractive. Where there is no anxiety there is not much
appeal. Young people experience a lot of anxiety about the
future, but great possibilities lie there. The future is very
appealing.
I sincerely hope that you will make your best efforts
with your understanding of the principal ideas of neurotic
treatment.
Judex

Action, taking, 100-102 Desire to live, 86-88, 113-115,


Adaptation anxiety, 105-108, 113, 120-128
121-123. See also Anxiety Distraction, 109-110, 123
Akirame, 13
Antagonism, 109 Edison, Thomas, 73
Anxiety, 11-12, 17-18, 36, 124, End, making means the, 109-111
126-128 Enlightenment, spiritual, 47-48,
adaptation, 105-108, 113, 81-82
121-123 Enrichment, 102-104
autonomic nervous system and, Equality, 67-70
68-70 Estranging process, 111
objects of, 108-109
Evolution, theory of, 28
social, 49-53
Arugamama, 3, 11-16, 18, 42-43, Facial expressions, 49-51
73-74, 85, 91-92, 111-113, 115
Fears, 17-18, 29, 34-35, 37, 43,
Attitudes
49-53, 67-69, 71, 89, 90,
reality-oriented, 98-100
108-110, 112-113, 121,
self-oriented, 98-100
124-125
Autonomic nervous system, 68-70
Feelings, knowledge of, 8-9
Flexibility, 45-46, 88-89
Behavior, 10
Freedom, 119-120
Butsuga ryoubou, 22
Freud, Sigmund, 127
Byodo-kan, 67
Fudoshin, 19-21
Cancer. See Illness, fear of
Character, 3-4, 107 Ga wo haru, 21
Conditioned reflexes, 53-54 Gashitsu, 21
Confidence, 74-75 Generalization, 54-55
Contradiction in thoughts, 109 Goethe, Johann Wolfgang, 4
Creation, theory of, 27-28
Hibi kore kojitsu, 19, 22-23
Death, fear of, 121 Hitler, Adolph, 26
Demosthenes, 5 Human nature, 29, 15-16

129
130 / INDEX

Humor, 46-48 Natsume, Soseki, 4, 29


Hypochondria, 27, 123. See also Nature, 88
Illness, fear of Nervous prostration, 81
Neurasthenia, 17
Illness, fear of, 37, 43, 51, 71, 89, Neurosis. See also Symptoms,
108, 121, 123 neurotic
Imperfection, 49-55 inferiority complexes and, 5-6
Improvement, desire for, 12-13 pitfalls of, 33-44
Inconvenience, 72-73 release from, 93-104
Inferiority complexes, 5-6, 79-81 Noguchi, Hideyo, 5
Interpersonal contact, fear of,
34-35, 49-53, 67-69, 108, 110, Obsession, 89-91, 119-120. See
112-113, 124-125 also Symptoms, neurotic
Invention, 72-73
Pain, 11-12
Jealousy, 4
Paranoia, 45
Jiko kankei zuke, 97
Pavlov, Ivan Petrovich, 53
Journals, 116
Perfection, desires for, 5-8, 11, 29,
83-85
Kankei nenryo, 97
Personality training, neurotic,
Keyakikai, 126
; 19-92
Kikko sayo, 108
Physical disorders, exaggerating
Kunisada, Chuji, 28
minor, 33-34
Kurata, Hyakuzo, 114-115
Practice, 73-75
Life Psychic interaction, 109
change, 25-29 Psychological reality, 6-7
mentally healthy, 25-29, 41-48 Psychoneurosis, 41
Love, 102-104
Reality, 15-18
Mania, 43, 71 Reflexes, conditioned, 53-54
Masaoka, Shiki, 123 Responsibility, 44-45, 85-86
Mastery, 73-75 Rettokan tousha, 111
Means, 109-111, 123 Repulsion-negativism, 108
Mental health, seven conditions
for, 41-48 Sabetsu-kan, 68
Messhi houkou, 21 Sanmaikyo, 19-20
Morita, Shoma, 15-17, 103, Sei no yokubou, 113
105-106, 108-109, 113, 123, Self, 10-11, 21-22
127 Self-awareness, 3-4, 6, 49-55
Morita Therapy, 38~40, 85-86, 88, Self-centeredness, 93-98
98, 107, 115-117, 119-128 Self-control, 44
Munen muso, 19, 22 Self-defense, 35-37, 93-94
Mushin, 22 Self-evaluation, 4-5
Mysophobia. See Uncleanliness, Self-knowledge, 3-13
fear of Self-reflection, 44
Myth, reversed, 27-29 Selflessness, 21-22
INDEX / 131
Sharing, 43-44 Time, passage of, 9
Shimoda, Mitsuzo, 86, 106 Tongo, 47
Shinkei suijaku, 17, 81-82 Training, phrases for, 19-23
Simplification, theory of defensive,
108-109 Uncleanliness, fear of, 70, 90,
Smoking, 89-91, 113-114 124-126
Sociability, 68 Understanding, 73-75
Socialization, 100-102 Uniqueness, 67-70
Suffering, 81-82
Sugita, Naoki, 86 Ware and muga, 19, 21-22
Suicide, 69 Weariness, 72
Symptoms, neurotic, 53-54, 70-72, Work, 42, 98-100
79-81, 95-98, 105-117. See
also Neurosis, Obsession Yagyu, Tanbanokami, 100

Tathi shigeki, 111 Zengo, 47


Tanin, 22

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THEOLOGY LIBRARY
CLAREMONT
SCHOOL OF THEOLOGY
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91711

LI-e2 DEMCO
How to
Live Well
Secrets of Using Neurosis
Takehisa Kora.
Translated by Gregory Peterson and David K. Reynolds
Foreword by David K. Reynolds

oF his is a doubly precious book: it is a unique primary


document, showing as it does the charm, wisdom, and
delicacy of a mature healer from another culture, but it is
equally valuable as a set of immensely practical and attractive tech-
niques for aiding those who suffer the neuroses of everyday life. It
is an honor and a delight to be in the presence of such a great
teacher.
“This work is especially relevant to those in the helping profes-
sions who are finding that their version of the ‘talking cure’ is not
applicable to all the populations with which they work. The
author's wisdom emerges through the medium of an utterly simple
and selfless human being, but the underlying message is both pro-
found and transformative.”
—Richard D. Mann, University of Michigan
“This book explains the fundamental principles of Morita
psychotherapy in unadorned language. It is altogether without
pretension and conveys a wisdom precisely because of this.
“Kora presents a distinctive approach to the treatment of such
phenomena as acute self-consciousness, obsessions, anxiety, and
phobic disorders, and dysfunctional perfectionism. Moreover, the
principles he recommends extend beyond the clinical setting and
apply to life generally.”
—Michael Washburn, Indiana University, South Bend
“In the attempt to eliminate all unpleasant feelings, many peo-
ple fail to control their behavior choosing instead to blame other
people or circumstances for their shortcomings. This book is very
important for today’s world because it encourages personal
responsibility for action based on purpose and acceptance of
unchangeable feelings.”
—HenryJ. Kahn, University of California, San Francisco.

ISBN 0-7914-2402~-2
90000>
Cover design: Shems Friedlander
Wl
State University of New York Press =
,

9 "780791"424025

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