‘Krishna was world’s first counsellor, Gita a textbook of counselling’
Modernpsychiatryhas its roots in the Bhagavad Gita, which is the unrecognised textbook of counselling to most psychiatric problems, the president of the Indian Medical Association (IMA) has claimed.
“Lord Krishna, who many revere as God, was the world’s first counsellor and Bhagavad Gita is the first textbook of counselling that has answers to most psychiatric problems,” said cardiologist Dr KK Aggarwal.
“I have always believed that what we call cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) in allopathy came from Bhagavad Gita. Arjuna, who gets acute panic reaction in the battlefield, goes to Krishna, who holds 18 counselling sessions with him. In the first chapter, Krishna doesn’t say anything and only listens, which is the first principle of counselling,” Dr Aggarwal said.
“Arjuna narrates his symptoms to Krishna, who counsels him in great detail, which is nothing but modern day talk therapy,” he added.
Dr Aggarwal has also contributed to the current issue of The Equator Line magazine where, in a piece titled Psychotherapy in the time of the Vedas, he says long before the term psychotherapy was even coined, a brilliant warrior got over melancholy and his dilemma about fighting and vanquishing members of his clan.
He said Krishna’s sessions with his patient Arjuna not only led to his spectacular recovery, but also constituted one of the most revered 700-verse ancient text called the Bhagavad Gita.
“Krishna, in the true sense, was the first and perhaps the most celebrated counsellor, whose sessions with his patient, Arjuna, not only led to his spectacular recovery but also constituted one of the most revered ancient texts, the 700-verse Bhagavad Gita. The history of psychiatry in India begins with Sri Krishna’s successful counselling of Arjuna before the 18-day battle of the Mahabharata,” an excerpt from the piece reads.