The Wisdom and Teachings of Fr. Keating, with Chris Hagen

In this video, Chris Hagen speaks out of the depth of his experience as a contemplative and as a student and directee of Fr. Thomas Keating. Following the video is Chris's written outline of this presentation.

Outline (with some time stamps)

1. The Purpose of Centering Prayer: Become the Image of God (beginning at 9:23). “God created humankind in his image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.” ~Genesis 1:27.

—Keating recognized that humans seek happiness – but we tend to seek the wrong experience, and we seek it in the wrong places.

—Happiness is usually defined as a positive emotional state that is brought about by an external experience.  

—But from a spiritual perspective, happiness is a state of contentment and well-being and balance that is not caused by an external experience. It is “the peace that passes all understanding.”

—This peace we seek is imprinted into our being; it is part of our fully human and fully divine DNA.

—The unconscious beliefs that we accrue as we develop can create obstacles to this peace.

 

— (17:30) Scientific analogies are useful in understanding how these obstacles arise:

   • Homeostasis is a state of equilibrium, our instinctual need for physiological balance.

   • Homeostasis can be compared to a thermostat, which sets an optimal temperature in a room.

   •  Biologically, mentally, & emotionally, we have a preset optimal “temperature.” However, temperature always changes, and we can tolerate variations in temperature. Biologically, we are at our healthiest when we are operating within a certain tolerance range.

   •  As we develop mentally and emotionally and encounter our needs for survival and security, affection and esteem, and power and control, unconscious learning occurs. This creates our personal “thermostat” and our unconsciously learned tolerance range.

   •  When this tolerance range is exceeded (e.g., when an emotional need is not met in a way that satisfies our unconsciously & often immature or misguided beliefs), we experience afflictive emotions: fear, anxiety, anger, frustration, etc.

   •  We seek relief from these afflictive emotions by creating ‘programs for happiness,’, i.e., outsized demands for security, affection, and control). This is how the so-called false self comes into being.

— (28:00) While our biological tolerance range cannot be changed, our unconsciously learned tolerance range, our beliefs about how and how much our needs ‘should’ be met, can be changed.

—These three things happen when we are stuck in false beliefs about how happiness is achieved:

   •  Our sense of where we find happiness is too narrow.

   •  Our optimal “temperature” on our thermostat is set too high.

   •  Our tolerance range is too limited and is often stuck at earlier levels of development.

 

—The treatment for this is to reset our thermostats: change our beliefs about the source and experience of authentic happiness.

—This will enable us to meet our instinctual spiritual needs, described by Maslow as the need for transcendence, the need for connection beyond ego, and the need to help others.

—This can also be stated as: becoming and expressing the image of God, the divine DNA, in our lives. Jesus Christ provides us the human model and path for doing this.

—To follow Christ’s new commandment in daily life – to “love your neighbor as I have loved you,” is to satisfy the spiritual yearning that will lead us to genuine happiness, the “peace that passes all understanding.”

—Ultimately, the self is not “false.” It is our unconscious beliefs about the source and experience of happiness that are false. The self develops over time.

 

2. The Spiritual Journey: Take Up Your Cross (37:15)

“If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple.”

                ~Luke 14:26

 

—The purpose of this journey is not to eradicate our needs for security, affection, or esteem. It is the distortion of these needs that must be dismantled.

—This dismantling entails the death of the false self and the resurrection of the true self.

—This requires that we abandon those unconscious beliefs / ‘programs for happiness’ that are inconsistent with unconditional love.

—The spiritual journey is not a quest for something we do not have; rather, it is the unfolding of what is already within us.   

—The divine DNA within us propels our metamorphosis into the true self.

 

3. Centering Prayer in Daily Life: Love Your Neighbor (47:17)

“In the beginning, was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God….And the Word became flesh and lived among us.” ~John 1:1, 14.

 

—Jesus was the Word, incarnation, and enfleshment of God’s image. His life shows us how to live as the image of God. As Raimon Panikkar noted, “We are asked to continue the incarnation; it didn’t stop with Jesus.”

—The spiritual journey is not just the twice-daily practice of Centering Prayer, but also a way of being in the activities of daily life – a way of incarnating the image of God day by day.

—As Keating writes in Open Mind, Open Heart: “The ordinary events of daily life become our practice. I can’t emphasize that too much. A monastic structure is not the path to holiness for lay folks. The routine of daily life is. Centering Prayer is aimed at transforming daily life with its never-ending round of ordinary activities.”

—Our encounters with people and situations in our daily life provide opportunities to respond in ways we would want to be responded to.

—We cannot will ourselves to be unconditionally loving. But over time, Centering Prayer and meditation changes the brain in ways that increase our capacity for empathy and compassion.   

—We can intend to respond to others with respect, understanding, etc.

—We can nurture our innate capacity for spontaneous unconditional compassion, non-judgementalness, forgiveness, humility, patience, etc.  

 

 

4. Helps on the Way: Responding Rather Than Reacting to Conflicts (53:43)

“The Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you everything and remind you of all that I have said to you.” ~John 14:26.

 

—Reacting, i.e. “fight or flight,” is our default mode during conflicts.

—Responding is the mode of being and acting in the image of God in daily life.

—Conflict happens when our perceptions & interpretations of the outside world do not match our beliefs, values, and unconsciously learned concepts.

—Thus, conflict actually occurs within us and not between us and other persons/ situations. 

—To respond to conflict, we must learn to pause between stimulus (trigger of the conflict) and response.  

— “Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response…..to stand back from ourselves….not attached to our thoughts or our knee-jerk reactions, we can find the space we need to choose the way we want to act or the words that would be most helpful.” –Victor Frankl, Man’s Search for Meaning.

 

— (1:03:38) We can intend to create the space for the Holy Spirit to guide us in a number of ways:

A. Before the Conflict: Daily Contemplative practices: Centering Prayer, Lectio Divina (monastic method), Welcoming Prayer, Prayer of St. Francis, Guard of the Heart, praying a scripture such as 1 Corinthians 13:4-8.

B. During the Conflict: Be aware of your early warning “fight or flight” signs (feelings in stomach, chest, heart rate, flushing, sweating, muscle tension).

    i. Create space by choosing flight.

    ii. Take a moment to breathe with wisdom of God in and the guidance of the Holy Spirit out. Wisdom=Spirit=Breath.

    iii. As you listen and observe, gently return to your sacred word or active prayer phrase.

C. After the Conflict: No analysis, commentaries, or internal monologues.

    i. Do not react to your emotions. Notice and sink into your feelings while letting go of thoughts, commentaries, or analysis.

    ii. Practice the Welcoming Prayer Method.