Zen and Psychotherapy

I started reading about Buddhism a couple of months after I began therapy (psychodynamic), and the combination worked really well for me, even though my therapy was not originally "intended" to be Buddhist or anything like that. In fact, I am a hard-core atheist, and I have always had some qualms about "spirituality" or anything that bears any resemblance to religion. While reading about Buddhism, however, I have never felt "preached to", but rather encouraged to find out on my own about things that troubled me and where they might come from.

I do not consider myself a Buddhist in the sense that many of Buddhism's ideas simply do not sit well with me (rebirth, karma...), but I have "picked" those that I do relate to (most of all its ideas on suffering, attachment, meditation, and compassion), and I feel my life has improved a lot: I am a lot less angry, I am more able to accept things and people as they are, and I am more understanding and less judgmental. In particular, I have found that meditation, if nothing else (I am not a very constant practitioner, I must admit), has taught me to see feelings, thoughts and emotions as something transitory, as something that does not define me, as something that is there now but might very well not be there tomorrow. In many ways, that has been very liberating: I always defined myself by my anger, and putting that anger in perspective (seeing it as something other than me, as I do when I meditate) has been healing because it has enabled me to open up and accept other emotions in a life that I felt was dominated by anger. I have discovered that I can be a compassionate person, that I can let go, that I can sympathize with people and not condemn them.

So, many of the positive changes that I have experienced in the past years have a lot to do with the integration of therapy and Buddhism that I did, and I would recommend it to anyone willing to take the chance. It was one of the most beautiful things I ever did.

I forgot to say: thank you for this blog, and for the opportunity you are giving us to participate in the dialog. I look forward to future posts.

Joseph,

I am very happy to have discovered your blog! In my work over the past 22 years I have synthesized Buddhist principles with hypnotherapy and NLP. I had the great good fortune to study with Suzuki Roshi and Chogyam Trungpa and their spirit and wisdom informs my work at its heart.

Perhaps we can guest blog with each other. Please visit my blog at
http://blog.findingtruemagic.com/

My website, http://FindingTrueMagic.com , and blog are named after my book, Finding True Magic: Transpersonal Hypnosis & Hypnotherapy/NLP.

I hope to hear from you.

Gassho,

Jack