Buddhism on the Couch

Buddhism on the Couch
Author: Caroline Brazier
Publisher:
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2003
Genre: Buddhism
ISBN: 9781569753491

Teaches the Buddhist path for a happier, healthier state of mind by using simple, straight-forward psychological concepts that are easily understood by Westerners.

Freud and the Buddha

Freud and the Buddha
Author: Axel Hoffer
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 180
Release: 2018-05-15
Genre: Psychology
ISBN: 0429913966

This book investigates what psychoanalysis and Buddhism can learn from each other, and offers chapters by a Buddhist scholar, a psychiatrist-author, and a number of leading psychoanalysts. It begins with a discussion of the basic understanding of both psychoanalysis and Buddhism, viewed not as a religion but as a psychology and a philosophy with ethical principles. The focus of the book rests on the commonality between the psychoanalyst's neutrality as he listens to his freely associating patient, and the Buddhist monk's non-judgmental attention to his mind. The psychoanalytic concepts of free association, the unconscious, transference and countertransference are compared to the implications of the Buddhist principles of impermanence, non-clinging (non-attachment), the hard-to-grasp concept of the "not-self", and the practice of meditation. The differences between the role of the analyst and that of the Buddhist teacher of meditation are explored, and the important difference between the analyst's emphasis on insight and thinking is compared to the Buddhist attention to awareness and experience.

The Couch and the Tree

The Couch and the Tree
Author: Anthony Molino
Publisher:
Total Pages: 361
Release: 1999
Genre: Psychology
ISBN: 9780865475748

A provocative and trailblazing cross-disciplinary anthology. With the growing interest in the relationship between Buddhism and psychoanalysis, it is surprising that no book has replaced the 1960 classic Zen Buddhism and Psychoanalysis, with essays by D. T. Suzuki, Erich Fromm, and Richard De Martino. Now, in this new alchemical collection, psychoanalyst Anthony Molino offers a bold new alloy of these two major disciplines. Both ambitious and timely, The Couch and the Tree is a two-part anthology that spans and documents a unique cross-fertilization of Eastern and Western thought. While Part One provides a historical overview of the classic writings in this far-reaching, adventurous dialogue (including the works of Fromm, Suzuki, Jung, Hisamatsu, Watts, and Horney, to name only a few), Part Two features a series of brilliant contemporary works, many appearing here for the first time. Included are essays by such innovative thinkers as Adam Phillips, Mark Epstein, Masao Abe, Polly Young-Eisendrath, Nina Coltart, and Michael Eigen. Most notable perhaps is a conversation--on the question "Is There an Unconscious in Buddhist Teaching?"--between the psychoanalyst Joyce McDougall and His Holiness the Dalai Lama. A truly essential collection, unique in both conception and scope, The Couch and the Tree marks a watershed in interdisciplinary and cross-cultural exploration.

The Foundation of Buddhist Practice

The Foundation of Buddhist Practice
Author: Thubten Chodron
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Total Pages: 292
Release: 2018-05-15
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 161429545X

The second volume in the Dalai Lama’s definitive and comprehensive series on the stages of the Buddhist path, The Library of Wisdom and Compassion. Volume 1, Approaching the Buddhist Path, contained introductory material that set the context for Buddhist practice. This second volume, The Foundation of Buddhist Practice, describes the important teachings that will help us establish a flourishing Dharma practice. Traditional presentations of the path in Tibetan Buddhism assume the audience already has faith in the Buddha and believes in rebirth and karma, but the Dalai Lama realized early on that a different approach was needed for his Western and contemporary Asian students. Starting with the four seals and the two truths, His Holiness illuminates key Buddhist ideas, such as dependent arising, emptiness, and karma, to support the reader in engaging with this rich tradition. This second volume in the Library of Wisdom and Compassion series provides a wealth of reflections on the relationship between a spiritual mentor and student, how to begin a meditation practice, and the relationship between the body and mind.

