Following up on my review of "Médiateur de l'âme" (2008) by Jacqueline Morineau, I read "La médiation humaniste" (2016) from her as well. As with the former book, I was unenthused by the latter, for much the same reasons. Morineau was French, flowery and vague when she wrote "Médiateur de l'âme" and this did not change by the time she wrote "La médiation humaniste". However, I also read Victor Frankl's "Man's search for meaning" shortly after, which did move and excite me. So I decided to review both books together, in the hopes that I would better appreciate Morineau's book and her philosophy more generally. With this rather wooden introduction over and done with, let's get started.

Outlines

First, a brief recap of both books. "La médiation humaniste" is what it says on the tin: an exposé of Jacqueline Morineau's style of conflict mediation, which she calls "humanist":

La médiation humaniste est le fruit de la rencontre de l'homme face à une situation de crise, un cri, un appel au secours pour sortir de ce qui lui semble inextricable. ... Cette expérience s'est révélée universelle et, à ce titre, elle est au coeur du questionnement de l'homme sur l'avenir. (p.18)

Humanist mediation gives people in crisis the space to express themselves, to shout (the cry of despair is a recurring image), to empty themselves of their rage, frustration and despair so that they can rebuild themselves anew. It takes a while, but she does eventually explain succinctly how the mediation process unfolds (I'm paraphrasing here):

Sur la structure de la médiation (p.82):

Les trois unités:

1. Unité d'action [le conflit, le sujet]
2. Unité de temps [kairos]
3. Unité de lieu

[I leave Morineau's definition of kairos here, because I find it particularly beautiful:]

kairos, le temps de l'occasion opportune, le temps juste, hors de la durée. C'est le temps qui s'arrête face à la beauté d'un couché de soleil, celui qui nous renvoi à un désir absolu, à une mémoire antérieure... Kairos nous sort de l'esclavage à Cronos pour découvrir un nouveau temps, une seconde d'éternité, un passage vers la lumière, temps nouveau qui peut s'inscrire dans le temps présent, ici et maintenant.

Les trois phases du déroulement (similaire à la tragédie grecque):

1. L'exposition du problème (théoria)
2. Le noeud de l'action (crisis)
3. Le dénouement (catharsis)

Lâcher prise (p.103)

• Les médiateurs n'ont rien à comprendre ; comment serait-il possible de comprendre l'autre si je ne comprends pas moi même?
• Lâcher prise des jugements, puisque je ne comprends pas.
• Lâcher prise de sa supériorité : "Moi je sais" pour parvenir à "Je ne sais pas."
• Lâcher prise de l'accumulation des savoirs afin d’accueillir le vide intérieure qui devient receptacle de ce que les médiants expriment au-delà des mots.
• Devenir simple miroir/receptacle d'un espace intérieur qui reçoit une image et la renvoie telle qu'elle l'a reçu.

Jacqueline Morineau studied Greek archaeology (with a speciality in numismatics, the study of currency, nice) which greatly influences her theoretical understanding of mediation. The influence of Zen and her newfound Christianity is much less present here than in her earlier book "Médiateur de l'âme".

"Man's Search for Meaning" begins with an analysis of Victor Frankl's experiences in concentration camps in the Second World War. Despite the horrific conditions of the camps, Frankl nonetheless saw opportunities for the prisoner's to find meaning in their suffering and maintain their will to live:

Nietzsche's word, "He who has a why to live for can bear with almost any how," could be the guiding motto for all psychotherapeutic and psychohygienic efforts regarding prisoners. (p.84)

This why quite literally allowed prisoners to survive the concentration camps (up to a point, of course):

The prisoner who had lost faith in the future - his future - was doomed. With his loss of belief in the future, he also lost his spiritual hold; he let himself decline and became subject to mental and physical decay [and eventually death - Frankl gives many examples of this happening]. (p.82)

Frankl maintains that meaning is a fundamental human need. This observation is the founding principle of his therapeutic project, logotherapy, which he explains in the second half of the book:

Logotherapy regards its assignment as that of assisting the patient to find meaning in his life. (p.108)

We're more than just flesh-filled skin-sacks

Both Morineau and Frankl claim that humans have to satisfy more than just material needs. For Frankl it's a need for meaning, in a very broad but concrete sense:

... it is impossible to define the meaning of life in a general way. Questions about the meaning of life can never be answered by sweeping statements. "Life" does not mean something vague, but something very real and concrete, just as life's tasks are very real and concrete.

Frankl gives many examples of how religion can provide this meaning. However, I failed to note any of these examples because they did not resonate with me.

