I will present a short analysis on Wilhelm Reich, an individual much maligned in these circles whom'st is perhaps deserving of a different and more thorough epistemological treatment. This is something he rarely receives as a result of people's obsession with his ethnicity.
Although this is probably historically relevant.
Throughout this essay, it is essential to remember that personal eccentricities and the working technique's outcomes are not necessarily commensurate with one other. One should not necessarily deduct legitimacy from the other. Needless to say, arrows of a very typical kind are usually aimed at this target. As one can imagine with Reich being a derivative of a Freudian psychoanalyst, this tends to end up a game of "pin the tail on the proverbial donkey." immediately, when analysing from the low-brow perspective, some of the more prominent, more essential themes are not even looked at. And yet it is these themes that give proper understanding to the broader questions. Reich’s nomenclature, technique, delusions later in life, and ultimately his imprisonment, however unfortunate, should be examined on their own merits. Not in the usual simplistic frames. I note many on the right detest Reich and feel his imprisonment was justified, I do not, and I’ve always wished to give people of genius free berth.
I note much of Reich’s more extreme quackery is doing the rounds at the moment. Indeed there is a plague of sorts, and indeed Reich was its victim. This is the reduction of esoteric to gross materialism. This forms the primary context for my overarching case.
Indeed much of what Reich suggested that is of eminently practical use never seems to garner a mention. In my opinion, this because the former is typically a consumable of some kind like 5G protective anal insertion crystals or something gimmicky. Whereas the latter requires hard work and suffering for a result. Maybe those who engage with it are not prepared for the consequence or were happy remaining asleep? These are all common questions to those who run through these techniques and techniques like them.
As I keep harping on about, a confrontation with your own character is the last thing on the menu for most moderns, even though they are in dire need of it. I agree with Reich in a small way; the mass of humanity is contemptible. The difference is I don’t think most of them can improve. An outstanding minority may be, and the ones I care about—the slightly damaged ones. The damage seems to offer the potential for great power. They seem to be wildcards, so to speak.
The results of his therapy cannot be purchased. In pop-terminology, the process offers a “challenge to the ego." Or perhaps as Reich would assert, the work, in fact, poses a challenge to the neurotic character structure through the use of what he termed vegetotherapy. Simply put, this is the notion that the character structure and emotional content of the human psyche (importantly as Reich thought - emotions) are “stored” in the layers of the human being's fascia and musculature. Thus, the individual's neurosis can be liberated through progressive manipulations of breath, awareness, and musculature. In effect, through the release of tension, you could aim to restore the organisms' ability to feel and release a charge induced by the external environment. And it was the reflex, flag-shipped by the orgasm reflex, that was stunted by the oppressive forces of civilisation:
“the sum total of muscular(chronic muscular spasms) which an individual develops as a block against the breakthrough of emotions and organ sensations, particularly anxiety, rage, and sexual excitation” (Reich:1936).
We have seen many flare-ups and interpretations of this since Reich’s death, from the so-called Primal Therapy of the 1970s and even Eliot Hulse presenting Alexander Lowen’s bio-energetic therapeutic techniques on youtube. Breathing into his nuts and crying out repressed birth canal memories as his Asian man-servant blasted him with some deep tissue massage.
However funny it is watching old footage of hippies wailing, flailing, screaming, and basically just chimping out in a group session while imagining coming out of their mother's vaginas; Emotional release is a significant point of misunderstanding and incorrectness. One Reich is almost squarely responsible for. I will elaborate on the misguided nature of emotional expression as a prime endpoint later. This, of course, is another crucial point of departure from Eastern techniques, driven by the ideology of his therapy.
Reich and Alexander Lowen, perhaps most famously and all the bio-energetic primal therapy crowd, sought the expression of pent-up emotion as the primary endpoint. This we the primary goal for them. However, this is nonsense. Sentiments and emotions expressed during this therapy are inconsequential to the effects of this kind of work. They are fleeting side effects of a more fundamental change. This is one of Reich's more significant misdemeanors. It is apparent even in the common vernacular and understanding that repressed emotions and emotionalism, in general, have ironically lead to a plague of over-emotionalism. Modern people, influenced by this, have entirely missed the forest for the trees. This view is consistent with his ideology since we are oppressed from birth, and thus we have repressed energies.
