Richard Schwartz

Too many of our basic institutions are based on the dark view. Take, for example, neoliberalism, the economic philosophy of Milton Friedman that undergirds the kind of cutthroat capitalism that has dominated many countries, including the US, since the days of Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher.

Later we’ll look more closely at some of the ways people practice spiritual bypassing—a phrase coined by John Welwood in the 1980s. Jeff Brown explores the phenomenon in depth in his film Karmageddon: “After my childhood, I needed the kinds of spirituality that would keep me from allowing the pain to surface…. I was confusing self-avoidance with enlightenment.”

I opened the door to our next session and my client had a big gash across her face. I collapsed emotionally at that point and spontaneously said, “I give up, I can’t beat you at this,” and the part shifted, too, and said, “I don’t really want to beat you.”