A Critique of Michal Pagis' Research on Vipassana Medidation

 

During her research on vipassana meditation, Michal Pagis set a focus on exploring the body in relation to the microsocial layers of the formation of self. Pagis explains that the body has been “a neglected avenue in empirical research” (Pagis 2009: 266), which she finds to commonly center around a discursive understanding of individual internalization rather than a relational process, centering around the body. In her text Embodied Self-Reflexivity, she describes that her ethnographic study led her to the understanding that “the existing models of selfhood are inadequate to explain the importance of the body […]” (265). This realization relates to four theoretical dimensions of her research, which include explorations of the body in relation to the concepts of self-reflexivity, enlightenment, self-constitution and equanimity. These four dimensions will be framed here as integrative in the formation of self as presented by Pagis and are to be analyzed individually to outline any contradictions which may arise in this perspective. The aim of my analysis is to open a space for this type of perspective by re-locating her research conclusions within a framework of Freudian and Lacanian psychoanalysis as well as poststructuralism.

The overarching aim of the exploration of Pagis’ work is to find inconsistencies and contradictions, which could lead to an alternative interpretation of her conclusions. The questions which have to be asked therefore include the following: Keeping in mind previous sociological categorizations as well as the fact that vipassana meditation is a silent activity and her research is comprised of explanations of her own as well as other’s experiences, what else could certain affectual or physical experiences relate to? How else could they be interpreted? Are there other ways to differentiate, categorize or structure the results?

It is my base claim that Pagis’ advocation for an increase of focus on microsocial layers of empirical research regarding spiritual body techniques also involves a reduction of psychoanalytical and poststructuralist categories which critically assess the formation of self as influenced by external discursive or extradiscursive sources rather than bodily experiences. Furthermore, by focusing on the individual and social bodily transcendental experiences, I claim that Pagis is risking the trivialization of individual agency of vipassana meditators.

2. Michal Pagis and her Research

Michal Pagis is a lecturer at the department of sociology and anthropology at Bar-Ilan University in Israel. Her fields of expertise include microsociology, sociology of religion and sociology of culture – influences which are apparent in the texts discussing her ethnographic findings in her research on vipassana meditation and self-construction. Those texts were written and published between 2005 and 2014, during and after her field study at meditation centers. Pagis focuses much of her research on the concept of self-formation, including transformations in and the rise of post-industrial self-construction movements which commonly focus different forms of meditation and the engagement with ‘Eastern philosophy’ such as Buddhism as techniques for self-realization. She tends to centralize self as constructed through the confrontation of multiple social spheres, including religion, spirituality and popular psychology.

Her research into vipassana meditation and the construction of self was conducted in the form of an ethnographic field study at vipassana meditation retreats and centers in Israel and the United States between 2005 and 2008. Her study frames vipassana meditation centers and retreats as social places which enhance the participants ability to experience the embodiment of selfhood through its emphasis on silent non-interaction. Her methodology included participant observation of group meditation sittings and formal, semi-constructed interviews with 60 participants as well as 3-5 follow-up interviews with 10 participants which usually took place in coffee-shops or at the meditation centers.

2.1. Vipassana Meditation

Vipassana meditation as taught by S.N. Goenka operates on a global scale. It has over 100 meditation centers and retreats worldwide and follows the teachings of S.N. Goenka, who developed the concept which is anchored in Theravada Buddhist traditions. These traditions are based on the satipatthana sutta – the paradigms of knowledge surrounding the foundation of mindfulness. This knowledge includes the categorization of four objects of awareness: the body, sensations, the mind, and the contents of the mind. S.N. Goenka developed his principle teachings around the idea that the body is of equal importance to the mind in terms of self-realization and mindful practice. His teachings place a heightened focus on bodily sensations as gateways to a clearer understanding of the self. Whereas most Buddhist meditation centralizes the mind as the source of transformation and change, Goenka viewed this focus as clearly significant, but also one-sided, as the body and its transformative utility is ignored in this framework. Pagis explains the focus of vipassana as follows: “Vipassana meditation […] turns to the body in order to produce an experience of non-self” (Pagis 2009: 270). She describes this process as the fundament of self-formation and the underlying purpose of vipassana meditation (270).