It should come as no surprise then that Reich himself was a Marxist in his earlier years, and when trawling his books, you definitely notice this in much of the language he uses. Terms like Sex-economy and sex-political. He reduced most of his thinking to the progressivist end-game of orgastic potency; that is, almost all the world's problems could be reduced to a kind of civilisationally imposed blunting of “orgastic potency." If one is further interested in this, I recommend reading his book The Function of the Orgasm, widely considered his magnum opus. Vegetotherapy, therefore, can be seen as being the derivative of 2 main streams of contemporary thought; Freud (of whom he was a student and famously broke away from) and Marxism. Yet as we will see, he did not really break away from Marxist notions, and in fact, this exacerbated his split with Freud:
“…Many other factors attributed to the conflict, including Reich’s increasing interest in Marxist theory and social action. In addition, Reich, who was a favourite son of Freud’s, had requested a personal analysis with him. While Freud had made a rule to no longer analyse those working with him, he had considered setting this rule aside, and it was crushing for Reich when Freud ultimately decided to stand by it.” (1 pp. 22)
Leftism, in a general sense, informed his entire ideology, as we will see. It is not science; it is ideology. His work is “ideological pseudo-medicine," utilising ancient techniques reinterpreted into a progressivist, Marxist framework.
The Charges…
For me, these charges are 3-fold. Firstly, Reich tried to medicalise something that is NOT medical. Reich attempted to label non-medical eastern mystical practices as a therapy. I argue that it is not therapy. Treatment is designed to adapt an individual the function well within the context of civilisation. What Reich proposed was, at least in the context of the time he lived, highly subversive since it was not designed for this purpose.
Secondly, I’ve always wished to understand how much of his own therapy did Reich practice on himself? One would have to say very little when taking into account the various delusions and hallucinations of his later life, much of which he documented in books like “Contact with Space: Oranur Second Report.”
“He became convinced that the UFO’s were “space ships” powered by Orgone Energy. He based his interpretation on certain observations that had been made of flying saucers: the bluish light shimmering through the opening of the machines, their comparatively silent motion, and the unusual maneuvers they were capable of making.” (1 pp. 23)
The final charge I level is Reich’s blatant theft (without acknowledgment) of the great Eastern Religions' spiritual hardware. His attempts to medicalise or materialise these powerful forces as a therapy to serve his Marxoid utopia. They were thereby not heisted in their necessary entirety. The reductionism of these forces to the sexual drive. And the hopeless attempt to transmogrify these powerful psycho-spiritual forces into pleasure-seeking utopian idealism. Reich is quite rightly assumed, ironically, as one of the head patriarchs of the ultimately impotent revolution of the '60s. And yet he failed to even do this. It was tied into knots of ideology. He took something genuinely ancient and esoteric and subverted it into an ideological idealistic humanist framework.
In his trademark aggressive and stubborn way, Reich reduced everything to the sex instinct or sex economy as the starting point for the mass man's psychic masochism. In part, this was derived from the flaring up of fascistic regimes in Europe at the time. Reich paraded the standard set of psycho-analytic scapegoats to explain what he termed the emotional plague as driving the human being's millennia-long struggle against psychic masochism.
The authoritarian family structure with the patriarch at the helm - enemy number 1. Of course, religion also as life-denying and pro-death. His revolution (although it did involve labour and civilisational mechanisms of material oppression and also as tools for a compulsive character) was different since it was a biological end of history he sought.
In sexually liberating adolescents and young people, he sought to install the progressive project of the left, the noble, free, and sexually liberated primitive man of Rousseau. For Reich, man's better instincts had been subverted by the extraneous forces of historical delusion, and all that was needed was to awaken man to himself. A primitivist utopian spirit that had been cruelly subverted by the edifices of a sick civilisation. Reich had found a non-mystical, bio-energetic nirvana.
