The Four states of mind

Credit to Ar. Narendra Dengle...

I am paraphrasing what he mentioned about the signs of evolution of culture within a person – conformation, denial, reflection and transcendence. We express these phases in our lives and not just ‘we’, but Nations can be categorized under such phases or even ‘information’ or a work of art can express above tendencies.

Confirmation means one is told to always stick to the norm. Whatever is seen or heard or told is to be regarded as the truth. This is a child’s state of mind – always receptive and fully attentive of the environmental signals. I would like to add over here, that we see examples where women or certain people in positions of society are not allowed to voice their opinions and they are required to just accept/ surrender whatever is given to them. And then there are regimes like communism and forms of dictatorship which compel citizens to confirm to set of rules. In general, any other side of the story is denied or does not exist.

Denial / rebellion mode – As the child grows, constant compulsion to confirm arises a sense of frustration in him and he wishes to break free from the created false beliefs imposed by parents or school or society. He wishes to experiment. The first sign is to prove that an alternative exists as compared to the status quo. If you tell me to confirm to ‘A’, I know ‘B’. Thus, a child chooses to rebel to assert his independence. This behaviour is in comparison with the first mode. He will just take the extreme step. This leads to argument, aggressiveness, friction. People in this mode of rebellion (which we find many in our society) tend to cause a lot of nuisance and disharmony. They create ‘noise’. 

Reflection – As a person matures and gains experience, he understands that life is full of shades of grey and not just back or white. In short, the idea of ‘context’/ situational truth/ relative truth/ perspectives/ alternatives/ references and so on, dawns on him. He becomes critical of everything around him and critical of his views too. He does not accept anything at face value and questions everything around him. He may become suspicious, doubtful, cynical, contemplative, reflective of a lot of things. He understands that external events influence him and how he chooses to interpret defines his existential experience. A reflective person or a society is a hallmark of an intellectual identity. One is conscious regarding one’s thoughts.

Transcendence – In all above three modes, we still identify with our thoughts (dependent on mind and body). In a reflective mode, we realize the grip of thoughts on us. We may also realize that fighting thoughts is of no use. We may realize and reflect on ‘where’ the thoughts seem to originate and ‘why’. We may realize the ‘nature’ of thoughts themselves. And this realization will bring forward the experience of going beyond thoughts and experiencing a zone of the void – beyond our identification with body and mind (place and time). Such a void or space is beyond purpose or meaning or intellect or identity. It is central to all manifestations. With this realization comes the understanding that intellect has a limited role to play. What we consider as our own contributions or whatever we derive a sense of attachment is required to be seen as incidental only. Our actions, in this mode, resemble some form of worship – just existing in bliss. 

Forms of Architecture and Art can generate above experiences in the user. In other words, the question is : what do you consider the role of architecture – conformist, rebellious, reflective (of an issue) or transcendental? Greatest of architectural (and art) experiences have a high degree of reflective and transcendental dimensions - they are appreciated by all people of all ages, at all places and at all times of mankind, precisely because these examples touch the transcendental dimension of human experience.

Equivalent development in the history of research can be stated as:

Positivism (generally agreeing to one version of truth)

Post positivism – beginning of another or contradictory voice

Critical Theory – Situational/ reflective/ contextual truth

Social Construction – Focus on object-subject relationship and nature of thoughts

However, research says nothing about the ‘final’ form of experience – which is going beyond thought itself.

Indian philosophy summarises ‘any situation’ (or reality) in four sentences:

This is true (confirmation)

This is not true (rebellion)

Either this is true or not true (contextual – shades of grey – multiple options)

Neither this is true nor this is untrue (ambiguousness of manifestation and unmanifested void)