In Buddhist philosophy, the ‘I’ is not understood as a constant but viewed as an ever-transformative process of change. Based on the three tenets central to the teaching of Buddhist philosophy, dukkha, annica and anatta, enlightenment is connected to the awareness of these three fundamental truths of existence: dissatisfaction, impermanence and non-self – non-self being the most difficult level of awareness to attain and cope with. In relation to the invoked idea of a non-self, Pagis claims that “[t]he identification is understood as going deeper than symbolic self-consciousness” – meaning that ‘I’ is inherently an identity assumed rather than actually existent. She also explains that “vipassana meditation attempts to enter somatic self-awareness and change the signification it carries” (270). According to Pagis, it is embodied sensual experience of the self which leads to the understanding and cultivation of the non-self. Further, she details that this understanding is also connected to an embodied experience of other. This is the basis of her evocation of the different layers of microsocial self-formation through vipassana meditation.

2.2. Empirical Framework

In order to show the significance of embodied practices and the microsocial perspective regarding the formation of self, Pagis locates her research developments within two major empirical frameworks. Concerning the internal aspects of self-formation, she challenges the concepts of scholars such as Foucault and Giddens who have defined self-reflexivity as being driven by forms of subjectivation as part of a discursive process (see Giddens 1991, Foucault 1994). Leaning on Rosenberg and Demo, she promotes a perspective of the self as being a transformative process, rather than a static symbolic entity, which she sees to involve the creation of an abstract version of the self which has largely been understood as a definitive version of the self in academia due to a lack of focus on non-discursive practices involved in self-formation (see Rosenberg 1979, Demo 1992).

The second layer of the empirical background which surrounds her research is the external aspect of self-formation. Within this realm, Pagis leans on concepts by Berger and Luckmann (1966) and Searle (1995) who explained that individual perceptions of reality are subject to collective, social production. Merleau-Ponty and Bourdieu both conceptualized ways in which knowledge is produced within the individual and claim that not only is knowledge habituated in the body, but it is also learned through social interaction (Merleau-Ponty 2002, Bourdieu 1977). Pagis outlines that concepts can become a felt reality and felt reality can become concepts through bodily experience and intellectual reflection (Pagis 2010).

3. Theoretical Developments of Pagis’ Research & Contradictions

When analyzing her texts detailing her ethnographic research, I found four different dimensions which Pagis deems necessary in the formation of self through a social process of embodied sensation: Reflecting, knowing, forming and feeling self through other.

3.1. Reflecting Self (through Other)

In her text, Embodied Self-Reflexivity, Pagis explains that

"[in Vipassana meditation] bodily sensations are used as indexes to psychological states, emotions, and past experiences, while constant awareness of embodied responses is used as a tool for self-monitoring." (Pagis 2009: 265)

This thesis invokes a perception of vipassana as a self-reflective activity which utilizes body sensations to center and explore the self. She explains that, contrary to the common sociological idea that the self is formed through discursive processes involving a symbolic medium, such as linguistic interaction with others in society, the self is also established through second-order sensations in the body, thereby creating a distinction between the self as established through “internal conversation” and the “somatic self” (267). She draws on Damasio’s studies in neuroscience, which outline that the central nervous system is involved in a consistent monitoring effort, which maps cognitive developments and engages in constant reproduction of first- and second order sensations, which guide the physical behavior of the individual First order sensations are of no relevance to the self, including mechanisms such as touching a hot plate without knowing it is hot. Second order sensations are based on an internal map, one which might be created by the knowledge that a plate has the potential to be hot and should not be touched (267). She explains that these sensations are not based on verbal signifiers, but rather on the somatic map itself – therefore carrying meaning: “The hermeneutics hidden in second-order sensations imply that certain kinds of meaning do not require thematization or verbalization” (Pagis 2009: 268)

Her research focuses on the differentiation between discursive self-reflexivity and embodied self-reflexivity by pointing out that “vipassana mediation actually strives to reduce the ‘self’ element of self-reflexivity” (270). One of the examples she uses, which centralizes the significance of embodied practice, comes from one of the observed and interviewed meditators, who had been crying uncontrollably and told Pagis about the reasons why she was crying. Later, when talking to the instructor, however, she did not share her story and was encouraged to “cry like a vipassana meditator – feel the sensations” (271). Pagis claims this encouragement away from her personal story reveals a non-Cartesian hierarchy. Pagis explains that “[i]n contrast to the talking cure in psychoanalysis, which requires a search for the causes of emotions” (271), vipassana exemplifies the body’s non-discursive healing capabilities through embodied self-reflection.