In the literature I have surveyed, I have not come across the notion that perhaps nature is not as liberating as one would think. But this has never occurred to the left, that their epistemological starting point is ultimately flawed.
A few words on Reich’s hatred of mysticism and religion…
Reich assumed his anti-intellectual, anti-religious stance would mend errant biology by restoring a proper reflex within the human organism. As we will see, this was his Marxist Bio-Nirvana. An Eastern would see the flawed ways on mankind as simply built into the fabric of reality, and thus NirvanaNirvana is the state where one has mastered these drives.
Reich assumed human nature has been subverted that, in fact, man's natural state was one of inherent goodness.
Spurring the individual adherent to not only accept the nature of things but in their own way to master all their senses to reach a state beyond man's base nature. Not to return entirely to it or to be ruled by it, but to master it and ride it as a mighty steed.
Indeed it was when contemplating these matters and the undeniable similarities of technique, I first entertained the idea that perhaps Reich almost entirely appropriated eastern esoteric methods and framed them within the psycho-analytic and social-democratic progressivism of his time.
As a Marxist, he saw the psychic plague as primarily driven by religion and the consequent authoritarian family structure. This was the root of all human ills. He needed to find another way to frame the “inner logic of nirvana," as he self-admittedly put it. Religion may contain some truth, but religion generally asserted the state of mankind as fallen in some way, and so as a progressive, he could not accept this as a frame. However useful the techniques may have been.
These various religions, driven by an aggressive patriarchal world order, deliberately sought to subvert man's pleasure-seeking nature. All we need to do is increase the human sensitivity and capacity to experience a pleasure. Thus, in no small way did Reich influence the 1960’s and its excessive progressivist emphasis on sexuality as a panacea for all of humanity's ills. And we have seen what destitute failure this sexual excess and pursuit of pleasure has been. If anything, it has considerably worsened the capacity of the modern of sex, passion, and love as even a cursory glance at tinder, at the disfigured outcomes you can see on those platforms of the '60s will so obviously betray.
Did he ever ask - is pleasure the sole aim of man? Why did the Buddhists consider pleasure as any otherworldly attachment? How would emphasis on pleasure alone be evolutionarily advantageous for an organism living in a dangerous world?
Some final words on frame….
I have personally integrated much of Reich’s physical exercises into my own practice and have done so for over 10 years. It is different from yoga, for a westerner probably better. However, I contend that the exercises are immensely powerful, and ultimately the deluded ideology behind them need not render them useless.
An ultimate utility cannot be denied; I know this for a fact. You can integrate them with other practices, and once you engage in even a rudimentary integration, the results can be seen on their own merits. You can take it where you wish.
The exercises should be taken aside from the over-arching bio-Marxist philosophy or emphasis on emotionality and sexuality and, ultimately, the Utopian visions of a liberated Marxist biological freedom from patriarchal familial repression. Of course, this vision also drove the radicalisation of feminism to a considerable extent and was spurred on by the utopian anthropological ideologies and research of feminine-primary societies.
Through practice and experience, one can clearly see that Reich made an essential contribution to those exercises he took from the East.
Below I submit a brief analysis and claim for consideration, one that has not been thoroughly looked at to my knowledge. That is the influence of the techniques of Eastern Mysticism, in particular Buddhism, on Reich’s vegetotherapy. Much has been written (since his death) on the “similarities” of Reichian therapy and the Hindu chakras, for example:
“This interaction of the 7 segments forms the etiology of the 5 Primary Character Structures. The 5 Character structures are not formed in isolation to one segment but relate to Energy economy, and the regulation is between segments and also believed to be via chakras as proposed by Eastern philosophy.” (2, pp.4)
Here is the difference: I am proposing that rather than it just being a coincidence (as these people do), Reich appropriated much of his theory. Including various “exercises” from the Buddhist and Hindu cultural saturation of Europe when he was developing his therapy.
I hope you derive some benefit from my breakdown. It is not exhaustive, and I only briefly outline significant points. Indeed an entire volume could be written on this matter. I hope you will see that Reich attempted to medicalise something that is not medical and should not be medical.
