Philosophy Discussion on Sigmund Freud

FREUD.SYA

Śyāmasundara: Today we are discussing the philosopher and psychologist Sigmund Freud. His thesis was that certain unconscious states must be repressed by a special mental mechanism which serves as a defense for the ego against painful or fragmental memories, emotions and desires.

Prabhupāda: That is our brahmācārya system. The psychology is that everyone has a sex appetite, everyone has a tendency for intoxication, and everyone had a tendency for meat-eating. Vyavāya āmiṣa madya sevā. These tendencies are already there. There is injunction in the śāstras that one can have sexual intercourse by marriage, legal sex. We are prohibiting illicit sex, but we are not prohibiting legal sex. Just like in the Bhagavad-gītā Kṛṣṇa says, dharmāviruddho' bhūteṣu kāmo 'smi bharatarṣabha, sex indulgence which is not against religious principles. That is (indistinct). So religious principle means regulated sex life. People have a tendency... Just like those who are not regulated by the Vedic injunctions are also having sex. So what is the meaning of this legal sex? Legal sex means it is restricted, that is all. Where there is no set injunction. Just like in Western countries, they are having sex without any restrictions. But according to the Vedic system, there are restrictions. Just like eating meat, that is also restricted. You cannot eat meat from the slaughterhouse, but the injunction is that you can take a goat and in the presence of goddess Kali you can offer it, and then you can eat it. In the śāstras this is called (indistinct). Amisa means meat which is not sacrificed. There are so many rules and regulations. Similarly, there is also injunction for drinking. By worshiping ( sandamani ) you can drink. So when the śāstras deal with meat-eating, drinking and sex, which is already there... Psychologically everyone has this tendency. Then why is it mentioned in the śāstras in this way? The whole thing is to restrict. Just like ordinarily in the state drinking liquor is also controlled by the excise department of the government. The government opens drinking shops, but the price is enhanced. I know because I was dealing in rectified spirits, so because we are preparing medicine we are getting opium, rectified spirits, gañja, very cheaply. One smuggler came to me and said that "You give me your license, you take one thousand rupees. I will manage." So I told him that when I would be arrested, because after I would be arrested, then the government would ask me that "We have given you the license as a respectable gentleman, and you are doing this," then what shall I reply? So this restriction is that liquor... Wine is made from rectified spirits, brandy, whiskey, everything; I know all the formulas, how to make them. The cost price of the rectified spirits is about Rs. 1/59 per gallon, and the government is selling at 60 rupees. For us it was five rupees, because we were manufacturers. So why (indistinct)? Restriction. Because unless the government takes this matter in their hands, people will distill... It is not very difficult. There are many illicit distillers also. That's why it is the duty of the excise department to arrest them. My point is that why is the government increasing the price? So that restricting, that people may not pay so much price, they may not drink (indistinct). When the government opens a liquor shop, it does not mean that all of you become drunkards. It is not an advertisement. Similarly, when śāstras give the permission that "You can have sex life by marriage," or "You can eat meat by offering the goat to goddess Kālī," or "You can drink by offering worship to Caṇḍī," it is restricted. Nobody can worship Caṇḍī daily. Nobody can worship Kālī daily. There is also fixed date... Kālī worship can be performed on (indistinct). The (indistinct) comes once a month. So that means restricted. One can eat meat once in a month. But the restriction is not there for eating rice, dahl, ghee, fruit or milk. There is no such restriction. But whenever there is a question of liquor, meat-eating and sex, immediately there is śāstra injunction that "You can do this under certain conditions." That means the whole idea is to restrict. That is, psychology is already there, but śāstras (indistinct), because they know if people become implicated with all these nonsense things, then his duration of materialistic way of life will increase, and we will have to accept material bodies birth after birth. So by restriction, gradually just like we are restricting all these things, gradually, the Western students, they are coming to the point of becoming a pure devotee. But these things are already there. Everyone know it. Mr. Freud does not require to study. It is already there. We know in the Vedic śāstras. But they should be restricted.

Śyāmasundara: His idea is that certain memories or painful experiences or frustrations or desires are sometimes repressed by forgetfulness. We forget them. They lie deep in our unconscious, but we cannot even remember them because they cause pain by their memory. This mechanism is called defense mechanism, forgetfulness.

Prabhupāda: No. That is not possible. There is the system that is yogic process, mechanical system to control the senses. Yoga (indistinct). Yoga means to control the senses. Yoga indriya saṁyama. So by this mechanical process of yogic exercises, one can (indistinct). One may artificially check, suppress, these tendencies, but we have many instances that even the greatest yogis like (indistinct) also failed. Our process is as it is recommended in the Bhagavad-gītā, paraṁ dṛṣṭvā nivartante. You give him a better thing, he will forget it.

Śyāmasundara: Sometimes people forget experiences which cause them pain. For instance, a child may have had a very frightening experience which he does not like to recall, so that he forgets it. But the cause of his forgetting is that it causes an unhealthy state.

Prabhupāda: Yes. So therefore we do not recommend such artificial means.

Śyāmasundara: But it's not artificial; naturally the...

Prabhupāda: Not natural. The child forgets... Our formula is bhayaṁ dvitīyābhiniveśataḥ syāt. This fearfulness is created when one is not Kṛṣṇa conscious. This is a quality of the conditioned soul. Īśād apetasya viparyayo 'smṛtiḥ. So as soon as one becomes Kṛṣṇa conscious, these things become almost nil. Nārāyaṇa-parāḥ sarve na kutaścana bibhyati SB 6.17.28 . One who is God conscious doesn't fear anything. Just like Prahlāda Mahārāja. Such a giant, his giant father, is threatening him. He is calm and (indistinct). He doesn't care for his father's (indistinct). His father is asking, "Prahlāda, how is it that you are so proud and fearless when I am trying to chastise you?" But he replied, "The person who has given me this power is protecting me." That was his answer. "You have power because it is gifted by Kṛṣṇa. So that same personality is giving me protection." He replied that.

Śyāmasundara: You say it's artificial to forget anything?

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Śyāmasundara: Forgetfulness is artificial?

Prabhupāda: Artificial.

Śyāmasundara: So why don't we remember everything?

Prabhupāda: Because you are not trained. Forgetful I do not understand. What do you mean?

Śyāmasundara: Forgetfulness means loss of memory. I can't remember what happened when I was four or five years old.

Prabhupāda: You might explain in your past life you had so many fearful incidents even, but you are not afraid of now. Why should you try to forget? There is no use of forgetting. Even if I remember I am not afraid, rather I thank Kṛṣṇa, that "Kṛṣṇa, you are so kind that You have saved me from so many misgivings. Now (indistinct) I am pure (indistinct)." So one should not be frightened by these past incidents. He rather (indistinct) afraid of all these things... (indistinct)

Śyāmasundara: What he is talking about is the natural instinct of people to forget painful experiences.

