presents
The Urgent Need for a Psychiatrist in the White House
and the even more urgent need for meditation
I have been saying for years
that it is time
that the politicians
should be watched,
and they should be looked after
by psychiatrists, psychoanalysts.
Since nuclear weapons have
come into existence,
the politicians have become
immensely powerful.
Power certainly corrupts,
and absolute power
corrupts absolutely.
It not only corrupts,
it gives you a megalomania.
And every politician
is a split personality; he has to be.
He says one thing,
he does another.
He always has a mask
to show to the people,
and his real face is always hidden.
The longer he remains in power,
the more possibility of his going
neurotic, schizophrenic.
It was okay in the past,
because all these politicians
could not do much harm,
but today it is absolutely different.
A single politician who is mentally,
psychologically sick,
can destroy the whole beautiful
planet.
I have been waiting for
psychoanalysts and psychiatrists
themselves to declare this situation,
and the declaration has come today.
Two psychiatrists, very famous,
known worldwide,
Dr. Jablow Hershman
and Dr. Julian Lieb,
wrote in the WASHINGTON POST
recently that there should be a
shrink in the White House.
At present there
is an official physician
for the president, but no psychiatrist.
They said, "In this nuclear age,
when the president of the U.S.
can start a nuclear war,
one has to make sure
that he is mentally stable,
and not subject to euphoria,
manic depression,
or suicidal tendencies."
They cited several examples.
"President Nixon,
before he resigned,
had been miserable for months –
avoiding people,
taking long walks alone.
He refused to talk about how he felt,
and had drawn away from his family.
He was not sleeping enough,
and once could not sleep
for four nights in a row.
He was drinking too much,
sometimes before lunch.
He had become unpredictable:
one minute close to tears,
the next furious over some
bit of nonsense,
and an hour later on top of the world.
Sometimes he seemed out of focus.
He rambled or gave orders
that were ridiculous.
One night he walked the halls of the
White House talking to the
portraits on the walls.
He hinted of suicide.
"Such episodes,"
say Hershman and Lieb,
"are usually kept under wraps,
but we have begun to realize
how widespread the phenomenon is
– from the periodic inertia
of Ronald Reagan,
to the latest revelations about
Lyndon Johnson,
to the details of
incapacitating conditions
suffered by Woodrow Wilson
and Franklin Roosevelt."
It would be a good sign
if every president,
not only the American president,
but every prime minister –
whoever has the power
to destroy this world –
had a personal psychiatrist
looking after him.
But that is not enough.
Man is body –
the personal physician can
look after it.
Man is mind –
the psychiatrist can look after it.
But man is something more too.
So what these two psychiatrists,
Hershman and Lieb,
are suggesting is an
incomplete cure.
Every president,
every prime minister,
every king around the world,
should also have a
master of meditation.
Only then we can be safe,
and this planet can be safe.
Psychiatry can only help
to keep the mind normal,
at the most,
but its limit is the mind.
But man's existence is far bigger,
it is beyond the mind.
That beyond has to be
understood also,
and that beyond only can create
right sanity.
That beyond can make you
peaceful and silent,
creative, celebrating.
Once you know something
of the beyond,
you are no more suicidal,
and you are no more murderous.
Nuclear weapons will disappear
from the world if we can make
the politicians understand
the absolute necessity.
Just as they are not
feeling embarrassed by having
a personal physician,
they should not be embarrassed
by having a personal psychiatrist,
and they should not be embarrassed
by having a personal
master of meditation.
These have become
absolute necessities.
If we want the world to survive,
the politicians have to be kept
under control by intelligent people,
by people who know
the secrets of life, of eternity,
and the people who can impart
that energy, that understanding,
that experience of the
innermost being.
This is the only possibility,
otherwise
there is no hope for humanity,
and no hope for life –
no hope for Gautam Buddhas,
people rising to the highest
peak of consciousness,
to the deepest depth
of consciousness.
And this planet is special.
It is a very small planet,
but it is absolutely unique
because it has life, consciousness,
and the opportunity for evolving
into Gautam Buddhas.
It should be saved at any cost.
We cannot afford a global suicide.
I thank Dr. Hershman and
Dr. Lieb for their suggestions,
but I would like them to know
that their suggestions
are incomplete,
because more psychiatrists go mad
than any other profession –
four times more.
More psychiatrists commit suicide
than any other profession.
More psychiatrists are vulnerable
to all kinds of mind sicknesses,
because the psychiatrist
is not a meditator.
This is our whole inner poverty.
The psychiatrist knows
about the mind,
but mind is not in itself
the eternal source of life.
It can slip at any moment
into neurosis.
At any moment it can become
megalomaniac.
A little power ...
I am also worried about the
psychiatrists who will be looking
after the presidents
and the prime ministers.
They themselves may turn out
to be megalomaniacs
because they now have great power!
So their suggestion is good,
but it has to be supported
by a master of meditation
who can look after the president
or prime minister,
and also can
look after the psychiatrist.
Do you understand what I mean?
It is absolutely urgent
because we don't have much time
before somebody goes crazy.
Any moment the destruction
of the earth is imminent.