“The ultimate truth is not for understanding, but for realization.” ~ Meeta Ahluwalia
While listening to a recent podcast, I was reintroduced to something called “mirror therapy for phantom limb pain,” and it gave me an insight into the psychological suffering experienced by many high-functioning, healthy individuals.
Let me first describe the therapy.
Phantom limb mirror therapy is a technique that is used to alleviate phantom limb pain, which is a sensation of pain or discomfort in a limb that has been amputated (separated from the whole). The therapy involves the use of a box with a mirror in the center that allows the patient to see their intact limb as if it were the missing limb.
During the therapy, the patient places the intact limb inside the mirror box and moves it in front of the mirror, creating the illusion that the missing limb is moving. This tricks the brain into perceiving that the missing limb is still there and is fine, which rewires the brain’s perception of their being a problem to solve, thus reducing the pain signals it sends to it.
So what?
Interestingly, many people feel themselves to be like an amputated leg—separated from the whole of existence—and so, like a phantom limb, their brains see them as a problem to be solved. And because of that existential perspective and the resultant pain signal (primarily anxiety and stress), they feel compelled to fix themselves and make their lives whole. It’s the reason why so many people strive for success and status and other external forms of validation.
In general, people unconsciously believe that they’re inadequate and incomplete organisms moving rapidly through a senseless world. This delusion is a kind of prison, which compels sufferers to escape and eliminate the psychological pain of lacking and create a feeling of completeness and freedom. Unfortunately, they can never escape, because they’re not in prison. Their brain is trying to solve a false problem using pain or discomfort as a motivator.
The cosmic mirror.
What I find truly fascinating is that the fact, of an amputated leg not being there, does nothing to convince the brain to relax and turn off the signal. It appears that knowledge—or conceptual thinking—no matter how certain, doesn’t set people free. My hypothesis is that the body feels that is should have a leg and it wants the problem taken care of. Similarly, people feel that they are disconnected from the whole of existence, and nothing that they read or are told changes that feeling.
Instead, the brain needs to see and feel the truth—its whole, perfect self—in order to believe, because that persistent delusion of missing something, like the phantom limb, is what’s screwing with their heads and causing psychological suffering. This can be accomplished through mirror therapy, in the case of a phantom limb, or in the case of a phantom identity, through a cosmic mirror—some type of transformative insight.
The difficult reality.
This illusion of being separate—of missing something and not feeling okay—is what causes psychological suffering, and the resultant striving behavior validates that perception and perpetuates not feeling okay. It’s a vicious, self-delusional and self-destructive cycle, like Ouroboros eating its own tail. I obviously know that telling you this won’t transform you, but it may cause you to be curious, to explore, and to eventually experience the truth for yourself; namely that you are not separate and lacking. Because what you really are is the Universe’s way of playing and experiencing the amazing rush of being alive!
Stay passionate!
Perhaps we are the universes own mirror box.
Yes yes yes! Wow ❤️