Prabhupāda: (indistinct) forget. Just like you were in the womb of your mother. It was a very painful situation. But you have forgotten. That is natural.

Śyāmasundara: So it's not artificial?

Prabhupāda: No. But when you were in the womb of your mother, that's a fact. Now when you think of it you can understand how horrible condition was that. Therefore śāstra says that even if you have forgotten, it does not mean that you have escaped the incidents. It is that you are waiting for another painful situation like that.

Śyāmasundara: His idea is that many of our present unconscious wishes and conflicts have their origin in infantile or childhood experiences.

Prabhupāda: You are going to be again (indistinct). Why you forget Kṛṣṇa? After this life, you will be put in another womb of mother, so that the same thing will again happen. You are not finishing your business, so therefore it is the duty of guru and father and mother to save him from that situation again. Pitā na sa syāt, gurur na sa syāt, na mocayed yaḥ samupeta-mṛtyum. So that is the opportunity of this human life. They should know that I had such-and-such bad experience. (indistinct), I will also experience the same thing again at the time of death, horrible situation. Again after, again enter, bhūtvā bhūtvā pralīyate BG 8.19 . You have to again take birth in the womb. The same situation is repeating. You may forget. That is another thing. Just like you had some surgical operation in your body. That was very painful. So even if you have forgotten, that does not guarantee that there will be no more (indistinct) and no more surgical operation. That is not (indistinct). It will be put again. What is the use of forgetting? Even if you do forget, what is the benefit of thereof?

Śyāmasundara: He says there is no benefit of forgetting, but it is a natural tendency.

Prabhupāda: That is natural, and everyone knows that's not a very (indistinct).

Śyāmasundara: So he says that the cure for many of our present conflicts is to try to recall these painful experiences and analyze them and try to correct them.

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Śyāmasundara: Just like for instance a person may have a hatred toward a member of the opposite sex. Why is this hatred? By tracing back in his childhood we may find that there was some horrible experience with his father or with his mother which caused him to hate that particular sex.

Prabhupāda: Just like if some woman does not like to give birth to a child...

Śyāmasundara: Because she was repressed when she was a child, or beaten by her father...

Prabhupāda: Not only that. A person does not like to bear children; therefore this contraceptive method is there. It is botheration, painful. It is called pain. (indistinct) (indistinct) means pain. So nature is prohibiting that, (indistinct), child delivery, so the man is also given so much trouble. The woman is also given so much trouble. So why is the trouble there? The (indistinct) for everything is don't be implicated in this sex life. If you simply tolerating a little itching sensation, then you will not have so much pain. Yan maithunādi-gṛhamedhi-sukhaṁ hi tuccham SB 7.9.45 . These ordinary men who are attached to the materialistic way of life, their only happiness is this sexual intercourse. So śāstra says this happiness derived from sexual intercourse is very, very insignificant. Yan maithunādi-gṛhamedhi-sukhaṁ hi tuccham. This is not happiness. It is very (indistinct) third class or even lower than happiness. But because we have no idea of other happiness, Kṛṣṇa consciousness, the materialistic way of life, that is the happiness. Yan maithunādi-gṛhamedhi-sukhaṁ hi tuccham. That is a very insignificant happiness. Then how is this happiness experienced? Kaṇḍūyanena karayor iva duḥkha-duḥkham. You have got itching, and if you scratch like this, so you get some happiness, but aftereffects of that happiness is very abominable. So even if you have legal sex, the mother has to undergo the labor pains and the father has to take responsibility for raising the children nicely, give them education. Of course, one who is irresponsible like cats and dogs, that is another thing. But those who are actually gentlemen, for them it is not painful. Therefore they are avoiding children by contraceptive methods, because they know to raise children is a very difficult job. So śāstra's injunction is simply to try to tolerate this itching sensation and you save so much pain. This is real psychology. That itching sensation can be tolerated if one practices this Kṛṣṇa consciousness. Then you will not be very much attracted by this sex life.

Śyāmasundara: I don't think we are talking about the same thing. I haven't made clear, perhaps, what is his philosophy.

Prabhupāda: What is his philosophy?

Śyāmasundara: His philosophy is that people have neuroses or disorders of their total personality, that there is conflict, there is anxiety, there is frustration, and that all of these have origin.

Prabhupāda: But I am telling you that all these are due to sex.

Śyāmasundara: That's what Freud is also saying.

Prabhupāda: That we also say. Freud is encouraging, and our process is to stop. That is the difference. Freud says that when there is sex impulse, enjoy. (indistinct) care what it is.

Śyāmasundara: No. He doesn't say one way or the other. He is merely trying to analyze the sex impulse. He says that due to repressed childhood sex desires that these neuroses arise in a person's personality, and that by analyzing...

Prabhupāda: Our process is not repression. We don't repress. Therefore we give facility, that "You have got sex impulse. All right, you have it, but with your wife, legalized wife."

Śyāmasundara: He thinks more in terms from the very beginning of birth there is sex impulse.

Prabhupāda: That is admitted. We say that as soon as there is an embodied living being, he must have hunger, he must have sex impulse. (indistinct), we find in the animals these impulses are there, so why so much philosophy? They are already there. What is the use of philosophizing?

Śyāmasundara: He analyzes that besides the id, or these sex impulses, there is the ego, which is the moral self, which tries to adjust these impulses, these sexual impulses, and tries to...

Prabhupāda: That we have already discussed, that because just like that the sex impulse you are giving him some facility that "You have sex life with your married wife." This is real (indistinct). Not (indistinct) because I have sex impulse, I can (indistinct) anyone, never mind mother or sister, and have sexual intercourse. That is not very nice.

Śyāmasundara: No. He doesn't enjoin that. He is a scientist. He doesn't make any recommendations one way or the other. He is merely trying to analyze what is cause...

Prabhupāda: (indistinct) our solution is this: Your materialistic life is painful. That's a fact. This materialistic life is painful. (indistinct). As soon as you have this material body, then you must suffer these three kinds of miserable condition of life. So our whole program is to stop. Everyone is looking after happiness. We say that unless you stop your materialistic way of life, repeated birth and death, there is no question of happiness. So the whole Vedic civilization is based on this, how one can get out of this disease. This is a disease, the repetition of birth and death. We are trying to cure this disease. Then all other symptoms will automatically vanquish. If you are a diseased fellow, you are getting sometimes a headache, sometimes leg ache, sometimes some pain in the stomach. But if your disease is cured, then that there are no more symptoms. That is our position.

Śyāmasundara: He says that these neuroses or disorders of the personality are due to repressed sex impulses in childhood, and that these cause traumatic and shock experiences. For instance, he says that at a certain age, around four or five, the son becomes jealous of the father, and he...