- A Brief overview of Reichian Therapy, Segments and Similarities Chakra “Physiology"
What is the stated purpose of Reichian therapy?
In essence, through various specialised breathing and muscle movements exercises, to undo the held patterns of muscular armour in the body, thereby releasing the “armour” or energetic stasis that is stored in the body. This inevitably leads to the release of pent up energy in the form of emotions or what Reich would term Orgone in later years as he expanded his theory beyond sexual and human bounds.
“Mobilisation of the orgone energy in the organism, i.e., the liberation of the biophysical emotions from muscular & character armorings with the goal of establishing, if possible, orgastic potency”(Reich:1934).
Orgone, which I believe to be synonymous with prana and his therapeutic notions borrowed from the Hindu description of Kundalini:
“…primordial cosmic energy; universally present & demonstrable visually, thermically, electroscopically, and by means of Geiger-Mueller counters, in the living organism."
(Reich:1934).
Thus, energetic blockages, at once preventing the circulation of Orgone and its accumulation, are expressed as blocks in the character of the individual and the consequence of this being psychological neuroses. The blockages result from individuals being unable to tolerate the experience of the charge produced by their bodies in reaction to external shocks. To clarify, the charge of Orgone cannot be handled in the body; the normal excitation, surrender, and discharge of Orgone is prevented. Think of it instead as an appliance plugged into a socket with a too higher charge.
These blockages are imposed upon the organism from a young age, leading several archetypal varieties of neurotic character structure. Reich outlines these as follow:
- The Schizoid character
- The Oral character
- The Masochistic character
- The Psychopathic character
- The Rigid character
Reich asserted that each of these “blocks” is armouring. Blocks are self-reinforcing, self-perpetuating and homeostatic. That is to say, in Reich's model, armouring serves a protective purpose (This happens to be a significant problem in the context of his epistemological starting point or man as a fallen being). Armouring can also be self-perpetuating for this reason, once can often see worsening of neuroses over time.
Each character type is directly correlated with the developmental phases of the child and corresponding age groups. Depending on psychic pressures unique to that child as determined by his psychological experience in a sick society at these specific developmental phases, he may develop disproportionate armouring at each developmental stage. Some retarded steps of development stunting or hindering the full development of others and so on. Ultimately leading to the unstable character structure of the individual within the civilisation, however, with some overarching themes endemic to a group of people. Each armoured segment implies some kind of psychological inability to express an innate drive, which under normal circumstances would be allowed to develop properly. Therefore, Reichian therapy aims to reverse this process, which proceeds from the lower to the higher, by undoing armour from the higher to the lower progressively. This is an interesting point of difference that I'd like to discuss at a different time.
These are, of course, reinterpretations of Freuds and Sandor Ferenczi’s work on these matters. Reich applied to to the various segments of the body in his own unique contribution; for example, the “oral character” would have armouring primarily in the oral component of the body, being the mouth and throat. There are all sorts of combinations; there are no pure types. Reich devised the armouring section as follows, and this is why it becomes interesting to us:
1. Ocular or Eye
2. Oral
3. Cervical
4. Thoracic
5. Diaphragm
6. Abdominal
7. Pelvic
At this juncture, one should note the emphasis Reichian therapy places on working the ocular segment of armouring before proceeding to any other part or segment of the body:
“Let us refer to the first armor ring as the ocular and the second as the oral armor ring. In the sphere of the ocular armor segment, we find a contraction and immobilization of all or almost all the muscles of the eyeballs, the eyelids, the forehead, the lachrymal gland, etc. Rigid forehead and eyelids, expressionless eyes or bulging eyeballs, mask-like expression, and immobility on both sides of the nose are the essential characteristics of this armor ring. The eyes peep out as from a rigid mask. The patient is not capable of opening his eyes wide as if to imitate fear. In schizophrenics, the expression of the eyes is blank, as if staring into space. This is caused by the contraction of the eyeball muscles. Many patients have lost the ability to shed tears. In others, the opening of the eyelids has been reduced to a narrow, rigid slit. The forehead is without expression, as if it had been “flattened out.” Near-sightedness, astigmatism, etc., very often exist.