Morineau claims that humans need to nourish or align their three essential constituants: "esprit, âme et corps" - spirit (= mind, rational), body (= material) and soul (= spiritual). Humanist mediation is not just about resolving a conflict, it is also a spiritual, transcendental experience:

[Sur l'étymologie du mot transcendance] "trans" signifie "ce qui est au-delà, ce qui dépasse la dimension physique" : "l'esprit transcende la matière". C'est exactement la transformation vécue dans la médiation. La partie moins élevée de la psyché, liée aux émotions et à l'égo, cède sa place aux aspirations les plus nobles, les valeurs, qui ouvrent à la dimension profonde de l'être, à l'esprit.

Il y a un lien étroit entre genesis, naissance, et gnosis, connaissance. Connaître, "con-naître", c'est recommencer à naître avec le monde, avec soi même ; c'est chercher à comprendre le mystère de la vie. (p.77)

Attention to suffering

I am tempted to link Workforce's song, "Attention to Suffering", so I will. In fact, here it is again:

Suffering plays an important role in being alive for Morineau and Frankl. For Frankl, this is very explicit: suffering is one of the three ways to discover meaning in one's life, the other two being through actions or relationships. The following quote sums up Frankl's point quite nicely:

The way in which a man accepts his fate and all the suffering it entails, the way in which he takes up his cross, gives him ample opportunity - even under the most difficult circumstances - to add a deeper meaning to his life. (p.76)

This is a very Judaeo-Christian perspective, which, if taken too far, justifies suffering in and of itself. I've never read him, but I'm pretty sure that this was what Nietszche meant when he criticised Christianity's "slave morality". However, this would be a wilful misinterpretation of Frankl's point:

But let me make it perfectly clear that in no way is suffering necessary to find meaning. I only insist that meaning is possible even in spite of suffering - provided, certainly that the suffering is unavoidable.

As I was writing this, I remembered that Morineau was also born again Christian. This happened in the last two decades of her life, though given her attention to the "cry of despair" (I'm paraphrasing) in her mediation I would not have been surprised had it happened much earlier. Nonetheless, her theorising in "La médiation humaniste" is mostly based on Greek tragedies. It is by traversing through crises, by suffering together, that humans can realign their three constituants, mind, body and soul.

I will finish this section with a collection of quotes from Frankl on suffering:

The attempt to develop a sense of humour and to see things in a humorous light is some kind of a trick learned while mastering the art of living. Yet it is possible to practice the art of living even in a concentration camp, although suffering is omnipresent. To draw an analogy: a man's suffering is similar to the behaviour of gas. If a certain quantity of gas is pumped into an empty chamber, it will fill the chamber completely and evenly, no matter how big the chamber. This suffering completely fills the human soul and conscious mind, no matter whether the suffering is great or little. There for the "size" of human suffering is absolutely relative. (p.55)

Not every conflict is necessarily neurotic; some amount of conflict is normal and healthy. In a similar sense suffering is not always a pathological phenomenon; rather than being a symptom of neurosis, suffering may well be a human achievement, especially if the suffering grows out of existential frustration. I would strictly deny that one's search for a meaning to his existence, or even his doubt of it, in every case is derived from, or results in, any disease. Existential frustration is in itself neither pathological nor pathogenic. A man's concern, even his despair, over the worthwhileness of life is an existential distress but by no means a mental disease. (p.108)

What reasons has he[, an old person,] to envy a young person? For the possibilities that a young person has, the future which is in store for him? "No thank you," he will think. "Instead of possibilities, I have realities in my past, not only the reality of work done and of love loved, but of sufferings bravely suffered. These suffering are even the things of which I am most proud, though these are the things which cannot inspire envy."

Main character energy - Frankl on agency

When I first wrote this section, I used the word 'autonomy' rather than 'agency'. However, autonomy implies an absence of external influence, whereas agency is one's ability to take action, regardless of the circumstances. Frankl criticises an excessive belief in 'determinism', which is the opposite of agency rather than autonomy. You don't choose your circumstances (autonomy), but you always have choices to make (agency). This is a point that Frankl makes again and again, or perhaps it felt like that because it resonated so much with me:

The camp inmate was frightened of making decisions and of taking any sort of initiative whatsoever. This was the result of a strong feeling that fate was one's master, and that one must not try to influence it in any way, but instead let it take its own course. (p.66)