Prabhupāda: These are all right, but what is the remedy that he is suggesting? That the child should be allowed to have sex life?

Śyāmasundara: No. The tension that is created by repressing the sex desire...

Prabhupāda: There are so many (indistinct), we established some of them. There are so many problems. But our program is that threefold miseries, everyone who has accepted this body has to undergo the threefold miseries. You may describe in...

Śyāmasundara: [break] ...psychoanalysis that by releasing these emotions, which have been built up due to tension, frustration, then the original shock can be released through admitting, confessing, remembering, like that.

Prabhupāda: What is the guarantee that he will not get another shock? He is getting shock after shock. You (indistinct) one and another is present.

Śyāmasundara: He attributes all of our personality conflicts to this...

Prabhupāda: But the thing is that he is trying to cure one kind of shock, but there is no guarantee that he will not have shock. So our program is total cure: no more shock. That is our program. No more shock of any kind. His treatment is useless because he cannot guarantee another shock. Ours is (indistinct). If you are situated in real Kṛṣṇa consciousness, the (indistinct) type of misery which is (indistinct) will not (indistinct). No shock at all. We are giving that in Kṛṣṇa consciousness. And he is trying to cure the resultant action of one kind of shock, but there is no guarantee that another shock will not come. You will get them, one after another, one after another. That is called (indistinct). You are trying to solve one problem; another problem is there, immediately. You solve that problem, another problem is there. So how can you change them? So long as you are under condition by the material nature, shock after shock will come. (indistinct). If one is Kṛṣṇa conscious, no more shock. That we are...

Śyāmasundara: His idea is that the one basic instinct which is the most important to the human personality is the drive to procreate, or sexual energy.

Prabhupāda: That we have already discussed, that everyone has got. The animal has got this sexual proclivity.

Śyāmasundara: So he says that the present state of the personality has grown about because of childhood or incomplete uses of this libido or sexual energy, and if it has been misused then there is a disorder in the personality. But by healing that original shock in childhood, then the future will all be healed. There will be not more fluctuation in the personality. Because by healing this original shock, there won't be any more fluctuations or neuroses.

Prabhupāda: That we have prescribed. We are trying to make boys brahmacārīs. So of course there is tendency, but by practicing the brahmācārya system, by diverting one's attention to Kṛṣṇa consciousness for Kṛṣṇa's service, there will be very little chance for this shock.

Śyāmasundara: He says that our sexual instincts are often thwarted by social constraints, so in a society which does not have a brahmācārya system, this would be...

Prabhupāda: Therefore this Vedic system is so scientific, varṇāśrama-dharma. When these things are automatically adjusted and checked, our life becomes very peaceful and we make progress in Kṛṣṇa consciousness. Then these things will not come.

Śyāmasundara: This sexual energy, or the libido energy, he sees as not only sexual intercourse but is associated with a wide variety of pleasurable sensations relating to bodily activities, such as pleasure of the mouth, of the different organs. He says it's all sexual energy-eating, sucking.

Prabhupāda: That is already stated, that the only happiness in this material world, maithunādi-gṛhamedhi-sukham. Ādi means the basic principle is maithuna, sexual intercourse. And now there are some maithuna-ādi. Or you can take it that one is very happy—just like one gentleman proposed to (indistinct), "Give me a son." But that is also maithuna-ādi, by sexual intercourse. He is thinking that "I will have a son and I will get him married; he will also begin maithuna-ādi— and a grandson." So the whole system, this materialistic way of life, just like Bhāgavata is saying, yan maithuna gṛhamedhi sukham. This is happiness. (indistinct). Suta means son and āpta means friend. (indistinct) wife, mother, sister, they are enjoying this life. (indistinct), that's in the desert, one drop of water. The desert requires an ocean of water, but in the whole desert if there is one drop of water, you can say, "Here is water." But what is the value of water? What is the value of this water? You can say, "Here is water." Similarly, this sexual pleasure society, there is some pleasure, but what is the value of that pleasure? That is compared with one drop in the desert. You are seeking after unlimited pleasure. (indistinct) You are seeking that pleasure. What this will pacify you? Therefore nobody is satisfied. He is having sex in different ways, placing the woman in different ways. Now these young girls are almost naked. They are attractive. But this is not (indistinct) how society is degrading. Now the woman population is greater everywhere. So how to solve? As soon as there is woman population, they say, "Where is a man?" The (indistinct) desire (is) that every woman, every girl is trying to attract a man. But where is the man? And the man will take advantage, that "Milk is available on the market. What is the use of keeping a cow?" So they will decline to keep a cow, because milk is so cheap. So this is social desertion. And the more the man will become attached to woman, the woman population will increase. It is psychological. The whole world is increasing woman population. So therefore there is desire, especially in (indistinct).

Devotee: How is that?

Prabhupāda: The same principle—if milk is available in the market, what is the use of keeping a cow?

Devotee: How does that result in more women?

Prabhupāda: When you have more sex, then you have no power to beget a male child. When the man is less powerful, a girl is born. When the man is powerful, a boy is born. That is Vedic system. In our country, in (indistinct), there are fewer woman because there the men are very stout and strong. When there is discharge, if the man's discharge is larger, then there is a male child; if the woman's discharge is larger, then there is a female child. So when women will be very easily available, the men will be weak. So what will he beget? He will beget female child, because he has lost his power. Sometimes he becomes impotent. So many desertions. If you don't restrict sex life, there will be so many desertions. And that is happening-impotency, no marriage, woman population more. But they did not know how things are happening, how human psychology can be controlled. The perfect system is the Vedic system.

Śyāmasundara: He says that all pleasures, all bodily pleasures have a sexual origin.

Prabhupāda: That we have already discussed, maithunādi. Ādi means in the beginning, sex impulse. That is already there.

Śyāmasundara: Even he says satisfaction of the eating and sucking tendency.

Prabhupāda: That is maithunādi. The central point is sex. Yan maithunādi-gṛhamedhi-sukhaṁ hi tuccham SB 7.9.45 .

Śyāmasundara: He says that after a period of childhood indulgence in these sexual appetites, he begins to learn that by giving up satisfaction he can please and influence others so as to gain more adult favors, just like (indistinct) and (indistinct) you were talking about. So the pleasure principle becomes replaced by the reality principle.