To counter this interpretation, I would like to draw on Sigmund Freud’s elaboration of coping mechanisms and mediation:

“Another friend of mine, whose insatiable craving for knowledge has led him to make the most unusual experiments […] has assured me that through the practices of Yoga, by withdrawing from the world, by fixing the attention on bodily functions and by peculiar methods of breathing, one can in fact evoke new sensations […] in oneself. […] It would not be hard to find connections here with a number of obscure modifications of mental life, such as trances and ecstacies.” (Freud 1930 [1962]: 19-20)

Freud then goes on to explain that the feeling induced by embodied self-reflexivity is merely a coping mechanism in the “programme of becoming happy – which the pleasure principle imposes on us” (30):

“The extreme form of this is brought about by killing off the instincts, as is prescribed by the wordly wisdom of the East and practiced by Yoga. If it succeeds, then the subject has, it is true, given up all other activities as well – he has sacrificed his life; and by another path he has once more only achieved the happiness of quietness.” (26)

In this interpretation the focus on the body serves merely as a distraction from the psychoanalytical foundation of the emotion which caused the observed woman to cry, the authority of the meditation instructor having perhaps verbally enticed her to engage in a repositioning of her focus. Since there is no follow-up information it is impossible to claim that her embodied self-reflexivity really brought her any closer to or her self or her non-self. Therefore, the question that remains regarding the true influence of the body in the constitution of self is whether or not the Cartesian hierarchy is really overcome through the body or if it is merely a coping mechanism designed to ‘trick’ the cognition into refocusing efforts, in which case the second-order sensations are still guided by discursive processes of external influence.

This perspective also falls into the trap of neglecting the focus on cultural differences as well as historical transformations in meditative practices, as outlined by Inken Prohl, who expressed that it is the very lucidity of definition and lack of historical reality involved in meditative practices in the Western realm which constitute “the foundation of its persuasive powers” (Prohl 2018: 116). The sensational focus on selfhood which may lack a certain level of reflection in terms of extradiscursive patterns through the focus on metaphysical transcendental experience concerning embodied self-reflexivity may lead to a generalization of vipassana meditation, which, in itself, produces its very own persuasive social knowledge.

3.2. Knowing Self (through Other)

In her text Embodying Enlightenment: From Abstract Concepts to Experiential Knowledge: Embodying Enlightenment in a Meditation Center, Pagis makes the following claim:

"[...] abstract concepts and embodied experience support one another in the construction of mediators' phenomenological reality and suggests a general framework for studying the variety of relations that exist between the conceptual and embodied dimensions of different types of knowledge.“ (Pagis 2010: 469)

Through her research into vipassana meditation, Pagis offers a new perspective on the embodied process through which Buddhist philosophy is commonly realized and understood. She differentiates here between conceptual and embodied knowledge, which she feels Buddhist philosophy promotes: Conceptual knowledge is the knowledge necessary to make sense of the practices engaged in in meditative sittings. They offer frameworks for understanding which relate to Buddhist philosophy. Pagis claims that embodied knowledge, however, makes up the path through which practitioners turn conceptual knowledge into a phenomenological reality, thereby embodying the enlightenment which, if it were to only stay on the discursive level, would not become engrained in the practitioner’s material being. Vipassana, she explains, leads as a path to embodied enlightenment in that it takes the most important Buddhist concepts, such as dissatisfaction, impermanence and non-self, and formulates ways through which this knowledge can be adopted to one’s physical existence: The long hours of meditation and the temporal pattern changes induced in the retreats, for example, are designed to offer the physical experience of suffering. Pagis interprets the focus on silence and physical sensation, which induces a state of heightened awareness of time and sensation, as a way to relay the concept of impermanence. The concept of non-self is conveyed through the evocation of the self as being stuck in a process of decay.

To outline an alternative interpretation, I would like to look further into Sigmund Freud’s interpretation of meditative practice. First of all, I would claim that offering conceptual backgrounds to physical phenomena such as physical suffering and impermanence are discursive processes which are influenced by external sources, whether Pagis wants to acknowledge this or not. When discussing the coping mechanism of controlling instinctual life, Freud explains that

“[…] the controlling elements are the higher psychical agencies, which have subjected themselves to the reality principle. Here the aim of satisfaction is not by any means relinquished; but a certain amount of protection against suffering is secured, in that non-satisfaction is not so painfully felt in the case of the instinct kept in dependence as in the case of uninhibited ones.” (Freud 1939 [1962]: 26)

It is possible to interpret the act of providing a conceptual framework for understanding to embody a feeling which may lead to a heightened ability to control desire a definite external and discursive process, which again, tricks the body into providing feelings of relief which can be understood as enlightenment. The reality which has been constructed may just be a simple manifestation of subjectivation processes.

