PERSPECTIVES

A forum for MCEC associates, colleagues, and trainees to write about trending topics in the helping professions to present clinical and theoretical insights related to Morita study, practice, and teaching. Submissions are welcomed and will be carefully reviewed for inclusion. Please send via WORD document the manuscript, recent photo, position/title, and educational background to bogawa@aol.com. New articles will be added periodically, including on Expressive Arts, Ecotherapy, Substance Abuse Counseling, Holistic Health, Anxiety Treatment, OCD, etc.

“My learning of Morita principles and theory began more than 30 years ago. Since then, it has become my lifeway, infusing and guiding each adventure in my personal aspirations and professional pursuits. Morita-do frees my sei no yokubo to be true to and fluid in Nature.

The urge and excitement to doodle, learn calligraphy, and immerse in art started in my childhood and continues to enrich my life and home. Artistic creativity has been an ongoing source of  joy and renewal. Having turned 64 this year, I am now spending more time creating mosaic and fused glass art that reflects my love of walking along shores, on trails, and through woods. Nature offers both serenity and engagement. My house garden is a place of ideas and connection. Tending to it reminds me to respect all finite living beings and the planet as a whole. I also have always enjoyed collecting fall leaves and stones from river beds because of the striking colors and shapes that simply and dramatically burst in Nature. 

Life is not only about what you think and feel. It is also about what you notice and appreciate. I continuously find inspiration through Nature. There is an endless supply of seasonal variations. Art, for me, is about reflecting the abundance of the vast cycle of Nature and spontaneously admiring the tiny beauty in bird feathers. I do not rely on patterns or precision as the ideal, but trust that Nature will teach me what choices are particularly vibrant or soothing. I often start with one idea in mind and then let go of what the outcome "needs" to be. Art is spiritual; it has an eco-purpose of reusing, recycling, and re-imaging, especially glass others have gifted to me and wood scraps discarded from work sites. Morita embodies Nature and Nature elucidates Morita. Both are my life energy and passion.”

The principles of Morita Therapy has been indispensable in my work as a psychotherapist who specialises in emotional intensity and emotional sensitivity. Recent research has found that about 20% of the population are born highly sensitive. Highly Sensitive People tend to show heightened awareness to subtle stimuli, process information more thoroughly, and be more reactive to both positive and negative environmental stimuli.

In my work with sensitive people, the biggest complaint I hear is that traditional anxiety coping strategies do not work for them. It turns out not everyone is capable of rationalising their emotions. When faced with stressors, sensitive people quickly become paralysed with fear and hopelessness. They may tend to over analyse, intellectualise, or self-criticise every aspect of their thoughts and actions. Commonly, their friends and families would say to them, “You must get over your feelings,” “You must learn to chill out.” When they fail to do so, they get criticised for being “too much,” “too emotional,” or “too dramatic.”

Sadly, most conventional Western psychotherapy approaches, including the most popularised Cognitive Behavioural Therapy, operates on the premises that 1. Anxiety is a negative emotion that must be banished and 2. Anxiety is to be controlled by rational thinking or reasons. Many emotionally sensitive clients have limited success with these approaches. Being told that their thoughts are “irrational” only enhances self-blame, and the instruction to be rid of something constantly emerging in one’s mind creates more tension. Besides, most of the conventional Western psychotherapies focus on self-introspection and place little attention to one’s place in and contribution to the community. In our highly individualistic world, the result is further isolation, self-absorption, and ego-entanglement.

This is where Morita Therapy comes in. A typical response to fear, sadness, and anxiety is to push them away, in the forms of denial, avoidance, and suppression.  However, therapies that encourage us to deem certain emotions as “bad” only enhance this tendency. In contrast, Morita Therapy holds that all emotions have their values.  It is recommended that we accept anxiety as a natural state of being and not be excessive in our conscious efforts to control it. Anxiety is not “bad”; it as a reflection of our desire to have a meaningful life.  For people who experience intense emotions frequently, this is an important reminder. Instead of rejecting parts of ourselves, we must learn to befriend and integrate with them, to become fuller human beings. In life, there are both “yin” and “yang”; we cannot have one without the other, just like there can be no light without darkness, no spring without winter.

Morita Therapy also reminds us that we do not need to wait until we feel “okay” to take productive actions. We are a part of this world community, and we have an obligation to take part and to contribute. Emotionally intense people have gifts of empathy and sensitivity. They are great friends, parents, counsellors, teachers and pastors. By turning their attention from endless navel-gazing to serving the world, they are also healed from gaining an expanded perspective. The action-focused component of Morita Therapy is a potent medicine for those who tend to focus excessively inward. 