Prabhupāda: Yes. That is stated in Bhagavad-gītā, (indistinct). If your consciousness is changed, if you become Kṛṣṇa conscious, then there is a verse by Yamunācārya, he says,

yad-avadhi mama cetaḥ kṛṣṇa-pādāravinde
nava-nava-rasa-dhāmany udyataṁ rantum āsīt
tad-avadhi bata nārī-saṅgame smaryamāne

bhavati mukha-vikāraḥ suṣṭhu niṣṭhīvanaṁ ca

(indistinct), he was emperor. So he said, "Since I am taking pleasure in the service of Lord Kṛṣṇa, nava-nava-rasa-dhāmany udyataṁ rantum āsīt, since I have engaged my life to enjoy the transcendental bliss by serving the lotus feet of Lord Kṛṣṇa, yad-avadhi mama cetaḥ kṛṣṇa-pādāravinde. (indistinct), "I am getting newer and newer pleasures. And because," he said, "and at that time when I think of sex pleasure," bhavati mukha-vikāraḥ suṣṭhu niṣṭhīvanaṁ ca. He was king. He had under his command (indistinct), but he said, "when I think of that sex pleasure, my mouth becomes deformed and I spit." That is Kṛṣṇa consciousness. (indistinct)

Devotee: Freud would analyze that as...

Prabhupāda: Why nonsense Freud would analyze it? He is not Kṛṣṇa. What does he know? What rascal (indistinct). He is a big man among the rascals. A big rascal, that is all. He is a rascal, but a big rascal, that's all.

Śyāmasundara: What is the purpose of discussing him?

Prabhupāda: Just to prove that he is a big rascal. He may be a very big man amongst the other rascals, small rascals. Jīva Gosvāmī—this is Jīva Gosvāmī's language. I think I have mentioned somewhere in my Bhāgavata, (indistinct), big rascal, that is all. The analysis of (indistinct), how can we approach that with little knowledge? What improvement has (indistinct); after his philosophy in the Western countries? He has degraded more.

Devotee: He has put their attention more on sex.

Prabhupāda: That's all. What actual benefit is derived from him?

Śyāmasundara: He has made the impression that all of our troubles are due to frustrated sex life in our childhood, and that by analyzing these activities of childhood we can rectify our situation.

Prabhupāda: That is (indistinct).

Devotee: That is why young boys and girls have increased sex life.

Prabhupāda: They are becoming hippies. What benefit is there? He has degraded the whole nation.

Śyāmasundara: I think we have many clothes out on the line.

Devotee: I don't think that in this discussion that we can convince in any way the (indistinct). I think the invalid aspects of Freud (indistinct) called irrational.

Prabhupāda: (indistinct)

Śyāmasundara: We have scientific reasons

Devotee: But there are aspects of Freud's philosophy and psychology which they feel have proven beneficial for mankind. So many cases of, say, someone is paralyzed and they can't find any direct physical reason why a person can't walk, and through analysis they are able to trace down that it is due to some repressed trauma, what they call trauma.

Prabhupāda: What is?

Śyāmasundara: Shock.

Devotee: And therefore the person reacts on a physical level and they can't (indistinct) psychoanalyzing him and having him recall that event, then he is free...

Prabhupāda: Therefore our prescription is that in the beginning of life, teach him brahmācārya restraint, and when he is grown up, he is above twenty, get him married. In the beginning he will learn how to restrain. If you teach your child to become saintly, he retains his semina, his brain becomes strong, he can understand things, because wasting your semina means less intelligence. So from the beginning, if he is brahmacārī, if he stops misuse of semina, then he becomes intelligent and strong and fully grown. For want of education, everything is being stunted-brain, bodily growth, and everything. So after he is trained as a brahmacārī, if he thinks that still he will have sex enjoyment, all right, he can be married. But because he will have strength of body and brain, he will beget a child, immediately there will be male child. This is practical remedy. And because he has been trained from boyhood to renounce this material way of enjoyment, when he is fifty years old, naturally his first-born child must be twenty-five years old, so he can retire from sex life. (indistinct), because household life means a license for sex life. That is all. It is not required. But one who cannot restrain, he is given a license, "All right, you have sex life by marriage," as I explained in the beginning. So that is real program. That will save the society. Not by (indistinct) or some (indistinct) and this and that. They cannot find out the root disease. But if you give him all indulgence, then he will study the (indistinct). You should take information from the standard knowledge. That's what we have discussed (indistinct) sex impulse is already there. So from the very beginning you have to restrain. Otherwise you will be implicated.

Devotee: Is doing it from the beginning necessarily always going to work? For instance in Nairobi, (indistinct) he came with his wife and two children, and his son was so frightened, he never liked to leave the house at night because he thought when he left the house at night, when he returned the house wouldn't be there, and you were saying that that was recalled from his previous life, that he was bringing that... [break] ...simple desires?

Prabhupāda: Yes. That is continued from the previous birth. As soon as the seed is there, we are getting so many impressions, there are seeds, so many impressions. So therefore Lord Caitanya said that we are getting so many seeds, every moment, so one who is fortunate, he gets the seed of bhakti by the mercy of Kṛṣṇa and guru. Guru-kṛṣṇa-prasāde pāya bhakti-latā-bīja CC Madhya 19.151 . The bīja is there, that seed, and if he nourishes that seed by watering, (indistinct), then it grows, he becomes a devotee. Everything is seed. Either bhakti or sinful life or anything—it grows (indistinct). So brahmacārī means from the very beginning sowing the seed of goodness, and if one becomes a devotee, then automatically other things are lost.

Śyāmasundara: So the Western system of bring up children is artificial, because they allow the child unrestrained freedom either to repress or to enjoy his sex desire.

Prabhupāda: No. That is not predictable.

Śyāmasundara: The Vedic program is a social program.

Prabhupāda: Social, yes. Just like Cāṇakya says. He is an experienced moralist, his ethical laws. He says, (indistinct), if you indulge in freedom, (indistinct) and if you restrict and restrain, that is very, very (indistinct). Therefore one should take care of his disciple and serve by chastising them, not giving them independence.

Śyāmasundara: Freud would say that this system of repression, by saying "Don't do this," is harmful to the child.

Prabhupāda: (indistinct) repression of course—his idea of repression is different. Our idea is different. Our repression is you must rise early in the morning, you must attend maṅgala ārati.

Śyāmasundara: It's with knowledge.

Prabhupāda: Knowledge will come later on. But in the beginning, "must"; otherwise he will not (indistinct). Even if there is no knowledge, if by the order of the spiritual master or superior, you must do it.

Śyāmasundara: Freud's idea, being as he came from the Victorian age, when there was straight restraint of sex desire by the social structure, was that if you tell a child, "Don't look at a woman. Don't look at a woman," that this will...

Prabhupāda: We don't say like that—"Don't look at a woman." Here is a woman sitting, I am looking. Does this mean immediately you become polluted?

Śyāmasundara: What they say is that there is a conflict between a man's natural desire to enjoy women...

Prabhupāda: Therefore I use that strong word mūḍha, that they are actually fools. They do not know how to do things. Therefore I say they are actually big fools.

Devotee: The Freudian method would be to think back to those seeds and rectify them-think back and back and back and try to remember those seeds.