The loosening of the ocular armor segment is brought about by opening the eyes wide as in fright; this causes the eyelids and forehead to move and to express emotions. Usually, this also effects a loosening of the upper cheek muscles, especially when the patient is told to make grimaces. When the cheeks are pulled up, the result is that peculiar grin expressive of defiant, malicious provocation.”
([4] Cf. Reich: The Discovery of the Orgone, Vol. I.)
Starting the ocular segment, gradually tonic integrity was restored to the structure of the muscles through movement. It is incorrect to just say it is tension, rather the ability to feel and use muscles in varying ways and combinations and flood the bloodstream and muscle tissues with blood to oxygenate the system. Each segment is designated as running at right angles to the spine on horizontal planes, so to speak. Once these segments of armour were loosened, and here is the interesting part, “liberated Orgone” was liberated to run:
“..the direction of orgonotic streaming is transverse to the armour rings”
([4] Cf. Reich: The Discovery of the Orgone, Vol. I.)
And:
“Genuine sensations of plasmatic excitation waves are experienced only when a whole series of armor segments, e.g., muscular blocks in the region of the eyes, mouth, throat, breast, and diaphragm, have been dissolved. When this has been accomplished, marked wave-like pulsations are experienced in liberated parts of the body which move up toward the head and down toward the genitalia.”
([4] Cf. Reich: The Discovery of the Orgone, Vol. I.)
Finally, Reich inadvertently indicates that perhaps a totally liberated energetic being is not a natural occurrence, and rather liberation may be a ceaseless activity:
“Very often, the organism reacts to these initial currents and pulsations with fresh armorings.”
Having experienced these things myself, I do not intend to detract from Reich’s description. They are true and correct; however, there are some critical takeaways here. Firstly, the insistence of the ocular segment as the primary starting point for the ability to "see" what is unfolding. Secondly, the segments of armouring running at right angles to the spine. Thirdly, once liberated that the energy runs from bottom to top and makes it’s way back down again, in a circular motion.
hmmm…..
Now, for a moment, I will briefly recap the 8 Hindu Chakras:
1. Sahasrara (not explicitly included in Reich’s work)
2. Ajna
3. Vishuddha
4. Anahata
5. Manipura
6. Swadhisthana
7. Muladhara
8. Bindu
Granted - each Chakra is not material as Reich would consider something material, though it is associated with the body areas where Reich’s armour rings are located. Kundalini yoga encourages a type of physical awareness by an intense focus on each chakra area (roughly corresponding with Reich's rings). Various yogas, breathing (such as pranayama), and asanas are utilised to “open up” the chakras and their corresponding areas. In some sense, we could accuse Reich of moving from the corporeal to the sub corporeal, making spiritual energies strictly “materialistic” phenomena. Whether I agree with this notion is a topic for another essay. This fits neatly into the theories of Guenon, for example. This is an overarching theme in modernity, and in Reich's re-working on Eastern Bodily asceticism. The tantras.
In Eastern mysticism, the process of kundalini awakening has traditionally moved from bottom-up, though some gurus encourage the opposite. There may be work required at each energetic Nadi to enable the process to properly unfold. Not necessarily a linear fashion. Work may be needed at different points to encourage the process along efficiently.
I would contend this is responsible for much mental illness in Western adherents. Ridiculous side effects of various colours thrust upon Westerners with no spiritual capacity, merely attracted to the honey pot of spiritual power or exoticism. Many Westerners who engage in kundalini yoga have no success at all, or they go batshit insane and have all sorts of physiological and spiritual problems. The reversal of this is something invaluable that Reich contributed.
Interestingly, Reich left out the Sahasrara chakra. I believe this is probably due to his self-admitted dislike of mysticism, but I have no evidence for this conclusion. Personally, I think his notion of the external universal life flow of Orgone to accounts for this strictly mechanistic version of the Hindu Chakra Sahasrara.
