Special Psychology Issue
Summer 1988 Vol. 5 #1
Summer 1988 Vol. 5 #1
Features
A. Hameed Ali, Sylvia Boorstein, Ram Dass, Joseph Goldstein, Daniel Goleman, Robert Hall, Michele McDonald, Sharon Salzberg, Frances Vaughan and Roger Walsh, in dialogue about Eastern and Western approaches to mental health, consciousness, liberation and the many methods of their realization.
Jack Engler talks with Wes Nisker about self-concept, healing and skillful means from the perspectives of Western psychology and Eastern spiritual practices.
Jack Kornfield speaks candidly about the strengths and weaknesses of meditation practice vs. psychotherapy.
Sylvia Boorstein outlines the principal insights of each system, noting that both kinds of insights have a place and a value and neither excludes the other—it is just a matter of emphasis.
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Analyst Gareth S. Hill explains Jung’s notions of Self, archetype and complexes, especially with regard to intimacy and self-acceptance. He finds that vipassana and metta meditation can enhance the healing process.
Tara Bennett-Goleman explains how therapy works with the mind’s content, while meditation works with the context. The two paths can complement and facilitate each other.
Myron Sharaf describes a body-based approach to overcoming trauma and integrating past and present experience. Quotes from Achaan Chah provide context from a vipassana perspective.
Mark Epstein says that Sigmund Freud’s recommended form of listening to patients greatly resembled the Buddhist concept of “bare attention.”
Practice
Joseph Goldstein discusses self-acceptance as an aspect of mindfulness practice and anatta.
The Dharma and the Drama
Wes Nisker ponders illusions of free will and self-importance through cosmic, geologic, biologic, psychological, cultural, political and spiritual lenses.