Prabhupāda: (indistinct) he is already grown up. Where is the seed? That is nonsense. Seed means those already grown up, fructified. Where do you find the seed? That is nonsense. Just like as example you have got arrow and bow. So long as it is in your hand, it is all right, but when it is thrown, you cannot control it. It is out of your hand. Another example is this (indistinct). You have seen bamboo. When it is green, you can bend it, but when it is yellow, it will break.

Śyāmasundara: It is proven in practical experience of psychoanalysis that by remembering some traumatic or shocking experience in the person's life it relieves the emotional tension which has caused the disorder in his personality, and he becomes healthy again.

Prabhupāda: That may be, but if you sow a seed, the seed, when fructified, grown into a tree, then it is no more...

Śyāmasundara: He doesn't call it a seed; he calls it a shocking experience which we repress because it causes pain, and this repression makes a tension. For instance, a person grows up with a great hatred of woman: "Oh, I hate all woman."

Prabhupāda: That is particular (indistinct) for a particular person.

Devotee: Otherwise, let's say when the child was very young, the mother became angry and locked him in a room for too long, and he was crying, locked up. So then that person for the rest of his life, as soon as the windows are closed, he will be afraid, because he remembers, even if he has forgotten the original experience. He is always afraid of. That's claustrophobia.

Śyāmasundara: Freud says by remembering this experience you can explain...

Prabhupāda: Suppose the child is locked up, and his brain becomes deranged. Then how can (indistinct)?

Devotee: So let's say he's grown, he still has that fear, and Freud or one of his doctors will start to think back, "What do you remember from your childhood?" And then the doctor will see, "Oh, that is (indistinct)."

Prabhupāda: That's all right. He can find out what is the cause, but what is the cure?

Śyāmasundara: By remembering and explaining to him, "You were only a child. It wasn't really a bad situation," like this, and then the patient loses the tension which has caused the disorder, and he becomes healthy again.

Prabhupāda: That is psychoanalysis?

Śyāmasundara: Yes. Psychoanalysis, psychotherapy.

Devotee: Actually the idea is that a child is sometimes unable to adjust to certain very extremes. It is called trauma, very shocking, and the child can't understand; he is simply very much stunned. So through his life he is affected by that. He can't remember exactly what it is, because he wants to forget it, it is so painful, but it manifests in some aberrant symptom later on, as he is afraid when the windows are closed. But by finding out what is the root of his fear,... (indistinct)

Prabhupāda: (indistinct) ...I become afraid. Just like in that hospital, it was so nice, everything was so nice, but because I was thinking, "Oh, I cannot go out, I cannot walk," it was giving me too much trouble—that very thought that I cannot go out.

Devotee: (indistinct) sometimes they can't trace out the history of a particular case. The idea is that if they can find out from this person remembering back when they were young that he had been locked in a room, then (indistinct) the person was able to understand the significance of that incident, that it was really very small. Then it loses its importance in his life. He has been unable to resolve it because he has repressed it.

Prabhupāda: But I don't think when a man's brain is already deranged he can be rectified by finding out the cause.

Devotee: It's not that the trauma makes him crazy so that he cannot function in society. He could be a business executive who has claustrophobia; he can't stand getting in an elevator. He is leading a normal life in society but he has a problem which causes him a great deal...

Prabhupāda: So why not divert his attention to Kṛṣṇa consciousness?

Śyāmasundara: Ah, by a higher type of knowledge, if one realizes that he is not this body, then all those things will be...

Prabhupāda: Yes, that is...

Devotee: That is why we are doing social service.

Prabhupāda: To divert his attention. (indistinct) That is understanding, and nicer thing (indistinct), that is our formula, (indistinct). Actually, as one increases his Kṛṣṇa consciousness he becomes (indistinct) all this material (indistinct). That is the prime remedy-panacea for all diseases.

Devotee: This Freudian philosophy is an offshoot from Darwin philosophy. Freud also thinks that man is a biological organism only; therefore his biological functioning should measure up to certain norms of biological behavior. If it doesn't, then there is something wrong. If it does, then everything is all right. So he makes some animal behavior good and other animal behavior substandard, and you want to bring everybody to a certain standard of animal behavior. But he has no conception of spiritual life.

Prabhupāda: (indistinct)

Śyāmasundara: We know he's a great fool, but we have to convince the students.

Prabhupāda: We have to convince them as I am convincing you. That is your business.

Śyāmasundara: Later on, Freud began to accept that certain nonsexual factors might produce these unconscious conflicts, also, and he divided the personality into three separate systems, called the ego, the super-ego and the id. The id is the unconscious instinctive drive to enjoy-sex desire, everything animalistic. The ego is that part of the mind concerned with adjusting efficiently to external reality. In other words, it's a moral segment of the personality which tries to adjust or protect.

Prabhupāda: We are trying to create (indistinct) these falsity. Everyone has got some false egoism. That is our (indistinct). Just like Freud is thinking that he is American or (indistinct). This is false ego. We are giving everyone the intelligence that this identification with this material body, that is (indistinct). Due to ignorance I am thinking that "I am Indian," "I am American," "I am Hindu," "I am (indistinct)." This is false ego- ahaṅkāra, as it is stated in the Bhagavad-gītā. This is inferior quality of egoism. The superior quality of egoism is Brahman: "I am eternal servant of Kṛṣṇa." So if he is taught to the superior engagement, then automatically this false egoism becomes stopped.

Śyāmasundara: He says that ego is concerned with self-preservation—by organizing and controlling against neurotic conflicts and the demands of the id. In other words, if the id sees something, like foodstuffs, it automatically has the urge to eat it, kill it, eat it. The ego is concerned with controlling that desire in order to preserve the individual. For instance, this becomes restrained. Voluntary restraint, control, by personalities and the superego are the authoritarian values of the society, or the parents which say "No, you do not kill like that. You do not eat this, like that." So these three systems are functioning in the personality, and they are always in conflict with a person as he progresses.

Prabhupāda: But the basic principle is called, as Vivekananda says, that he is following the principles of (indistinct), he has no conception of the soul that is existing beyond the body. So they are taking consideration of the body. So according to our philosophy, Bhāgavata, anyone who is in the concept of this body is no better than an ass. Sa eva go-kharaḥ SB 10.84.13 . Yasyātma-buddhiḥ kuṇape tri-dhātuke SB 10.84.13 . One who is identifying this body of three elements as the self, he is no better than an ass.

Śyāmasundara: These three types of reaction to anything—the id reaction, the ego reaction and the superego reaction—these are all bodily reactions.

Prabhupāda: Yes. They are all bodily—subtle reactions.

Śyāmasundara: Each one is more subtle than the other.

