Prof. Tarhan: “Psychotherapy techniques that cannot explain the death do not satisfy”

President of Üsküdar University, Psychiatrist Prof. Nevzat Tarhan participated in the online program titled “The meaning and Purpose of Life during Challenging Times” organized by Sivas Cumhuriyet University. Tarhan said that one of the most important reasons for the challenging times is the matter of death. Noting that techniques other than third generation psychotherapy cannot bring an explanation or meaning to death, Tarhan said that the reality of death is a reality that everyone will face. However, all techniques except third generation psychotherapy techniques cannot provide an explanation and meaning to death. Why should one live in hope when they know that they will die? These approaches do not satisfy people because a human has a desire for the search for meaning and a need for consolation.”.

"Challenging times have a 'danger' and an 'opportunity' dimension"

Stating that we can approach the calamities that occur in life from two different perspectives, Tarhan said that the search for meaning is one of the biggest features that distinguish human beings from other living things. Tarhan said that "There are two different aspects to difficult times in human life. The first characteristic of difficult times is the danger dimension and the other feature is the opportunity dimension. If you focus on the dangerous dimension of the events that occur, you will suffer from these challenging times. If you learn from the dimension of danger, take the right position against it, and then focus on the opportunity, difficult times will lead to new births. It passes into an incubation provision. For example, during the pandemic period, our physical comfort deteriorated, and we could not move as we wanted. Similar situations occurred in the earthquake. On the other hand, human life was restricted and we started to think more about death. Death is a sad reality, and we' are starting to think about it more. These are always challenging times. What stresses people more than the calamity experienced in these challenging times is the events, uncertainty, the unknown and loneliness. With all these combined, the pain of a difficult time with uncertainty, the unknown and loneliness increases from one to five. However, if the uncertainty decreases, if the unknown decreases, and if one feels that they are not alone in such situations, the pain of difficult times will be relieved. Victor Frankle said, ‘A person's life purpose is the pursuit of meaning.’ This is not a very new idea. It goes from Aristotle to Plato to Socrates. There he defines happiness in two ways. One is hedonistic happiness, as Freud said, and the other is happiness obtained by searching for meaning. The search for meaning in humans stems from the metacognitive gene that other living things lack. Thanks to these metacognitive genes, that is, metacognition, man searches for meaning and reason in everything. Through this search, one can find the meaning that explains death."

"The events that take place have a visible face and an invisible face"

Tarhan stated that there may be some invisible reasons as well as apparent reasons for the events that took place, and drew attention to the main reasons, that is, the wisdom aspect of the events. Tarhan said that "Events have a visible face and an invisible face. The invisible side of events is the side of wisdom. Allah has put up road signs in the universe that will find Him in the same way that traffic signs show the way. If you follow the road signs, you will reach your destination. When we look at the universe, all the arrow signs are flowers, insects, electrons, DNA and the universe. They all have a common signature, as if they came out of one hand. When you look at the universe, you say that there is a great knowledge and a great design here. Even the design is not enough, you say there is a calculus, mathematics. Then you look at it and say there is energy, there is physics. Then there is matter, atomic, subatomic particles, chemistry and biology. With all this, quantum physics has told us something that classical materialism has not. Classical materialism said that matter exists first. However now, after quantum physics, it is understood that first there is information and then there is matter. First there is the design, then the substance. Right now, many court-ordered schools in the United States are teaching intelligent design as an alternative to evolution. That is why I have conveyed in my book The Psychology of Wisdom that quantum physics is seen as the intelligent design of the universe when looking at the universe. If there is intelligent design, there is a designer. There is a designer who does not show himself, there is a designer who is not of the type of matter.".

"Psychotherapy techniques that cannot explain death do not satisfy people"

Stating that techniques other than third-generation psychotherapy techniques could not bring an explanation and meaning to death, Tarhan underlined that these approaches did not satisfy people. Tarhan said: "There are two important diseases that distract people of this age from finding the truth: 'Narcissism and worldism.' Modern man sanctifies themselves, narcissism is the act of seeing oneself as the God of the earth, inflating one's ego and thinking that one will not die. The second is worldliness, that is, seeing life as consisting only of the life in the world. When one overcomes these two prejudices, a person will seek the truth. If a person is not looking for the truth, they must first question themselves. 'Why did I come to life? What is the meaning of life? So, everything you have will come and go one day. Look, my relatives are dead.' The reality of death is a reality that everyone will face. A person will be able to face the reality of death and misfortune. However, now you see that all the psychologist techniques except the third generation psychotherapies cannot bring an explanation and meaning to death. Why should anyone live in hope, knowing that they will die? These approaches do not satisfy people. Human beings have a desire for search for meaning and a need for consolation. The reactions that took place in the brain in the experiments conducted on Buddhist monks and Mevlevis prove a human being’s demand for eternity and the solace that comes from believing. That consolation of faith, that consolation of integration with God, is the greatest proof of God's existence. Allah gives inner peace in advance to those who believe in Him and surrender, which they call 'authentic happiness' in Positive Psychology. Authentic happiness is to be able to be happy in any environment. To be like the tree that yields fruit in all four seasons. This happiness is considered pure happiness. However, a person who believes catches this happiness.”.

"Modernism put satisfaction at the center of life"

Emphasizing that emotional intelligence studies have gained momentum in the world after the complications of modernism, Tarhan said that modernism puts the feeling of satisfaction at the forefront of human life. Tarhan stated that "As a result of the increase in sexual identity disorders, open relationship marriages and divorces, emotional intelligence studies have started to be carried out. Movements such as Mindfulness, which means managing emotions, have begun. In a world where the balance of freedom and responsibility is now being disrupted, we are experiencing the complication of modernism of mental illness. Modernism glorified pleasure, sanctified it. One imprisoned themselves and ignored their mental health. Panic disorder has become an epidemic. The background of panic disorder lies in the fear that the person's physical and spiritual integrity will be disrupted. In other words, the thought of deteriorating the ability to control, the sense of control, causes panic disorder. Exaggerating one's sense of control is also a kind of stealing a role from God, taking on the role of God for oneself. More important than human's search for meaning, there is a search for satisfaction in human being. Modernism put satisfaction at the center of life. There are two kinds of satisfaction; concrete satisfactions and abstract satisfactions. Concrete satisfactions are eating, drinking, sheltering, reproducing, that is, our level of satisfaction that is equal to other living things. These are material and basic physiological satisfactions. Common satisfactions with other living beings; however, what distinguishes man from other living beings are abstract satisfactions about the meaning in life, mental satisfactions. The search for meaning, for example, is mental satisfaction. When one feels that they are part of meaning, there is mental satisfaction, fulfillment and pleasure. That person knows the meaning of life, knows the meaning behind the sufferings they are experiencing and knows the captain of the world ship when they see the world going. To perish after death is terrifying. Therefore, a great peace and mental satisfaction captures meaning."

Üsküdar News Agency (ÜNA)