One of the biggest giveaways, and one that set me on this path to discovery, is Reich’s insistence that the ocular segment and ring is the primary focal point for channeling all these energies and must be cleared first and continuously worked upon. It is, in fact, the same with kundalini yoga:
“…where the tantra guru touches the seeker during the initiation ritual (saktipata). He or she commands the awakened Kundalini to pass through this center.”
This was the part that finally convinced me of Reich’s having lifted eastern mystical techniques. How would he alone have come up with the concept that all energies are integrated through the Ajna knot - or in his case, the ocular segment of armouring?
It is interesting, therefore, that there is such a striking similarity. One could rightly ask, why has no one made this connection? The answer is, many have. From all the literature I have surveyed. However, the implication is that Reich intuited this all on his own. This is where I differ; I believe he was influenced by Eastern streams of though and extrapolated the physiological doctrine of the chakras into his own pseudo-medicalised version.
Similarities with Buddhism:
It is abundantly clear to me now, so many years on, that similarities between Reich's views and techniques and those of Buddhism are, in fact, carbon copies. Reich himself admits in the introduction to the function of the orgasm:
“…again, I ran across the “to” of biology in various doctrines of salvation. I read Grimm’s (a book I recommend by the way), Buddha. I was stunned by the inner logic of the theory of NirvanaNirvana, which also rejected joy because it inevitably entailed suffering…" (Reich 1934)
Let us now briefly examine an essential idea and a significant point of departure. Nirvana is described by the Buddhist mystics to be a state of mind where one is free of hatred, greed, and delusion. Could we entertain the possibility here that Reich, upon engaging with these ideas, was fundamentally influenced by them? Reich was indeed a progressive as was common amongst left-wing political radicals at the time, and this is a critical factor in correctly understanding this point of departure.
Here we see Reich’s Marxist perversion emerge. Initially, Reich sought to abolish the repressions society and religion imposed on the individual, leading to neuroses.
Like Marxism, that sought to bring an end of the repression of the common man and to bring an end to political history, I believe Reich, being influenced by his Marxist & Freudian inception, effectively sought to bring an end to biological history; one where a man was liberated entirely to live out his own “deep impulses."
That is to say, through completely biologically and psychically liberated individuals, mankind could effectively free himself from the subversion of the structures of the psychic plague. Therefore, the genitally realised man represented an end of biological and orgonotic subversion. What would later become to Reich an orgonotic subversion of the mass of mankind on a cosmic scale, involving galactic scale.
I contend this, in essence, is a kind of strange biological Marxist Nirvana. A place where, although not totally free of enmities, mankind would no longer be subject to fascistic group hatreds, like the Bonobo, he would be driven by his own liberated sexual economy. I do not need to go into the Utopianism of this idea; it should be evident to the reader. For sure, I do not critique pleasure. For pleasure is a gift, yes I contend it is not the supreme achievement. It is fleeting. Yet Reich did acknowledge this in the last moments of his career, in which his name was invoked in the name of the more extreme species of perversion, to which he was apparently to retort “shit perversion” of his work.
This is interesting at I believe the entire idea of NirvanaNirvana, in his own words, applied, therefore, to be achievable by all men. It was a state that the Buddha didn’t describe correctly. Instead, Reich has used it properly. The Buddhists were all simply mistaken.
As for specifics as to the different stages of therapy, I have found the following comparison useful. In fact, there is much in common today with what is termed “Vissipana," which in reality are merely elements of the Mahāsatipaṭṭhāna Sutta.
Summary of Similarities:
(1) Vegetotherapy therapy, after conducting muscular loosening exercises, sets aside ample time for “sensing and feeling." By describing and keeping eyes open, the patient becomes completely aware of all bodily sensations, arising and falling away, thoughts arising, and falling away. This is precisely the same as the initial scope of the Mahāsatipaṭṭhāna Sutta. It is also described in Grimm’s book, of which Reich would have therefore been aware, at the very least, through this book. But who knows how deeply he really delved?
