Welcome, noble viewers,
to Science and Spirituality
on Supreme Master
Television.
Today’s program
features neurobiologist
and researcher
Dr. Jeffrey M. Schwartz
of the University of
California, Los Angeles
School of Medicine, USA.
Dr. Schwartz, who
graduated with honors
in philosophy from the
University of Rochester,
USA, has published
nearly a hundred
academic articles in the
fields of neuroscience
and psychiatry
as well as several books,
and is well versed
in Buddhist philosophy,
specializing in the
concept of mindfulness
or conscious awareness.
He studies the influence
of mindfulness
on brain function and is
an expert in self-directed
neuroplasticity
or the mind’s ability to
purposefully reorganize
neural pathways
in the brain.
Dr. Schwartz is
best known for
his four-step method
of treating
obsessive-compulsive
disorder (OCD),
a condition characterized
by unwanted thoughts
or obsessions
and repetitive behaviors.
For example, some OCD
sufferers fear germs
so much that
they engage in constant,
excessive hand washing.
Supreme Master
Television recently
interviewed Dr. Schwartz
about his views on
mind-brain interaction
and other topics.
Dr. Schwartz begins by
speaking about his book,
“Dear Patrick:
Life is Tough – Here’s
Some Good Advice,”
which provides guidance
for young people
moving from childhood
to adolescence.
That book was written
with a very good friend
of mine by the name
of Patrick Buckley.
That book was done
12 years ago, when
he was 16, and it's letters
that we exchanged that
basically delve into the
subject of as adolescence
sort of comes upon you,
there are a lot of changes
going on in your mind,
your brain.
Adolescence turns out
to be a very good subject
in which to investigate
this relationship
between mind and brain,
and specifically what
we were trying to do
in that book is show
that something, which
in the subsequent decade
has become a lot more
popular, called
“mindful awareness” is
useful for helping people.
To answer
Patrick’s questions,
Dr. Schwartz draws
on his own experiences
while undergoing
the doubts and challenges
of adolescence,
on the ideas of great
spiritual masters such as
Jesus Christ, Moses and
the Buddha, and on his
psychiatric background.
The sense of social
acceptance and rejection
is becoming
much more acute.
So these things are
going on as you go from
12 to 13 to 15 and then
when you hit 16,
it all seems to sort of
just explode.
So we were discussing
in this book what can you
do in terms of developing
what I've come to call the
“impartial spectator.”
Following the great
Scottish philosopher
Adam Smith,
what can you do in terms
of self-observation
to help you deal with
all these feelings that
you are having that can
become overwhelming?
That term
impartial spectator
came from Adam Smith.
He wrote a book that was
published in 1759, and
the title of that book is
"The Theory of
Moral Sentiments."
And this book has been
very influential on me.
So, that term,
impartial spectator
he used to mean that
we can actually
look from the outside
into ourselves,
taking the perspective
of an impartial person.
You can actually utilize
a perspective of attention
that is like standing
outside yourself, like
being another rational,
fair-minded person
who's viewing you and
what you are doing and
thinking, and has access
to your inner experience.
Dr. Schwartz
gives lectures to
diverse audiences in the
US, Europe and Asia and
writes insightfully on
the philosophy of mind,
especially on the role
of volition
in human neurobiology.
His book,
“The Mind and the Brain:
Neuroplasticity and the
Power of Mental Force,”
was co-written
with Sharon Begley, a
prominent senior science
columnist and editor
of the popular US
magazine Newsweek.
The focus of
my whole work has been
getting away from
what has become
the accepted paradigm.
The belief that everything
about your mind is
completely determined by
and in fact reducible to
what your brain does,
what's become a slogan;
that is, “The mind is
what the brain does.”
The separation and
integration of the words
“mind" and "brain"
are best understood
by realizing that, yes,
the brain is certainly
responsible, and
definitely in a scientific
and cultural context
is very reasonably
understood to be causing
a lot of the content
of your thinking
in certain ways, and
certainly how you are
feeling about things,
what we call
in psychiatry the “affect”
or the “mood,” states of
happiness and sadness.
These things can
markedly be influenced
by the neural chemistry
of your brain.
But, and it's a big “but,”
it's also important to
realize that the way you
experience those feelings,
the way you interface
with those thoughts,
the kinds of attention that
you pay to it, being
either mindfully aware or
having sort of a rational,
third person perspective
on it, or being just
gripped by it interfaces
with what your brain
is doing, and how you
focus your attention
can change what
your brain is doing.
When Science and Spirituality
returns,
we’ll learn more
about Dr. Schwartz’s
important work of
empowering people to
take charge of their lives.
Please stay tuned to
Supreme Master
Television.
You’re getting people to
change their perspective,
change their quality
of attention.
