"The psychologists, particularly the behaviorists, have been studying man for half a century, but they study the ordinary man, and of course their thesis is proved by all their studies. The ordinary man, the unconscious man, has nothing more in him than the bodymind composite. The body is the outer side of the mind and the mind the inner side of the body. Both are born and both will die one day.

"But there is something more. That something more makes a man awakened, enlightened, a Buddha, a Christ. But a Buddha or a Christ is not available to be studied by Pavlov, Skinner, Delgado and others. Their study is about the unconscious man, and of course when you study the unconscious man you will not find anything transcendental in him. The transcendental exists in the unconscious man only as a potential, as a possibility; it is not yet realized, it is not yet a reality. Hence you cannot study it.

"You can study it only in a Buddha, but even then studying is obviously very difficult, just very close to the impossible, because what you will study in a Buddha will again be his behavior. And if you are determined that there is nothing more, if you have already concluded, then even in his behavior you will see only mechanical reactions, you will not see his spontaneity. To see that spontaneity you have also to become a participant in meditation.

"Psychology can become only a real psychology when meditation becomes its foundation. The word psychology means the science of the soul. Modern psychology is not yet a science of the soul.

"Buddha certainly has denied the self, the ego, the 'I', but he has not denied the soul and the self and the soul are not synonymous. He denies the self because the self exists only in the unconscious man. The unconscious man needs a certain idea of 'I', otherwise he will be without a center. He does not know his real center. He has to invent a false center so that he can at least function in the world, otherwise his functioning will become impossible. He needs a certain idea of 'I'.

"You must have heard about Descartes' famous statement: 'Cogito ergo sum – I think, therefore I am.'"