Buddhism and the Art of Psychotherapy

Book excerpt: Also available in an open-access, full-text edition at http: //oaktrust.library.tamu.edu/handle/1969.1/85767 In this engaging and intriguing work, renowned Japanese psychologist Hayao Kawai examines his own personal experience of how a Japanese became a Jungian psychoanalyst and how the Buddhism in him gradually reacted to it. Kawai reviews his method of psychotherapy and takes a fresh look at I in the context of Buddhism. His analysis, divided into four chapters, provides a new understanding of the human psyche from the perspective of someone rooted in the East. Kawai begins by contemplating his personal koan: "Am I a Buddhist and/or a Jungian?" His honest reflections parallel Jung's early skepticism about Buddhism and later his positive regard for Buddha's teachings. He then relates how the individuation process is symbolically and meaningfully revealed in two philosophical and artistic picture series, one Eastern and one Western. After exploring the Buddhist conception of the ego and the self, which is the opposite of to the Western view, Kawai expands psychotherapy to include sitting in silence and holding contradictions or containing opposites. Drawing on his own experience as a psychoanalyst, Kawai concludes that true integration of East and West is both possible and impossible. Buddhism and the Art of Psychotherapy is an enlightening presentation that deepens the reader's understanding of this area of psychology and Eastern philosophy.