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Śyāmasundara: The id is the most gross,

Prabhupāda: Yes. Mind is the beginning of subtle. Just like my senses are gross, but my senses are being controlled by the mind. The mind is the subtle element, but mind is controlled by intelligence, and intelligence is controlled by ego. So if the ego is false, then the whole thing is false. If I am thinking I am this body, this false identification, ego, then all other things which are coming out of this false ego, they are also false. Therefore it is called māyā, or illusion, because they are standing on false platform. Therefore the whole Vedic education is that you be relieved from this false platform and come to the real platform. That is called brahma-jñāna, real platform. And in Bhagavad-gītā it is stated, (indistinct). When one comes to that knowledge that I am spirit soul, than immediately he becomes happy. All this trouble is due to this false ego. Immediately he comes back. (indistinct) What does this mean? The blazing fire of material existence is immediately extinguished. These philosophers are simply describing the blazing fire of material existence. We are trying to get him out of the prison. That's all. Immediately he feels relief: "Oh, I am out of the fire." And within the fire, however you try to make him happy, how will he be happy? The fire is already there. Save him from the fire. Then he is happy. That is Caitanya Mahāprabhu, (indistinct). And in Bhagavad-gītā also it is stated, (indistinct).

Devotee: Twelfth Chapter.

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Devotee: (indistinct).

Prabhupāda: (indistinct) Kṛṣṇa says, (indistinct), we are getting out. So our (indistinct).

Śyāmasundara: We have more to discuss.

Prabhupāda: He is identifying the body with the soul. And our preaching is different—that we are not this body. Our first principle of understanding is to know that we are not this body. I am different from this body and I am transmigrating from one body to another. That they cannot express. They are explaining that the body is evolving from this body to that body. That is the basic misunderstanding.

Devotee: Freud's case is interesting, that he formed all of his conclusions by his observations of what he calls neurotic and psychotic patients. He observed mentally ill people, neurosis and psychosis, and he drew his conclusions about both sick and normal psychology from his observation of abnormal. He observed the normal behavior of neurotic people, psychotic people, crazy people, and from their behavior he tried to infer all about human psychology. So not only was he on bodily platform, but his only subject matter was the insane. So how can he draw valid conclusions about behavior?

Prabhupāda: So what is your answer?

Devotee: Yes, his observation is correct, but at the same time it doesn't invalidate Freud's use of psychology for supposedly normal people.

Prabhupāda: (indistinct) psychology.

Śyāmasundara: He didn't analyze only crazy people; he also analyzed his friends, his mother, his wife, other people also, healthy people.

Devotee: The point is in Revatīnandana Mahārāja's argument is that we have to define, then, what is crazy and what is sane.

Prabhupāda: He is saying that he had studied only some crazy people.

Śyāmasundara: No.

Prabhupāda: But that is not the fact. He analyzed some sane people also. But one psychiatrist's opinion is that (indistinct) was a civil servant, he was called to give evidence in a case where the criminal was pleading (indistinct) became insane while he committed the murder. So the civil servant was called to test him, whether actually he was insane or (indistinct) insanity. So he gave evidence that "I have tested so many persons, so I have seen that more or less everyone is insane. More or less. They are bewildered. So in that case, if insanity is the only plea that he should be excused, he can be excused. But so far as I know, everyone is more or less insane." And that is our conclusion. We say (indistinct), anyone who is infected with this material nature is more or less insane, crazy. He is crazy, not more or less. Anyone who has got this material body must be crazy. And therefore everyone is speaking in a different way.

Devotee: As a result of Freud's philosophy he prescribed, and many of his students prescribed, certain activities. This is one thing we forget to mention—that they prescribed certain activities to help relieve the patient of the trauma, and that is called therapy. Actually there is a higher therapy. Actually one of Freud's students would say that we are all involved in therapy in Kṛṣṇa consciousness, which we are, and that therapy is chanting Hare Kṛṣṇa. Therapy is a certain kind of activity which will relieve the anxieties and stresses of the mind.

Prabhupāda: That is recommended by Freud?

Śyāmasundara: No. He wasn't a therapeutical psychologist.

Devotee: No, but as a result of his...

Śyāmasundara: Later on they devised that theory of therapy.

Prabhupāda: (indistinct) in support of our movement.

Devotee: According to our philosophy, everyone in this material world is under the spell of the material nature, māyā, "that which is not." So Freud observed that not only in crazy people, but in so-called normal people, everybody's lives are based on some types of illusion. So his psychoanalytic therapy is to trace out how I have come to this illusion or that illusion, that due to some childhood experience with my mother and father or my mouth or my genitals, something like that, all of these experiences are contributing to my unreal perception of the world. But the point which you made is that although he may have worked out what is one particular illusion, who is to prevent that there will not be another illusion? So our process is not to bother tracing out each and every illusion that we have, but to become free from the whole process of being controlled by illusory energy.

Prabhupāda: Yes. That is our position: not to be affected by any more illusion.

Devotee: He was analyzing the details of the particular illusion, but we are becoming free from the whole influence of māyā.

Devotee (2): (indistinct) the fire is extinguished.

Prabhupāda: (indistinct) taken him out of the fire, then he is ...

Devotee: But his one point is that Freud's theory underwent many changes. In the beginning...

Prabhupāda: Then (indistinct) because that is imperfect.

Devotee: His first doctrine was that we should indulge the senses, that this would help, but later he reformed that idea, that instead of indulging the gross senses we should sublimate our natural instincts to some higher cause. So his idea was that instead of actually indulging in gross sex life, we should channel this sexual impulse to some higher cause, such as for developing the culture.

Prabhupāda: That we have explained by quoting Śrī Yamunācārya's verse, that "Since I have taken to Kṛṣṇa consciousness, whenever I think of sexual intercourse, my mouth becomes deformed and I want to spit."

Devotee: Freud would say that whatever talents you have, use them in Kṛṣṇa consciousness. But Freud says if somebody has the impulse to kill, he should become a surgeon. If somebody has the impulse to stab someone, then he should be directed to become a doctor and a surgeon, and then by that same cutting...

Devotee (2): This is still a limited conception of what...

Prabhupāda: Then all murderers should be sent to medical college to become surgeons instead of condemning them. Why not?

Devotee: Or put them in the army.

Prabhupāda: (indistinct)

Devotee: They do not like that now. They recruit for the army from the prison.

Devotee (2): (indistinct)

Devotee: But we have the higher...

Prabhupāda: To some extent that is all right, because therefore the kṣatriya race is there, the fighting spirit.

Śyāmasundara: Another part of Freud's theory is that there is a life instinct and a death instinct, that we all have these two instincts, and that the death instinct is the impulse toward aggression and destruction, whereas the life instinct is the impulse towards self-preservation and sex and procreation. He said that people have these two impulses, and those who have the death impulse to extreme often direct it against the self, so that you have people who have accidents and diseases, that is all self-inflicted; that because I get some disease or have some accident, that is my death instinct directed against myself. So he saw that...