(2) A primary assertion of Buddhism being the self or “atta” as an illusion. Likewise, in the Reichian conception, the self is inherently neurotic, and it is a construct of blockages or drives. Buddhism decrees that once we become experientially aware of the illusory nature of what we refer to as “self," we become aware of the totality of the interdependent nature in all things. Reich would say that as soon as we clear all the rigidities of our character, we would become aware of the “universal pulsation of orgone” and our neurotic character's prior folly. Reich employs only different language.
(3) For Reich, the clearance of blockages enables the patient to be totally in touch, or better said, aware of the prior unconscious emotions, motives, and drives of the body and the psyche. This is the proposed outcome of the Mahāsatipaṭṭhāna Sutta..
(4) Part of this process includes the embrace also of painful emotions, thoughts, or bodily sensations. Both Reichian therapy and Buddhism in technique and theory require that one should be able to be aware of and acknowledge all subjective bodily phenomena - as part of the process.
(5) Practically, Reichian therapy's sensing and feeling and the various species of Buddhist meditation aim to get one to notice the independent arising, passing away of sensation, feeling, and emotion. This enlivens the individual to the energies around them, and one, therefore, becomes fully conscious, fully genital, and unconsciousness of these same forces are dispelled.
(6) one of Reich’s primary assertions was that part of the psychic plague was that mankind could not cope with the inevitabilities of transition, painful or pleasurable, due to his fear and anxiety. So then. I ask, how is this any different to the law of impermanence in Buddhism in anything but language?
(7) sensing and feeling - Part of this process includes staying completely aware of and conscious of sensation coursing through the body. The correct mental positioning is one of objective observation. This is done in the following manner:
“I feel a tingling in the right hand… I feel a twitch in the left eye."
How is this any different to the descriptive requirements of the Mahāsatipaṭṭhāna Sutta.?:
“Breathing in long, he understands: ‘I breathe in long’; or breathing out long, he understands: ‘I breathe out long.’ Breathing in short, he understands: ‘I breathe in short’; or breathing out short, he understands: ‘I breathe out short.’ He trains thus: ‘I shall breathe in experiencing the whole body of breath’; he trains thus: ‘I shall breathe out experiencing the whole body of breath.”
Conclusion
As with most things, apparent differences here are almost entirely semantic. Driven by ideology, Reich attempted to subvert powerful forces for progressivist ends. However well-intentioned. The wrath of the authorities was inflicted upon him with full force as a result.
The required emphasis on emotions and pleasure for their own sake remains very different from the outlook of his ideas' original sources. Reich took these things in the wrong direction in this respect.
I ask, however; How could they be fundamentally different? Reich glaringly re-appropriated these powerful forces into a modern materialistic, linguistic and ideological framework. And yet Reich was avowedly anti-intellectual. This streak of anti-intellectualism run through Eastern Philosophy also. Western philosophical tradition remains profoundly skeptical of the limitation of word and language to solve dialectical problems.
Despite his misdeeds, Reich encouraged man's ability to allow all emotions, impulses, and sensations - all those things that are apart of the experience of life and the senses, to be felt in full. He appropriated it for a western mind and body. I can attest to this valuable contribution.
In essence, he was saying that these blockages, the character armour indeed ails mankind, his potential. Exacerbating his disconnectedness from himself and from his own drives, from his nature. This is no different from what the Buddhists and Hindu’s explicitly assert in various practices.
I do not deny he is correct in some way. If all were to engage in this therapy, who could possibly tell the outcome?
Modern man has gone to such extreme lengths to avoid pain and suffering, and yet through this, he is also avoiding greatness.
As Reich famously touted it in his seminal work The Function of the Orgasm:
"contraction-tension-release-expansion."
This dynamic principle underlies our physiological experience of reality. The Buddhists would say, do not grasp. Do not become swept up and attached to these phenomenological life events, as if they were concrete, real or substantial. Since all problems are only an extension of our own mind and psyche. As it were, to allow these things to pass through, to observe.
I am afraid I cannot really see the differences here.
And this is why the reframing of Eastern Mysticism into a Marxist-Nirvana Utopia remains as one of the great misdeeds of Wilhelm Reich.