Furthermore, any instruction or imperative by the other, in this case being the instructors or the source of conceptual knowledge has been discussed in psychoanalysis. Jacques Lacan opens up a space for the important relation between self and other, which Freud had alluded to – the dependence of self on the other for the construction of subjective reality. He turns the idea of the pleasure principle into the principle of desire (Lacan 1973 [2018]: 31) and locates the aim of desire in the Other as the ultimate creator of reality to the self. He explains that the subject is created in “the interval that separates them, in which the place of the Other is situated” (45). According to Lacan, this is a place which is located between perception and consciousness, or, the place where thought and the real meet (49). This understanding could explain the establishment of a phenomenological reality as much as and regardless of physical influences – meaning the fundament of the meditation practice, its purpose, is still dictated by the mental dependence on the pleasure and reality principle, or in other words, the satisfaction of the drive.

Another important conflict created by Pagis’ evocation of the embodied dimension of knowledge lies in its very own interpretation of physicality. According to Knoblauch, empirical research cannot go beyond verbal communication; however, this does not mean that it does not take into account affectual aspects of experience:

„Die Möglichkeit, dass die Transzendenzen über die berichtet wird, Auslöser der Erfahrung sein können, muss für den Funktionalismus gar nicht ausgeschlossen werden. […] Denn für die beobachtende empirische Forschung zeigt sich immer nur die kommunikativ objektivierte Erfahrung“ (Knoblauch 2004: 62).

In contrast, Pagis’ focus on the embodied and non-discursive, however, seems to lift up the affectual level to a point of universality and circular logic. The principle that the affectual realm of understanding, one which, in Buddhist tradition, in particular in vipassana meditation, is seen as one which does not need to be discussed or shared with words, is, through her own efforts ignored in favor of ‘making sense of it’, thereby giving it a discursive framework.

3.3. Forming Self (through Other)

Pagis’ text Religious Self-Constitution: A Relational Perspective includes the following evocation:

"Though in recent years there has been a call for studying the emotional and experiential bases of religious practice, [...] these calls are confined to a paradigm [...] which anchors the self in the internalization of belief systems." (Pagis 2013: 92)

Pagis claims that the focus on this internalization process fails to address the formation of self as an embodied process which is contextualized through social relations. She explains that the formation of self has been commonly explained through the evocation of a moral paradigm, which presents self as a mere internalized structure of values and beliefs which exist in a moral space. Within this definition, Taylor made a distinction between the modern and the premodern self – the modern self needing to find meaning within a moral realm, whereas the premodern self derived fulness from the essentialization of God as an absolute. Here, the religious self is defined as being subject to narratives and belief-structures which produce the external moral order.

Pagis claims that her research shows the limitations of the moral paradigm. She explains that the moral distinction separates the self from all immediate social interaction: “[…] theological doctrines are not necessarily the driving force behind different practical ethics” because “[…] symbolic systems are the side effect of certain religious practices” (94). By framing the self as a process rather than an object it is possible to turn to self and other simultaneously. She explains that “[…] it is only through taking the role of the other that we can become conscious of ourselves as both subjects and objects in the world” (95). Instead of viewing religious transformation as a point of adopting new belief systems, she advocates to perceive this process as a religious formation of self, in and of itself.

To further define her evocation of the importance of social interaction in the formation of the religious self, she explains that during her research she has encountered many instances where the need for physical proximity in silent vipassana meditation was apparent. In one case, she speaks of a practitioner who had achieved a level of expertise, where solitary meditation was encouraged. Yet, he decided to return to the social meditative setting:

“I felt laziness and drowsiness. So for the majority of the time I decided to sit in the hall and not alone in the cell. It was very surprising – I would go to the cell, sit down, and suddenly I open my eyes, I do not feel like meditating.” (100)

Pagis claims that “[t]hese moments […] should be treated as equal in importance to the learning of religious doctrines or the performance of moral behavior” (103).