Morita Therapy also has particular implications for the spiritual seekers amongst us. As a philosophical practice, it teaches us the art of surrender, the virtue of humility and balance, as well as to train our ability to live in an imperfect and ever-changing universe. Through a course of Morita Therapy, we can go from being selfish to selfless, from being critical to compassionate, and from living in rigidity to fluidity. As we can see life as it is and live accordingly (arugamama), we also mature spirituality.

Ultimately, I have found Morita Therapy to be a unique and powerful self- development tool for both myself and my clients. It offers a unique perspective to human wellbeing, and helps us not just to eradicate the anxiety symptoms but also attain holistic health.

People with severe anxiety, in general, do not closely experience the present moment. They tend to think about what may happen in the future and worry about worst-case scenarios. While it is useful to pay attention to anxious feelings to alert ourselves to take precautions against conceivable disastrous situations, energy may be wasted on the imaginable rather than the actual.

Whenever I mention "mindfulness," some assume that I am referring to yoga and meditation. Yoga and meditation are mindfulness-based activities, but mindfulness in its literal meaning is "baring the mind: awareness." To be aware, requires one to pay attention to the details of living. Some of my clients express the life goal as "leading a disaster-free, failure-free, stress-free life." While we might naturally prefer a carefree existence, reality brings with it the imperfect, unpreventable, and uncontrollable.

Morita Therapy teaches us how to live to the fullest (e.g., mindfully) during and in the midst of whatever circumstances, emotions, or challenges we encounter. By attempting to avoid all hardships, we lose the ability to become more resilient and adaptable. While not desiring or seeking difficulties, our productive actions can impel our lives. For example, if we worry about failing an exam, we can re-direct our attention to studying. If we are depressed about how untidy our house is, feeling overwhelmed about de-cluttering, we can begin simply by sorting through one small corner of a room. We are already (keenly) mindful of the need. The momentum to act (reliably) presents itself in the immediate task.

Recently, I expanded my practice of victim advocacy to include and increase the option of restorative justice practices and victim-offender dialogue to repair harm and relationships following serious criminal victimization. This question is frequently asked of me: “How, when, and why should facilitators invite such a personal interaction?” The simple answer is that addressing and attempting to repair harm that a person has caused others in life is a necessary and powerful means to demonstrate accountability, humanity, remorse, and apology. For me, the answer is also informed by the past 23 years of my practice of Morita Therapy.

The first time I heard about Morita was when I was 35 years-old and attending a 3-day workshop presented by Dr. Ogawa at a Florida law enforcement conference. I was introduced to principles to guide people to live well following a traumatic crime. Morita Therapy has guided my life and work as an advocate for victim rights and services ever since.

Morita Therapy teaches that “life is attention.” Whether people have been victims or perpetrators, our lives are dependent upon to what we give our attention. At times, we may under-attend or over-attend to the tragic impact people can have on one another. Morita Therapy teaches that this critical awareness brings focus on living well. Each moment has value and meaning. Living responsibly requires our attention and care, especially in the aftermath of a crisis. The focus we direct towards returning to/seeking purposeful living contributes to repairing and restoring our lives. When we are fluid in our attention to all of life, living realistically and openly, we experience a wide range of emotions, events, opportunities, and risks existing from moment to moment.

The following is how I apply Morita Therapy to Restorative Justice:

· Attention directed to the real, practical, and daily can contribute to healing, which can impact adapting to a new and always evolving life for yourself and others impacted by a criminal act.

· The natural order is to live in harmony. As we live spontaneously and attentively to what is immediately before us, we reorder our lives to its inherent meaningfulness, balance, and peace.

· Each of us has “a desire for life” (sei no yokubo) and can be guided to free and strengthen this innate energy to protect and nurture the physical and psychological needs of ourselves and the needs of those impacted by violence. Sei no yokubo is characterized by the in-born need to relate to others and the striving to be involved in purposeful activity. This is what makes restorative justice appealing, as it moves toward fulfilling the potential in all of us.

· Behavior has responsibility. Not everything that happens to us is within our absolute control, but what we do or don’t do is always our responsibility. As I prepare restorative justice participants for a meeting, I invite them to distinguish what in the aftermath of crime is within their means to control and change.

· Offenders and survivors can (re)build their character. After a crime occurs or a sentence has been imposed, a victim-offender dialogue invites each person to recognize that one’s character can progress through productive behavior.

When parties in a restorative justice meeting accept the invitation to meet and address a criminal incident, each person can benefit from identifying, clarifying, or establishing intent for meeting with one another. In so doing, they help to determine the outcome upon themselves and others. Morita Therapy teaches that this effort is success in itself.