Does this not bring to mind the story of Death in Teheran? A rich and mighty Persian once walked in his garden with one of his servants. The servant cried that he had just encountered Death, who had threatened him. He begged his master to give him his fastest horse so that he could make haste and flee to Teheran, which he could reach that same evening. The master consented and the servant galloped off on the horse. On returning to his house the master himself met Death, and questioned him, "Why did you terrify and threaten my servant?" "I did not threaten him; I only showed surprise in still finding him here when I planned to meet him tonight in Teheran," said Death. (p.66)

And there were always choices to make. Every day, every hour, offered the opportunity to make a decision, a decision which determined whether you would or would not submit to those powers which threatened to rob you of your very self, your inner freedom; which determined whether or not you would become the plaything of circumstance, renouncing freedom and dignity to become moulded into the form of the typical inmate. (p.75)

And there were always choices to make. Every day, every hour, offered the opportunity to make a decision, a decision which determined whether you would or would not submit to those powers which threatened to rob you of your very self, your inner freedom; which determined whether or not you would become the plaything of circumstance, renouncing freedom and dignity to become moulded into the form of the typical inmate. (p.75)

Naturally only a few people were capable of reaching great spiritual heights... To the others of us, the mediocre and the half-hearted, the words of Bismarck could be applied: "Life is like being at the dentist. You always think that the worst is still to come, and yet it is over already." Varying this, we could say the most men in a concentration camp believed that the real opportunities of life had passed. Yet, in reality, there was an opportunity and a challenge. One could make a victory of these experiences, turning life into an inner triumph, or one could ignore the challenge and simply vegetate, as did a majority of the prisoners. (p.81)

... there is something which seems to me to be an even more erroneous and dangerous assumption [of psychoanalysis than "pansexualism"], namely, that which I call "pan-determinism." By that I mean the view of man which disregards his capacity to take a stand toward any condition whatsoever. Man is not fully conditioned and determined but rather determines himself whether he gives in to conditions or stands up to them.

Conclusion

There you have it. Quite honestly this review took me a month to write and I cannot be arsed anymore, and I'm not really sure how to conclude. Perhaps by mentioning that my next review will be on a book about self-esteem which I'm also reading for my mediation course? Seems good enough. Til next time.

More quotes

Here are remaining quotes that I omitted from this book review but nonetheless found interesting.

La mediation humaniste

Je peux témoigner personnellement de ma rencontre avec Agnese Moro, la fille du juge qui avait été assassiné [par la Brigade rouge en Italie dans les années 70, 80].

I kept this quote because I have a family member who also met Agnese Moro.

Le mot jaillit: ils ont besoin de retrouver la confiance, celle-là même qui a habité le couple dès son union. (p.59)

L'essence de la vérité est d'être en partage. Un vérité qui n'est pas partage n'est pas une vérité.

I absolutely adore this last quote. Succinct yet profound, I was quite surprised by Morineau!

Man's search for meaning

I think it was Lessing who once said, "There are things which must cause you to lose your reason or you have none to lose." An abnormal reaction to an abnormal situation is normal behaviour. (p.32)

I shall never forget how I was roused one night by the groans of a fellow prisoner, who threw himself about in his sleep... I became intensely conscious of the fact that no dream, no matter how horrible, could be as bad as the reality of the camp which surrounded us, and to which I was about to recall him. (p.41)

The salvation of man is through love and in love. I understood how a man who has nothing left in this world still may know bliss, be it only for a brief moment, in the contemplation of his beloved. (p.49)

This intensification of inner life helped the prisoner find a refuge from the emptiness, desolation and spiritual poverty of his existence, by letting him escape into the past. (p.50)

The importance of imagination! This is another topic that has been

As the inner life of the prisoner tended to become more intense, he experienced the beauty of art and nature as never before. (p.50)

... one observed that people with natures of a more primitive kind could not escape the influences of the brutality which had surrounded them in camp life. Now, being free, they thought they could see use their freedom licentiously and ruthlessly. The only thing that had changed for them was that they were now the oppressors instead of the oppressed.

I cannot help but think that many of these people ended up founding the state of Israel...

... existential frustration often eventuates in sexual compensation. We can observe in such cases that the sexual libido becomes rampant in the existential vacuum.

Love is the only way to grasp another human being in the innermost core of his personality. No one can become fully aware of the very essence of another human being unless he loves him. (p.116)

At some point Frankl describes the method of reverse psychology, though the example he uses is quite peculiar. He describes someone who sweats a lot and is afraid of this happening in public and embarrassing himself. He suggests to them to concentrate on sweating next time he is in public, and he proves unable to.

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