06.09.2023 How Buddhism and Psychology Work Together Like a lot of Buddhists today, I benefit from both meditation and psychotherapy. Together, I find that these two great sciences of mind offer me a more complete path to well-being. That’s why I’m so pleased that Lion’s Roar is offering our upcoming course, Buddhism & Psychology: Timeless Wisdom for Modern Healing, featuring leading experts who are bringing together these two traditions. Many are both well-known Buddhist teachers and practicing psychologists, and they will show us how Buddhism and therapy work together as an effective and comprehensive path to healing trauma and finding happiness. Buddhism and modern psychology are more similar than we might think. Both are devoted to reducing human suffering. Both identify the mind as the key determinant of our happiness and suffering. Both use similar techniques to work with the mind: to be fully aware of our thoughts, emotions, and actions in the present moment, and to treat ourselves and our suffering with compassion. Both use the healing power of relationship, whether it’s with our therapist or our Buddhist teacher and fellow practitioners. Where these two great sciences of mind differ — and where they compliment each other — is in their diagnoses of our condition, in the different causes of suffering they treat. In Buddhist terms, this offers us a fuller understanding of the Buddha’s second noble truth, the cause(s) of suffering. The profound wisdom of Buddhism addresses the existential cause at the root of all suffering — our basic misunderstanding of our own nature and the nature of the world we experience. Buddhist wisdom and techniques helps us dispel this fundamental ignorance and realize our natural, enlightened state, which the Buddha defined as the ultimate end of suffering. While Buddhism focuses on the universal cause of suffering, modern psychology addresses the suffering and trauma that is specific to our own life and history, particularly the wounds we suffered in childhood whose impacts continue to this day. So together, Buddhism and modern psychology offer us a fuller picture of human suffering and how to ease it. (And if we add the social, political, and economic causes of suffering, we probably have the complete second noble truth, from the root cause of suffering to all its manifestations.) For me, practicing Buddhism while also working with wise and caring therapists has helped me to ease my mental suffering, see some of my patterns, and hopefully be a better person toward myself and others. I have selected these Lion’s Roar articles that may help you benefit from this powerful dual path as I have. —Melvin McLeod, Editor-in-Chief, Lion’s Roar          Discovering Our Nobility: A Psychology of Original Goodness   As a PhD psychologist and one of the leading Buddhist teachers of our time (and presenter in our upcoming course), Jack Kornfield has been a pioneer in bridging Buddhism and modern psychology. Here, he writes about the starting place of the Buddhist approach to psychology: that we are all basically good.   Among the most central of all Buddhist psychological principles are the four noble truths, which begin by acknowledging the inevitable suffering in human life. This truth, too, is hard to talk about in modern culture, where people are taught to avoid discomfort at any cost, where “the pursuit of happiness” has become “the right to happiness.” And yet when we are suffering, it is so refreshing and helpful to have the truth of suffering acknowledged. Buddhist teachings help us to face our individual suffering, from shame and depression to anxiety and grief. They address the collective suffering of the world and help us to work with the source of this sorrow: the forces of greed, hatred, and delusion in the human psyche. While tending to our sufferings is critical, this does not eclipse our fundamental nobility. ADVERTISEMENT Healing the Child Within   The great Thich Nhat Hanh had a deep understanding of and appreciation for modern psychology. In this excerpt from his book Reconciliation — which I cannot recommend enough — he helps us do the important work of healing the wounded child within us. The wounded child is in each cell of our body. There is no cell of our body that does not have that wounded child in it. We don’t have to look far into the past for that child. We only have to look deeply and we can be in touch with him. The suffering of that wounded child is lying inside us right now in the present moment. But just as the suffering is present in every cell of our body, so are the seeds of awakened understanding and happiness handed down to us from our ancestors. We just have to use them. We have a lamp inside us, the lamp of mindfulness, which we can light anytime. The oil of that lamp is our breathing, our steps, and our peaceful smile. We have to light up that lamp of mindfulness so the light will shine out and the darkness will dissipate and cease. Our practice is to light up the lamp. Uncover The Golden Buddha Inside You So many of us are burdened with feelings of guilt and self-doubt. This modern plague causes us great unhappiness and separates us from our true nature. Insight Meditation teacher and psychologist Tara Brach shows us how to escape what she calls “the trance of unworthiness” and trust the goodness inside us.. The basic teachings of the Buddha awaken us to who we are. They begin with learning to recognize the Truth of our experience by opening to life, just as it is. Then we discover how to awaken our inherent capacity to meet this ever-changing life with Love. This unfolding of presence and love reveals the Freedom of our true nature. Even though the gold of your true nature can get buried beneath fear, uncertainty, and confusion, the more you trust this loving presence as the truth of who you are, the more fully you will call it forth in yourself, and in all those you touch. And in our communities, as we humans increasingly remember that gold, we’ll treat each other and all beings with a growing reverence and love. How Your Mind Works Of course Buddhism has its own extraordinary teachings on psychology. Its traditional analysis of our mind and being is without parallel even today. Buddhist teacher Gaylon Ferguson breaks down the five skandhas — or “heaps” — we are all made of. Developing a harmonious friendship with yourself is a central part of the Buddhist path of awakening. These teachings on the five skandhas invite you into a deeper, more intimate experience of yourself. What do you find when you look into your own experience of body and mind? This isn’t about dogma—the point isn’t to confirm that the map is accurate or “correct.” Part of the point is to notice that the map is not the territory and never could be. (Imagine a map of Canada that was the size of Canada: how useless would that be?) You are invited to set forth as explorers of your own inner and outer terrains. Bon voyage. When you engage in this psychological exploration, one of your best companions will be a sense of friendliness toward yourself and others. Friendliness means taking these five mental processes not as signs of an inherent weakness or fundamental inadequacy but as aspects of your basic humanity. Through cultivating friendliness, you can experience the skandhas (as well as whatever else arises along the way) with a real sense of gratefulness and appreciation. Let me be more specific here. LION’S ROAR PROMOTION Sign up to watch a free teaching from Jack Kornfield and Trudy Goodman!