Use the impartial spectator,
use full awareness,
to help them understand
that this is their brain
sending them
a false message, and then
when they understand
that it’s their brain
sending a false message,
they can change
the perspective
they take on it.
Welcome back to
Science and Spirituality
featuring respected
US neurobiologist
Dr. Jeffrey M. Schwartz.
In his best-selling book,
“Brain Lock:
Free Yourself from
Obsessive-Compulsive
Behavior,” Dr. Schwartz
presents a four-step,
mental exercise method
for overcoming
obsessive-compulsive
disorder, a condition
characterized by
unwanted thoughts
or obsessions and
repetitive behaviors.
The specific steps in
Dr. Schwartz’s method
are as follows:
Relabel, Reattribute,
Refocus and Revalue.
In step one, Relabeling,
a patient’s attention is
focused on his or her
thinking process so that
obsessive thoughts
and compulsive urges
may be recognized.
That kind of attention
is very similar to what
in ancient
Buddhist philosophy
came to be called
“mindful awareness,”
and it certainly also
has strong analogs
in the Judeo-Christian
tradition, in terms of
having some attempt to
make a connection with
God and of course in a
Christian perspective,
very much with
making a connection
through Jesus to God.
In a Christian perspective
you can actually
view Jesus as helping you
(find) that quality of
attention that allows you
to be reasonable,
rational, loving
when you are angry, and
calm when you are upset.
The second step,
Reattribute, involves
not blaming oneself
for an obsession
or compulsion, but
instead re-attributing it
to a medical condition
affecting the brain.
Using mindful awareness
or acting as
an “impartial spectator”
is also a key to step three,
Refocus.
In this step,
one should work around
the obsessive thought
or compulsive urge
by shifting attention
to something else.
Any activity with
a constructive purpose is
a suitable substitute,
with hobbies being
an excellent choice.
For example, one can
jog, paint or play a game
with friends.
My view of how to treat
obsessive-compulsive
disorder hinges on
when people understand
that the urge to watch,
the urge to check
the terrible bad thoughts
that come in to people
who have obsessive
compulsive disorder,
that these things are
caused by misfirings
in their brain.
The “Fifteen-Minute Rule”
is a useful technique
in refocusing.
Instead of acting
on the urge, one should
let 15 minutes pass, and
in the interim perform
steps one through three
of the four-step process.
Then at the end of
the period,
a constructive activity
should be undertaken
to substitute for
the unwanted behavior.
With the fourth step,
Revalue, one reassesses
one’s unwanted thoughts
and urges and decides
to assign them
a lower value.
As a result, one is
less likely to have such
thoughts or act on them
in the future.
However, Dr. Schwartz
says a complete cure
of the condition is rare.
What you can do is
get it to the point where
you can really manage it
and manage it in ways
that it really doesn't have
very significant impacts
on your life anymore.
Dr. Schwartz believes
we need to reintegrate
spiritual ideals
into science so that
it can provide
the answers we seek.
Thus his four-step process
for treating
obsessive-compulsive
disorder takes a different
approach than that of
conventional medicine,
yet it is no less scientific.
If you’re talking to me
about how the mind
can change the brain;
how the mind can
influence the brain, and
I’ve done a lot of work
with a colleague by the
name of Henry Stapp,
who’s a physicist
up in the University
of California, Berkley
(USA) at the Lawrence
Berkeley Laboratories,
we have a very, very
orthodox scientific theory
based in
quantum mechanics that
really makes the case
in a very scientifically
rigorous way that
attention through
a quantum mechanical
process can influence
what the brain does.
This is all very rigorously
done; it’s been published
in top journals.
My book,
“The Mind in the Brain,”
is an overview of it for
scientifically interested
lay readers.
There’s been
significant resistance to
accepting the view, both
because it flies directly
in the face of the accepted
fundamentalist belief
that the mind is
what the brain does.
It cuts against the grain
of a materialist science
that wants to stress
the use of drugs
as a treatment for
psychiatric disorders,
and that’s one of the
main outcomes of having
a materialist world view
in science and medicine
is that it puts a premium
on treating things
with drugs.
I believe that it’s
culturally damaging to
view science and religion
as intrinsically
completely separated.
Hopefully things are
changing and
science is going to
become less materialistic.
That’s what my whole
life’s work has been.
We thank
Dr. Jeffrey M. Schwartz
for sharing his ideas
on the interaction of the
mind and brain, blending
science with spirituality.
Please join us
next Monday for Part 2
of our program, when
Dr. Schwartz will further
discuss how people
can use mind power
to reach their goals.
For more details on
Dr. Jeffrey M. Schwartz,
please visit
Books by Dr. Schwartz
are available at
www.Amazon.com
Gracious viewers,
thank you for
your company today on
Science and Spirituality.
Coming up next is
Words of Wisdom
after Noteworthy News
here on
Supreme Master Television.
May your life be
blessed with God’s love,
comfort and light.