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Article 50
December 21, 1989

Anesthetic Concepts

It is, however, neither practical nor desirable for us to perform a "concept-ectomy" on ourselves and become mindless sponges for sensation and fountainheads of impulsive action. We cannot really get away from concepts anyway, since (as we have seen in IRM Article 42 "The Conceptual Core") concepts inevitably lie at the core of all of our experiences.

It does seem true, though, that fixating on certain concepts allows us to avoid confronting certain other disturbing or painful ideas or perceptions, and may also serve to make certain difficult actions seem wrong or unnecessary. Such concepts might be termed "anesthetic concepts" (in that they inhibit awareness and activity) to differentiate them from ordinary concepts (which facilitate awareness and activity).

How can a concept act as an anesthetic? Let us first look at the normal consequences of thinking. I think about the fact that I need to make a certain phone call; that concept spurs me to action and I go ahead and make the call. But suppose I start to think about making a phone call -- say to a stranger -- and I start getting feelings of anxiety or dread, connected to mental pictures of being rejected or belittled. As long as my attention is on making the call, and until the call is completed, I have those feelings. In this situation, I have only three choices:

1. I can continue to think about the call and continue to feel anxious.
2. I can make the call and get it over with.
3. I can find a way of avoiding the issue, e.g., some rationale that makes the call seem unnecessary.

The human mind, however, is usually agile enough to think of a good many reasons why the action is unnecessary, or otherwise to avoid the situation. These avoidance strategies have been called "ego defense mechanisms", and their great number and variety is a tribute to human ingenuity. Just to give a few examples, one may:

1. Simply refuse to think about the situation.
2. Allow oneself to be distracted by something else.
3. Procrastinate -- place the situation at a distance by putting it in the future.
4. Introduce false but plausible concepts that serve to keep the situation at bay.

Rather than following the traditional spiritual program of reducing all ideation, then, it seems more appropriate to focus on finding those specific ideas that are anesthetic and therefore fixed and, on their removal, addressing and handling the confusion, conflict, or discomfort they are meant to anesthetize.

In a sense, the source of all aberration is procrastination. By utilizing conceptual anesthesia as a stopgap means of avoiding discomfort, the viewer puts off his painful incomplete cycles. The facilitator's job is to bring him back into the present by helping him complete these cycles on a gradient and to replace anesthetic concepts by concepts that facilitate perception and understanding instead of inhibiting it.

Frank A. Gerbode, M.D.
Director, IRM