Waking, Dreaming, Being

Waking, Dreaming, Being
Author: Evan Thompson
Publisher: Columbia University Press
Total Pages: 497
Release: 2014-11-18
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0231538316

A renowned philosopher of the mind, also known for his groundbreaking work on Buddhism and cognitive science, Evan Thompson combines the latest neuroscience research on sleep, dreaming, and meditation with Indian and Western philosophy of mind, casting new light on the self and its relation to the brain. Thompson shows how the self is a changing process, not a static thing. When we are awake we identify with our body, but if we let our mind wander or daydream, we project a mentally imagined self into the remembered past or anticipated future. As we fall asleep, the impression of being a bounded self distinct from the world dissolves, but the self reappears in the dream state. If we have a lucid dream, we no longer identify only with the self within the dream. Our sense of self now includes our dreaming self, the "I" as dreamer. Finally, as we meditate—either in the waking state or in a lucid dream—we can observe whatever images or thoughts arise and how we tend to identify with them as "me." We can also experience sheer awareness itself, distinct from the changing contents that make up our image of the self. Contemplative traditions say that we can learn to let go of the self, so that when we die we can witness its dissolution with equanimity. Thompson weaves together neuroscience, philosophy, and personal narrative to depict these transformations, adding uncommon depth to life's profound questions. Contemplative experience comes to illuminate scientific findings, and scientific evidence enriches the vast knowledge acquired by contemplatives.

The Different Paths of Buddhism

The Different Paths of Buddhism
Author: Carl Olson
Publisher: Rutgers University Press
Total Pages: 306
Release: 2005-01-06
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0813537789

For centuries, Buddhist teachers and laypeople have used stories, symbols, cultural metaphors, and anecdotes to teach and express their religious views. In this introductory textbook, Carl Olson draws on these narrative traditions to detail the development of Buddhism from the life of the historical Buddha to the present. By organizing the text according to the structure of Buddhist thought and teaching, Olson avoids imposing a Western perspective that traditional texts commonly bring to the subject. The book offers a comprehensive introduction to the main branches of the Buddhist tradition in both the Mahayana and Theravada schools, including the Madhyamika school, the Yogacara school, Pure Land devotionalism, Tibetan Tantric Buddhism, Zen Buddhism, and village folk Buddhist traditions. Chapters explore the life and teachings of the Buddha in historical context, the early development and institutionalization of Buddhism, its geographic spread across Asia and eventually to the United States, philosophy and ethics, the relationship between monks and laity, political and ethical implications, the role of women in the Buddhist tradition, and contemporary reinterpretations of Buddhism. Drawn from decades of classroom experience, this creative and ambitious text combines expert scholarship and engaging stories that offer a much-needed perspective to the existing literature on the topic.

Introducing Buddhism

Introducing Buddhism
Author: Kodo Matsunami
Publisher: Tuttle Publishing
Total Pages: 264
Release: 2012-10-09
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 1462909612

Introducing Buddhism is a classic, authoritative collection of essays on Buddhism It expresses the author's desire to write a comprehensive book on Buddhism from within—a book that will lead the reader to an understanding of Buddhism as it existed in the past and continues to exist today. In order to accomplish his purposes, he deals with his subject under four headings: Buddhism in Thought Buddhism in History Buddhism in Tradition Buddhism in Action It is the author's conviction that "the time has come to think of Buddhism not in terms of temples or of traditional rituals, but in terms of injecting more vitality to make Buddhism more meaningful to all of us. Buddhism has a living significance as a great world religion and can contribute to the enrichment of world culture."

Seeding Buddhism with Multiculturalism

Seeding Buddhism with Multiculturalism
Author: D. Mitra Barua
Publisher: McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP
Total Pages:
Release: 2019-05-13
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0773557601

Immigrants often face considerable challenges when it comes to preserving their cultural and religious teachings. D. Mitra Barua argues that the Sri Lankan Buddhist community in Toronto has maintained its coherence and integrity not despite but because of the need for cultural adaptations. Drawing on survey data, over fifty in-depth interviews with temple monks, educators, parents, and children, and fieldwork conducted in Toronto and Colombo, Sri Lanka, Seeding Buddhism with Multiculturalism examines how a religious tradition is transmitted from one generation to the next in a new cultural setting, and what happens during that process of transmission. Barua demonstrates that Buddhists have passed on Buddhist beliefs, attitudes, and practices to their Canadian-born youth, who in turn have constructed their own distinct Buddhist identity, influenced by the individualistic, egalitarian, and secular cultural ambience in Toronto. Through creative fieldwork and translocal analysis – taking into account migrants' geographical, cultural, and familial ties to multiple locales – this book further explains that pre-migration experiences often shape and determine the success or failure of intergenerational transmission. An ethnographic religious study with an uncommon depth of perspective, Seeding Buddhism with Multiculturalism shows that first- and second-generation Sri Lankan Buddhists in Toronto are successfully practising Theravāda Buddhism within a Canadian context.