Prabhupāda: That is suicidal policy.

Śyāmasundara: If someone gets sick, it's because they want to get sick. Or if there is some accident, it is due to my own desire that that accident takes place. This is his theory.

Prabhupāda: How is this theory?

Devotee: We see practically. I think most of us have experienced this, and you have told us that if we overeat we will get sick, and we have all experienced that if we overeat we get sick.

Devotee: But my reason for eating more is not my tendency to get sick. (indistinct) is different. He says that this is the (indistinct).

Devotee: Yes. So therefore one should not overeat, but still even though we have all gotten sick, we will still go ahead and overeat and get sick.

Śyāmasundara: Sometimes he analyzes that if there is a problem facing someone, that he will get sick, and that will resolve the problem. Psychosomatic sickness. And he saw that accidents happen in the same way.

Devotee: It sounds like to me that what he calls life instinct is what we call logical, and what he calls death instinct is what we call tamoguṇa. If some people... Let's say Freud never came across people who have the urge for mukti. People have the urge to go...

Prabhupāda: Neither death nor life...

Devotee: They haven't touch...

Śyāmasundara: That would be part of the life instinct, self-preservation—if you want to live forever.

Prabhupāda: There are others also: to want to die forever.

Śyāmasundara: Yes. Death instinct.

Devotee: Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura writes that "Vaiṣṇavas die to live," so when we die to live, that is another instinct.

Prabhupāda: The Bhagavad-gītā says, (indistinct), by giving up this body, that is death, (indistinct).

Śyāmasundara: Do you attribute accidents and disease to a desire for self-destruction?

Prabhupāda: No. Ultimately we say there is no such thing as accident. Nothing can take place without God's sanction. So there is no question of accidents.

Devotee: If they would have some information of the three kinds of miseries, ādhyātmika, ādibhautika, ādi-daivika, they should stop circulating all these kinds of instincts, because they understand all these different things are categorizing...

Śyāmasundara: I thought I heard you say before that some sicknesses and accidents are caused by the person's desire—the person desires to be sick; the person desires to have accident.

Prabhupāda: (indistinct) person desires to be sick.

Devotee: Suppose somebody says, "Well, I want to be happy." So we say, "You just chant Hare Kṛṣṇa and join us, then you will be happy." So he is saying, "No. I want to keep my job. I want to do this or that." So when we can say that actually he is not serious about becoming happy. If he really were serious about becoming happy, he would join us. So in a sense he actually doesn't want to be happy. That's what he would say.

Prabhupāda: He wants to be happy but he is miserable. That is (indistinct). He wants to be happy but he is misguided in search of happiness. Everyone wants happiness, but when one is misguided, that is called illusion. He is searching happiness without any basis. (break—continues next day)

Śyāmasundara: We are discussing Freud still. It was his idea that every person has certain aggressive and destructive tendencies within them, and sometimes these are directed upon the self, so that one will have accidents or sicknesses which are self-inflicted. Does this happen?

Prabhupāda: When one commits suicide, that is not in sane condition. He is crazy. In sane condition nobody commits suicide.

Śyāmasundara: He observed, for instance, when someone came up against a massive task, that sometimes they got sick in order to escape the task—these kinds of things. He investigated slips of the tongue and different accidents. He said that a lot of times they are caused by the self, the psychic.

Prabhupāda: Yes, that is intention, not insanity.

Śyāmasundara: Another area of his investigation was the problem of anxiety. He says that the source of anxiety is the id, or the primitive instincts, which are always forcing us to do this and do that. In other words, desire. These impulses threaten to overpower the rational or the moral self. So there is always a tension or an anxiety produced.

Prabhupāda: Anxiety shall continue so long as you are in material condition. You cannot be free from anxiety in your conditioned life.

Śyāmasundara: It is because we desired something and we were always frustrated by that desire?

Prabhupāda: Frustration must be there, because you do not desire the right thing.

Śyāmasundara: So that is the basic cause of anxiety-desire?

Prabhupāda: Yes. Desiring something which is not permanent. That we call (indistinct). Suppose that I wish to live forever, but if I have accepted this material body, therefore there is no question of living forever. So I am always anxious when death should come. I am afraid of death, when the body will be destroyed. This is (indistinct). So therefore the conclusion is that anxiety is due to our acceptance of something which does not exist. This is the right definition of anxiety.

Śyāmasundara: He says that the ego develops strategies of defense against this anxiety which is entering from the id, and one of the strategies it develops is repression. Whenever there is some strong animalistic desire, the ego represses that desire in order to preserve itself.

Prabhupāda: Repression is always there. We make plans in so many ways, but by nature it is frustrated. That is repression.

Śyāmasundara: Is conscious repression advisable?

Prabhupāda: Conscious repression?

Śyāmasundara: Yes. Of my basic instincts, my desires. Should I consciously strive to repress these desires?

Prabhupāda: Just like if you are in a diseased condition and you desire to eat something which is forbidden by the physician. So consciously you have to repress in order to cure. That is the way.

Śyāmasundara: I heard you say once that we cannot really repress desire but we have to channel it, control it, into other objects.

Prabhupāda: Repression means, suppose you have a disease, you are suffering from typhoid fever, and the doctor says that you don't take any solid food. Now if you desire to take a paratha, you have to repress it: "No, I cannot take paratha. " Suppose there is looseness of your bile(?), and if you want to take some condensed milk, you have to repress it. (indistinct) go against you, you have to repress. Repress means repressing something which is going against my welfare. So in this brahmacārī system also there is repression. He should not see young woman, he should not sit down with young woman. But he desires. The desire is that "I shall see young woman." He has to repress. So this is called tapasya, voluntary repression.

Śyāmasundara: Aren't these desires given outlet in other ways? Do we channel the desires to some other field? Instead of seeing a beautiful woman, we see the beautiful form of Kṛṣṇa, like that?

Prabhupāda: That is our process. From this (indistinct) if you have got better engagement, you give up inferior engagement. When you are captivated by seeing the beautiful form of Kṛṣṇa, naturally you have no more desire to see the beautiful form of a young woman.

Śyāmasundara: The Buddhists also say repress desires, but they mean total repression.

Prabhupāda: Yes. We don't say that. We just say that sometimes there is strong desire, we have to repress it. Just like my Guru Mahārāja used to say that while you get up from bed, you beat your mind a hundred times with your shoe, and when you go to bed, you beat your mind a hundred times with a broomstick. Then you will be able to control your mind. Sometimes, just like wild tiger, they have got him to control by repression. The circus players, they do that. Because it is wild tiger, repression is required. But when it is under control, there is no question of repression. You can play with the tiger; he becomes your friend. So repression is not always bad.

