The paradoxical nature of surrender

Surrender is one of the most fundamental, important aspects of spirituality and of integration. It is crucial to our relationship to God, to self, and to others. While surrender is essential for any real attempt at authenticity and integration, it is also one of the most challenging aspects of any spiritual pursuit or endeavor. The inability or unwillingness to surrender is a serious impediment to our relationship with God, with others, and even with ourselves. Paradoxically, there is great freedom and an increased sense of control that is experienced when one is able to surrender. This article explores two themes that the author believes are involved in surrender: fear and trust. Clinical as well as personal examples of the paradoxical nature and transformational power of surrender are offered.     

The pre-delirium syndrome in alcoholic patients in ambulatory care and its treatment

In an administrative district of roughly 70,000 inhabitants, two-thirds urban, one-third rural, 60 patients, 46 male, 14 female, received out-patient treatment for alcoholic predelirious syndromes during the period 1982-1986. The total number of predeliorious attacks was 91, age incidence lay between 18 and 65, peaking at 35 to 45. In 61.7% of the cases only one predelirious attack occurred, in 28.3% two, and in 10.0% three or more. Through the period there is a perceptible rising tendency. In eight cases there was an epileptic grand mal fit in the course of a predelirious attack. Out-patient treatment was successful in all but three cases, which definitely called for hospitalised treatment. Diazepam, Diazepam/Haloperiodol, and Distraneurin were administered orally as a regular part of the program of treatment. 30 times Diazepam and Haloperidol effected a cure, while in 61 attacks it appeared that treatment with Chlormethiazol was inevitable. Results are discussed and conclusions drawn.     

The consciousness of surrender and the surrendered consciousness: ecstatic dreams of Lord Krishna

This article is based on research at Bhaktivedanta Manor, the main UK centre of the Hare Krishna movement, and it examines ecstatic dreams of Lord Krishna which devotees at the Manor claim to experience. With a focus on one key informant's account of such dreams, the article explores the role the dreams play in spiritual and devotional life. Moving away from psychoanalytic and from similar or related psychological interpretations of spiritual dreams, it advances an alternative approach, a phenomenologically oriented approach rooted in the work of the French philosopher Jean‐Paul Sartre. The article further contends that this provides students and scholars of spiritual dreams with a helpful model, not merely for analysing accounts of ecstatic dreams reported by members of the Hare Krishna movement, but also, perhaps, for interpreting spiritual or ecstatic dreams reported by adherents of other faiths.     

Reciprocal depression in recovering alcoholic couples: The efficacy of psychodynamic group treatment

This single case study describes an outpatient psychodynamic therapy group for recovering alcoholic couples established in the Family Studies Unit, Laboratory of Clinical Studies, National Institute of Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism. While depression in the recovering alcoholic is widely recognized, the authors stress their observation of recurrent depression in the well spouse and note a tendency for depression to alternate between members of a couple. The authors suggest clinicians need sensitivity to this issue and that a psychodynamic therapy group is an effective treatment modality for married alcoholics and their spouses.     

On surrender,death, and the sociology of knowledge

Surrender-and-catch is a protest against [... our time] and an attempt at remembrance of what a human being can be. The sociology of knowledge is a protest against its hypocrisy and against unexamined social influences. Like surrender, the sociology of knowledge does not fear but passionately seeks what is true and thus, like surrender, is a remembrance, proclamation, and celebration of the spirit. Both ideas, that of the sociology of knowledge and that of surrender, are critical, polemical, radical [...]; so is the sociology of knowledge also in its practice, while in its practice surrender is cognitive live. Using a [...] distinction developed by Mannheim, we may also say that the sociology of knowledge is an extrinsic interpretation of its time, our time; surrender, an intrinsic one: the former is, advocates, and practices such an extrinsic (sociological) interpretation but needs the latter to overcome the relativism it encounters in its practice by its remembrance, rediscovery, reinvention, the catch, of what is common to all human beings, what is universally human (Wolff, 1982., pp. 265–266).     

On surrender, death, and the sociology of knowledge

Surrender-and-catch is a protest against [... our time] and an attempt at remembrance of what a human being can be. The sociology of knowledge is a protest against its hypocrisy and against unexamined social influences. Like surrender, the sociology of knowledge does not fear but passionately seeks what is true and thus, like surrender, is a remembrance, proclamation, and celebration of the spirit. Both ideas, that of the sociology of knowledge and that of surrender, are critical, polemical, radical [...]; so is the sociology of knowledge also in its practice, while in its practice surrender is cognitive live. Using a [...] distinction developed by Mannheim, we may also say that the sociology of knowledge is an extrinsic interpretation of its time, our time; surrender, an intrinsic one: the former is, advocates, and practices such an extrinsic (sociological) interpretation but needs the latter to overcome the relativism it encounters in its practice by its remembrance, rediscovery, reinvention, the catch, of what is common to all human beings, what is universally human (Wolff, 1982., pp. 265–266).     

The importance of stories in the act of caring

This article focuses on the essential role and function of story in the care of young children with emotional and behavioral disorders in an institutional setting. Highlighted in this article is the importance of story in the therapeutic relationship, its educational implications, and in theological reflection. A narrative approach of care becomes a way of healing both heart and mind, and is ultimately an act of love.     

The obscure act of perception

Finding disjunctivist versions of direct realism unexplanatory, Mark Johnston [(2004). Philosophical Studies, 120, 113–183] offers a non-disjunctive version of direct realism in its place and gives a defense of this view from the problem of hallucination. I will attempt to clarify the view that he presents and then argue that, once clarified, it either does not escape the problem of hallucination or does not look much like direct realism.

Salivary output of the alcoholic: Effect of treatment with amitriptyline

In a group of alcoholic patients salivary output was measured before stimulation, during anticipation of tasting lemon juice, and after stimulation with lemon juice. These measures were obtained twice a day (a.m.-p.m.). Either amitriptyline or a placebo had been administered to each patient. The dental-roll technique for measuring salivary output was demonstrated to be reliable over time. In patients who had received the placebo salivary output in anticipation of the taste of lemon juice demonstrated an extinction phenomenon. Amitriptyline inhibited this anticipatory response. No relationship between the subjective symptom of dry mouth and salivary output was found. The results are interpreted as indicating that amitriptyline inhibits welldeveloped conditional anticipatory responses and that the symptom of dry mouth probably occurs predominantly during the hours immediately preceding mealtimes.     

The role of the right hemisphere in speech act comprehension

In this research the role of the RH in the comprehension of speech acts (or illocutionary force) was examined. Two split-screen experiments were conducted in which participants made lexical decisions for lateralized targets after reading a brief conversation remark. On one-half of the trials the target word named the speech act performed with the preceding conversation remark; on the remaining trials the target did not name the speech act that the remark performed. In both experiments, lexical decisions were facilitated for targets representing the speech act performed with the prior utterance, but only when the target was presented to the left visual field (and hence initially processed by the RH) and not when presented to the right visual field. This effect occurred at both short (Experiment 1: 250 ms) and long (Experiment 2: 1000 ms) delays. The results demonstrate the critical role played by the RH in conversation processing.