Buddhist Blogging

East Meets West:
Contemplative Psychotherapy & Buddhism: Contemplative Psychotherapy is the notion that all of us are fundamentally, brilliantly sane, but that we are not always in touch with that brilliant sanity. ...a good mindful practice highlights impermanence and change and shows us how each moment is different...a good mindlessness practice, on the other hand, disguises all that. It lets us believe that things remain the same...When we feel a little like things are too fresh, we turn to a mindless practice...This is the kind of quality that keeps us repeating clearly dysfunctional patterns. Because they are familiar, we feel at home, we feel soothed. Because things are familiar, we know who we are; we know how to do things. We call that 'ego.' The price of it is that we miss our lives in each of those moments.
...Read the article [ Contemplative Psychotherapy: Cultivating Brilliant Sanity" ].

Buddhism and Psychoanalysis: There are some interesting parallels in how Buddhist practice and psychoanalytic practice work. Just showing up is the main requirement of both...

...As in psychoanalysis, we quickly find that the last thing in the world we want is to stay present. To stay present is to become increasingly aware of what our minds and our bodies are actually doing, as opposed to the way we wish they were. We find out we're a lot less calm, compassionate and focused than a good Buddhist is "supposed" to be. And so, like the analytic patient on the couch, the meditator on the cushion begins to shape their experience, to try to steer themselves in the direction they want their minds to go, rather than honestly staying with what is... My Zen teacher, Charlotte Joko Beck, repeatedly emphasized awareness of this resistance to moment-by-moment experience as the core of true practice. Stay with your anxiety, your anger, your confusion—in other words, stay with precisely those aspects of yourselves that you came to meditation to change!
...From the book review of [ "Buddhism and Psychoanalysis: An Unfolding Dialogue" ].

Health: There was an empirical study that found that people who have the tendency to use more self-referential terms (I, me, myself) tend to have more health problems and earlier deaths (the Dalai Lama had heard this the day before from another speaker in neurology at a symposium on Buddhism and meditation in New York City)...
...Quote taken from the [ "Words of the Dalai Lama" ].

Meditation: Theravadan breath meditation starts off...tell yourself, "May I find true happiness." Remind yourself that true happiness is something that comes from within, so this is not a selfish desire. In fact, if you find and develop the resources for happiness within you, you're able to radiate it out to other people. It's a happiness that doesn't depend on taking away anything from anyone else....So now spread good will to other people...
...See the [ full article here ].

Weed of the Month: "You should rather be grateful for the weeds you have in your mind because eventually they will enrich your practice." --Zen Mind Beginner's Mind

Mind Murder: Communication depends only partially on the words that are said. Equally important are the ways things are said, thus making possibly irony, humor, flattery, admiration, and other subtleties of expression. Such subtleties also provide psychological sadists with a method for murdering another person's mind.

...it makes a good deal of difference whether word-emotional dissonances are deliberately created with full knowledge of what's going on or whether they occur outside the conscious intent of the speaker. It also is important that mind murder not be deliberately used for destructive means. See more about [ mind murder ].

Tantra Exposed: Tantrayana, or Vajrayana deals with transformation so symbolism is widely used. All the tantric deities are manifestations of fully enlightened, compassionate Buddhas, yet the appearance of some of these deities is ferocious or desirous.

The sexual imagery isn't to be taken literally, acording to worldy appearances. In Vajrayana, the depiction of deities in sexual union represents the union of method and wisdom, the two aspects of the path that must be developed to attain enlightenment. Ferocious looking deities aren't monsters who threaten us. Their wrath is directed toward ignorance and selfishness, which are our real enemies. This imagery, when properly understood, shows how desire and anger can be transformed and thereby subdued. It has deep meaning, far beyond ordinary lust and anger. One should avoid misinterpreting it.
From the book "What Color Is Your Mind?", by Thubten Chodron.