Śyāmasundara: Another field of investigation for Freud was the idea of projection. He said this is a technique for attributing one's own unconscious attitudes onto other people. In other words, X called Y a name, but actually Y is the object of that. In other words, for instance, X may regard Y as being jealous, but in fact X is jealous and he projects that attitude onto someone else.

Prabhupāda: That is accepted. (indistinct) Everyone thinks others like himself.

Śyāmasundara: So he says that this desire to accuse someone else of being the same is sometimes repressed and replaced by the opposite expression. In other words, someone may dislike someone, but they will inhibit that dislike and show overt symptoms of friendliness, where in fact there is no friendliness there but it is only a mock friendliness. This is one of the psychological attitudes he was studying. Sometimes someone who may have dislike for someone, instead of expressing dislike, may express just the opposite, extreme fondness, where in fact he dislikes the person.

Prabhupāda: That is called (indistinct), silliness. What is the meaning of silly?

Śyāmasundara: Silly means frivolous or superficial.

Prabhupāda: (indistinct) If the other party is silly, then you also become silly. That is human nature.

Devotee: Freud would give an example like this: The child three or four years old, and then a younger child is born in the family. The four-year-old child sees the younger child as a source of competition for affection, and he doesn't like the younger child, but then if he expresses dislike for the child he will be chastised by the parents, so he makes as if he likes the child very much in order to get approbation, but factually he dislikes the child. That is another mechanism that...

Prabhupāda: I don't think the older child dislikes the younger child. Sometimes.

Devotee: Yes. But he would say this sometimes occurs.

Śyāmasundara: You don't notice it very much in Indian families because they are so well-adjusted, but in Western families this quite often happens—the older child becomes jealous of the younger child's favors, but in order to gain the favor of the parents, he expresses overt love for the younger child, or...

Prabhupāda: I don't think children are so clever, that in order to win the love of parents they will treat like that.

Devotee: Freud put so much emphasis on children and the mentality and emotions of children—what one is experiencing, youth and so on—and it is all concocted, don't you think?

Prabhupāda: Children can be trained in a different way. As you train them, they become like that.

Devotee: Freud says that all children experience this if there is a younger child born in the family.

Prabhupāda: They imitate. Children's position is imitation. I have seen in other children, one child was two years old and another child was three years old, and they were imitating just like they had seen sexual intercourse of their father. I have seen it. They are playing, lying down, and the male child is laying upon her. I saw it. Imitation. They do not know what is sex, but they will imitate it. That's all.

Śyāmasundara: Freud analyzes that there are different defense mechanisms by which the ego protects itself.

Prabhupāda: The conclusion is that children generally imitate. They do not know what is the value, but they imitate.

Śyāmasundara: He would say there are instinctive defense mechanisms in the psychological make-up of everyone, such as repression, projection, excessive overt reactions of an opposite kind, different mechanisms which the ego employs to cover up, to protect itself from the impulses of the id, primitive impulses.

Devotee: Just like he says that from the social standards of conduct and moral codes, a person develops an ideal conception of himself. He wants to think himself ideal, and this ideal conception fits the standard of the society and his environment. Then from inside, from his more animal desires, sex desire, etc., he gets impulses which don't fit that standard, that he feels some sex love, but it should not be there, so he wants to say, "I don't really have that." So he tries to repress that desire either by repressing it or by saying, "I don't desire that. Somebody else desires like that," or in so many ways he tries to cover the fact that his own psychological make-up doesn't fit his standard. Therefore he calls it defense mechanism, a way to pretend as if I still am ideal, although I don't really have ideal desires and thoughts, like that. That's the (indistinct). So he postulated all these different mechanisms for defending the ego against the desires of the id or... [break]

Prabhupāda: You have seen that play?

Śyāmasundara: Tarzan?

Prabhupāda: Tarzan. Yes. He was brought up by monkeys. He was brought on... He has got the monkey habits. Children, if you keep them in good association, then they will come out very good. They will have psychological development in good way. And if you keep them in bad association, they will come out bad. Just like in Boston the priest regretted that these our American boys, they were so much after God, but they could not lead(?) them. Actually you American boys, before coming to Kṛṣṇa consciousness, there was no God consciousness; there was hippie consciousness. And now this has changed, due to association. So you are all grown-up, but even small children, if you keep them in good association, they come out nice. Demigods they come out. And if you put them in the demon association, they come out demons. So they are blank slate. As you write, it is written. That is real psychology. You can mold children as you like. They have got the capacity to... Therefore children are sent to a school for taking education, not old men.

Śyāmasundara: So there is no fixed pattern of development of children's personalities?

Prabhupāda: No. This is nonpsychology. You can mold them in any way. As you put them into the mold, they will come out. Just like you take a soft dough, and you can mold it-like parathas or capatis, kacaurīs.

Śyāmasundara: So actually Freud was speaking only of a certain set of children in a certain society, Western society, where they were all brought up a certain way.

Prabhupāda: That's all right. He has a got a one-sided experience.

Devotee: Yes. He has been criticized like that.

Śyāmasundara: You don't find these neuroses in Indian families.

Prabhupāda: No.

Devotee (2): They have studied subsequently primitive tribes and they have found that these neuroses were not there. They only existed in the social structure of Victorian Europe.

Prabhupāda: Therefore this is the conclusion—that if you put children in right association, they will go rightly, and if you put them in wrong association, they will go wrongly. They have no independent psychology.

Śyāmasundara: Perhaps his one contribution was that he said that behavior must be understood in terms of a person's whole life history, in the total...

Prabhupāda: That is why in our Vedic system it is forbidden that even a small child, before that small child, the husband and wife should not joking. They should not talk jokingly.

Śyāmasundara: To the child?

Prabhupāda: Before the child.

Śyāmasundara: Before the child.

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Devotee: To each other.

Prabhupāda: Yes. It is not that "It is a small child. They will not understand." But they can understand. So what to speak of having sex intercourse before the child? They will learn it. I've seen it. They do not know what is sex intercourse, but they have learned it from their rascal father and mother.

Śyāmasundara: So Freud, actually his psychology depended upon a rather pessimistic view of human nature—that we are all beset with these uncontrollable impulses...

Prabhupāda: This in not only pessimism, but due to poor fund of knowledge. He has no perfect knowledge, neither is he trained up by any perfect man. So he is talking all nonsense.

Śyāmasundara: His conclusion was that it was impossible to be happy in this material world, but we can alleviate some of the conflicts through this psychoanalysis. You can try and make the path as smooth as possible, but it is always...

Prabhupāda: That is one (indistinct) that you cannot be happy in this material world, but if you are spiritually elevated, spiritually trained up, then you will be happy. The same example. Just like iron is not fire, but you put it in the fire, it will act like fire. Similarly, although there is no possibility of happiness in this material world, if you are spiritually trained up, if your consciousness is changed into Kṛṣṇa consciousness, then you will be happy. (end)