To offer an alternative interpretation of her research, I will now return to Jacques Lacan’s conceptualization of self and other, as explained above (Lacan 1973 [2018]). It is conceivable that the practitioner felt legitimated in his practice through the other in a sense of social belonging rather than it being the source of his confrontation or lying at the basis of his process of self-formation. The phenomenon of social belonging as a form of self-legitimation is, again, a discursive process in that it is dependent, in this case, on being part of the group defined as vipassana practitioners in the first place. Pagis claims that physical experiences in the group meditative setting created a type of flow of sensation which could be understood as an embodied interconnectedness. But is it not possible that because of the relationship between self and other as discussed by Lacan, the practitioner is already engaged in social meaning production through the participation in vipassana meditation in the first place and his predetermined sense of group belonging is challenged by the solitary meditation method? So instead of seeing vipassana as somehow explanatory of a dimension of religious constitution which is not related to an established moral order, I see it as a cultural and social space, which is very much influenced by societal structures which mimic religious doctrine.

Koch et al. explain the precariousness of external mental guiding mechanisms (Lenkungsverfahren) in their work on Imaginationstechniken:

“[…] Rituale, Körperpraktiken und andere kulturelle Performanzen und Medien [können] als kulturelle Techniken verstanden werden, die kollektiv geteilte Imaginationen aufrufen, verkörpern und inszenieren und somit ebenfalls an die Vorstellungskraft appellieren und sie in bestimmte Bahnen lenken.“ (Koch et al 2015: 75)

In terms of religious aesthetics, it is of particular importance to note that there is a close connection between the body and perceived mental transformations on a collective scale, which can be understood to be induced by specific techniques which are either performed collectively or understood collectively through external levels of social knowledge (see Koch et al. 2015: 75-79). To blur these lines by focusing on body experiences over established or transforming orders of knowledge may lead to the distortion of the influences which drive collective transcendental experiences and therefore could endanger the reflected focus of real self-formation as part of individual agency in each individual.

3.4. Feeling Self (through Other)

In her text Evoking Equanimity: Silent Interaction Rituals in Vipassana Meditation Retreats, Pagis make a simultaneous distinction and connection between psychological states and social attitudes which she had previously alluded to:

"[...] meditation-based equanimity is not only a psychological state but also a social attitude that is cultivated and learned in a unique silent interaction order.” (Pagis 2014: 39)

She also outlines that frequently, when discussing social practices, the focus lies on discursive and non-embodied social orders, which makes vipassana such a compelling case for studying the embodiment of social practices which have the potential to adopt a new social attitude. Leaning on Collins and Katz, she describes what is felt as emotional energy within the physical proximity of the meditative space. She also does not shy away from calling this group effort a ritual but focuses specifically on the way the emotions which are produced are utilized by the individual. She states clearly that this self-change differs from discourse-related self-change, because of the strict adherence to silence as representative of a non-discursive mechanism. Yet, she still interprets this process as social attunement, produced by a ritual. She then interrelates the practitioner’s experiences: “[…] when asked about their positive experiences from vipassana meditation retreats, almost all the interviewees mentioned equanimity, deep inner peace, calmness or tranquility” (45) and explains that many practitioners feel a need to return to vipassana centers after a while of gradually declining equanimity:

“I found that while family members stressed the change they observed in social terms, participants spoke about their experiences in relatively individual and inner-related vocabulary. Yet, at the same time, all the interviewees participated in collective meditation retreats, and reported that their most significant experiences of deep equanimity took place while meditating in a group.” (46)

To offer an alternative interpretation, I would like to claim that it is not surprising that an individual who had participated in a silent group activity would feel the need to regain that level of calmness achieved through a harmony of the group, precisely because of its symbolic meaning. Her interpretation seems to be an individualization of a process which may well be a simple expression of the above-mentioned group belonging.

Jacques Lacan’s theories on the structure of the psyche differ to that of Sigmund Freud because of Lacan’s focus on the likening of the psyche to a linguistic system. He explains that “the unconscious is structured like a language” (Lacan 1973 [2018]: 20). However, a linguistic system involves more than discourse transmitted through verbal conversation. What she describes as social attunement can be interpreted as such, even when using Jacques Lacan’s psychoanalysis and, still, it makes absolutely no difference whether or not words are spoken or if silent and physical connection, rather than verbal communication, are involved. Both are essentially discursive systems:

“Before any experience, before any individual deduction, even before those collective experiences that may be related only to social needs are inscribed in it, something organizes this field, inscribes its initial lines of force. This is the function that Claude Levi-Strauss shows us to be the truth of the totemic function, and which reduces its appearance—the primary classificatory function. Before strictly human relations are established, certain relations have already been determined. They are taken from whatever nature may offer as supports, supports that are arranged in themes of opposition. Nature provides—I must use the word—signifiers, and these signifiers organize human relations in a creative way, providing them with structures and shaping them.” (20)

So, according to Lacan, social relations, even if held in silence, are still fundamentally determined by the linguistic, discursive structure of the mind, in this case likely the semiotic level of mind. The fundamental need to connect with others and the drive to belong is not necessarily determined by spoken interaction. And I would like to claim that this aspect is not neglected in sociological research, particularly not in the research she attempts to counterargue in her work, as can be seen by Foucault’s evocation of discourse as explained by Michele Barrett: “[…] it enables us to understand how what is said fits into a network that has its own history and conditions of existence” (Barrett 1991: 126). However, verbalization is not necessarily transmitted through words, because linguistics is not limited to words, but to semiotics, semantics, pragmatics and other form of expression, concerning the internalization of systems of belief.

Furthermore, I question in this case also the danger of reducing the position of the practitioner and her or his agency. As outlined by Knoblauch,

“[s]ofern Erfahrungen kommuniziert werden müssen, um beobachtbar zu sein, sind sie ohnehin schon immer von kulturellen und sprachlichen Deutungsmustern geprägt, die nicht nur die Motive, sondern auch die sprachlichen Klassifikationsschemata, die sprachliche und außersprachliche Metaphorik sowie die kulturellen Modelle umfasst.“ (Knoblauch 2004: 65)

The risk is high to end up violating individual agency through the interpretation of feelings of connectedness as social attunement without mentioning psychological phenomena such as countertransference or analyzing the way in which this social attunement could have been achieved through external influences. Pagis communicates that which she feels is non-discursive – making the non-discursive subject to verbal communication with her in a position of authority as the one analyzing and interpreting the practitioners’ experiences and universalizing their meaning.

Conclusion

Pagis’ overall claim is that the microsocial perspective, including the focus on the body rather than the mind in the understanding and formation of self, is commonly neglected in sociological research. Because of this claim I had to ask myself several questions, all leading to one overarching problem which I claim can be reduced to Pagis’ rather radically dualistic definition of discourse and selfhood. Arguing against reductionism concerning discourse Barrett explains:

“To those who see all forms of ‘post-structuralism’ as a rampant idealism in which all non-discursive social phenomena are obliterated, one should emphasize here the unequivocal distinction Foucault made between discourse and extradiscursive social practices. The way in which he thought of the relations between the discursive and the non-discursive, and the values he attached to them, are, however, profoundly different from the conventions of Marxism. […] Discourses are composed of signs, but they do more than designate things […]” (Barrett 1991: 130)

Therefore, I will conclude this analysis of Pagis’ work by offering an antithesis to her initial claim: To increase the focus on the microsocial side of sociological inquiry would be to reduce the history and context of the violation of selfhood whose illumination and destruction is the principle aim of, both, poststructuralist approaches as well as vipassana meditation. The danger lies in the neglect of that aspect of knowledge production which draws distinctions between that which is chosen behavior and that which is subjectivation. And this does not only relate to external social knowledge production in modern society but also, as conveyed by Lacan, to the “totemic function” of the psyche (20) - the internal formation of self through symbols, including its connected psychic structures which make up the cycle through which social knowledge is reproduced. The push for a focus on the embodiment and non-discursivity of social practices may ultimately lead to a distortion of the underlying psychic and cultural power mechanisms and the perpetuation of the very powers which profit from a lack of individual agency.

To relate this claim more clearly to Pagis’ research means to view the personal and psychological as well as the cultural and ideological side of vipassana meditation, which I have done in this essay. I have shown that there are other ways to interpret her research altogether, including processes such related to psychological coping-mechanisms, imagination techniques, Easternization, temporal and spatial formations of group belonging, and extradiscursivity. Keeping in mind that neither the psychological nor the cultural are necessarily rooted in discursivity alone, as claimed by Pagis, every aspect of her theoretical developments can be challenged by invoking a perspective of vipassana meditation as an extradiscursive, symbolic formation subject to each practitioner’s individual expression of agency – or in short, every vipassana meditator gets to decide for themselves what to do with or why to engage in the practices, which seems to be the basic foundation of a spiritual body technique which centers non-interaction in the first place. Whether or not researchers sit together and form theories on the individual’s formation of self beyond structurally-embedded processes makes no difference in terms of individual agency, because that would be a violation of their right to self-determination. They, themselves, decide at which level and why they choose to engage. It does not need to be understood, legitimated or validated – especially in a setting which embraces non-interaction as its main principle.

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