Читать книгу Psychological support at the last stage of life path of human - Илья Андреевич Басов - Страница 4

In this section we will look at the new psychological support of the dying process (PSDP), which will be useful, as it seems to us, to everyone. The starting position of the one who is next to you at the last stage is, so to speak, without show–offs; it is presence, an existential meeting, authenticity, sincerity, openness. There is no need to teach and broadcast how it would be right and wise to act, and if, for example, you are also scared, tell me about it (if I am sitting next to my mother at the bedside of a dying father, and it hurts me like my mother to admit that he has a few days left to live, then why will "well, nothing, nothing, don't cry mom"?). A close, dear person is passing away, you are experiencing sadness, so have the courage to live this sadness; there is a potential for development in suffering, this is not something that you need to get rid of as soon as possible, this is something that needs to be comprehended.

I remember an episode from working in a boarding house for the elderly and disabled, where people died not infrequently, including those with whom I managed to get close. And more often it happened that they tried to avoid leaving (which can also be understood); and in understanding this, you sit down by the bed and just take a person by the hand, he doesn't say anything, you don't say anything, it lasts less than five minutes, but it's outwardly simple and possibly meaningless for someone it is of great importance and depth.

As in pedagogy, the teacher himself is the tool, he himself is the methodology, so the inner world of a person will work with the accompaniment of dying, nothing special and artificial needs to be done. Do you want to say that "I am near" – say "I am near"; if you sincerely believe that a person goes to the best of worlds – say; I want to believe – say, "I want to believe"; if a person believes that he has lived an empty life and did not have time to do much, did not do it right, and you do not agree with this – "I understand that it seems to you that it did not make much sense, but I cannot agree with this, I would really like to tell you why I think so, you have got an important experience… your living life is sacred… there are higher, spiritual layers of being…". Carefully express yourself, carefully hear the one who is beside you, who is going on his last journey.

A very worthwhile experience of accompanying the dying process is presented in the Zen hospice33, where the approach of respect for the last page of the life path is implemented. Conditions and opportunities have been created in it for deep contact with oneself, one's deadly illness, one's experiences, certain final actions and events; without flight, hiding, a person meets with what is. One of the important rituals (I have not seen this in any other institutions of this type), when a person has left, they do not seek to remove the body as soon as possible and it is better so that no one sees it. On the contrary, he is slowly and respectfully carried out through the garden, where everyone, whether it's someone from the staff or other patients, can come up to say goodbye, say something, express themselves, let's say, in tears.

We believe that there are some invisible energy channels between people, some intangible communication. I remember an example from the book "Monsters and magic wands" (this is also about the fact that they do not always leave at an advanced age). An infant (an unwanted child) was dying there, the doctors were powerless, a psychologist (not an academic) came to this crumb and began to talk to him. He said that he understands that it seems to him that no one needs him, he said that he himself would be hurt, would not want to live … he said that there are many people in this world, including kind and good, that there are many beautiful things in it for which it is worth living, such as love, beauty, nature… And now it seemed to the psychologist that baby’s greenish face turned pink … the child went on the mend; he chose to live.

Question: what would happen if the same words were said by another person who would be indifferent to the future fate of the baby, who would internally disagree with these words?… Our semantic space works, our attitude, our openness, sincere interest, the ability to existential encounter. And the fact that everyone is an individual does not mean that we are not connected, does not mean that we cannot be one. Our delusion about the separation within is a consequence of the apparent physical separation, the separation of our physical bodies and human egoism. Understanding the alienation34 of oneself from the world as a matter of personal choice, outgrowing oneself as an ego is the key moment in unpacking the meanings of death.

We believe that the same example is suitable for illustrating the next issue of this chapter – overcoming death with meaning, going beyond it. We have already considered two of its key aspects in the book "New Horizons of Old Age": unity (the connection of everything with everything) and the answer to the question "Who am I?". And if the first aspect is eloquently reflected in the example with the baby (and most likely you, my reader, will be able to recall confirmations from your own life), then the second is a continuation of the question of the freedom of choice of perception and its purely applied nature.

If someone claims that the end of human existence is the death of the body, then what does this mean? Obviously, it's not that this is the case, that this is true or not true; but it definitely says something about the perception of this person, about how he chose to see himself and the world (he chose to be an atheist, a materialist, maybe considers himself a descendant of monkeys or something like that). As in this case, it is proposed to go beyond such a finiteness of being – socially (leave offspring, make a contribution to the development of science, benefit society and the fruits of your deeds will outlive you). Of course, such a view puts some restrictions on the semantic sphere, since no clear answer has been received to the question of questions about the meaning of life.

Although we do not set the task here to trace the roots of this or that attitude to death and its perception, nevertheless, we note that after three years35 a person is identified with the logic of thinking that is inherent in society. I.e., it is not developed, but assimilated; with a certain degree of certainty, we can talk about a person as a product of social logic. Its content includes, among other things, death, which is understood as the death of the whole person: the death of the body is a total disappearance from existence. The child initially does not have such an understanding, for example, if you tell him that dad is dead, then in the child's mind it is presented something like this: "well, he died, and that he should not come to me tomorrow for my birthday?". It is important to understand that there are other variants of logic (for example, in India), where "dad died" will mean that "dad is now in the next room, and we keep a relationship with him, he is still with us, but in a different way."

The logic of the mind (in which it is obvious that the death of the body clearly indicates that the person is no more) opposes the logic of the heart – the logic of faith, trust in inner feelings, experiences, intuitive cognition (the body has stopped functioning, but I feel that he is alive, that he is invisibly present in being). Such a "contemptuous" attitude of the modern world of technological progress to emotional intelligence cannot but have a detrimental effect on the mystery of death (after all, one can see in it both a great riddle and an equivalent sister of life).

Options for overcoming the limits of death are presented significantly further in world religions (and in a huge variety of esoteric schools and currents). And although in modern realities (as we have already noted above), with the development of rational, critical thinking, humanity naturally raises a lot of questions (consideration of which seems to us an unnecessary and unproductive task) this does not detract from the achievements of spiritual searches, plus it greatly expands (adds options) what the logic of the mind represents as the only real thing (the death of the temple of the soul is the death of the noetic and is equal to it, on the grounds that the soul cannot be "touched").

And finally, psychology36 also offers help in overcoming death with meaning (coping with it). Here it is necessary to clearly specify that there is a cognitive level, a mental level, a level of knowledge (let's say a person found out that he has a soul and now he has such information and can reproduce it) and a sensory level when a person has some kind of living experience ("I feel in my gut that this is so"). Both levels are important, so, let's say, a person can somehow concretize his deeper request for himself (for example, the fear of death), and look for answers in books or conversations. However, in such work, the dominant is the "heart level", and the mind is a service tool. So, in psychological reality, the departed relatives and close people do not go anywhere, they continue to influence a person's life (sometimes even more than during his lifetime). The person continues to conduct dialogues with them, prove something, ask for advice, etc. And if someone has a very clear experience of such communication, then for him it can become a door to the comprehension of some new, invisible dimensions.

I'll give you an example from the lessons. One participant, let's say Svetlana, 68 years old, said that even in her atheistic youth she had an experience of communicating with a demon who offered her wealth and success in exchange for a soul. She showed him the fig, which was followed by a series of troubles, losses, health problems. However, Svetlana does not regret the choice she made and her relationship with death is friendly. Once again, we are not talking here about whether it is so or not "in fact", whether it is bad or good, whether one or the other is right37. We are conducting research in order to get as close as possible and clearly see what is, the way it is.

In the proposed approach, which we relate (most closely) to existential psychology, we proceed from the following axiom: