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Mindfulness & psychotherapy
Greetings All!
We have had a couple of threads about Buddhism & therapy. So, I found this one while lookin 4 somethin else entirely
http://blogs.psychcentral.com/mindfulness/2009/08/mondays-mindful-quote-pema-chodron-on-difficult-people/
Namaste
We have had a couple of threads about Buddhism & therapy. So, I found this one while lookin 4 somethin else entirely
http://blogs.psychcentral.com/mindfulness/2009/08/mondays-mindful-quote-pema-chodron-on-difficult-people/
Namaste
0
Comments
I found the following video the other day of a talk at Google called "Be Your Own Therapist" by a nun in the Tibetan tradition named Robina Courtin. She has a delightful no-nonsense style about her and speaks with clarity and cohesion. Coming from a chiefly Theravada perspective, though, I found some of the things she said indicative of some of the departures that might arise between the various schools on how best to approach the "healing" of the mind.
For example, towards the beginning she says that our feelings are "ours" -- which seems to go against the Buddha's teaching in the Pali canon on not "selfing" (feelings, like the other aggregates, are not me, mine or essential to me because they are out of our control, impermanent and not satisfying). She follows this with the idea that perfection (Buddha-nature) is the true essence of our being. This is one of the major talking points between Mahayana and Theravada, and is problematic from the Theravada perspective which does not encourage attachment to a concept of either self or no-self. I once read a review on Amazon by someone for Tara Brach's book Radical Acceptance that took Brach to task on her assertion that one's "true self" is compassion, based on a similar understanding.
That said, one can reasonable glean something similar from the Theravada canon. The concept of the kilesas -- mental poisons -- are seen as the root contributors to suffering. The suffering mind is a mind that (in the words of the Dhammapada is "poisoned" or "impure." Thus, it can be said that when one's mind is cleansed of the mental poisons (hatred, craving and ignorance), the underlying purity (calm) of the unafflicted mind will arise.
The video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nasIq4E9nNg