the heart of zen therapy

Here's Dharmavidya on the course he has been teaching in Korea:

Day One: Qwan Shi Yin practises deeply

Introductory remarks about Buddhist psychology, Zen Therapy and about the sutra.
Introductions by individuals. Three particular themes emerged

• the challenge of living the Dharma life, whether as a person in the robe or as a layperson
• the question of all acceptance
• the matter of space and emptiness

Input:

• Do not criticise, but accept everything
• Do not be proud of oneself and devalue others
• Do not seek personal advantage
• Do not advertise one's own virtue, nor the faults and failings of others
• When one finds that one has done these things (as all of us do) tery to avoid becoming defensive or self-punishing and, instead, learn how it is to be a human being.

After lunch
Talk:

• Two main characters: Quan Shi Yin and Shariputra
• Two main concepts Prajna and Paramita

Quan Shi Yin and Shariputra as two different kinds of intelligence that need to be in communication with one another, the heart and the head. In helping others, the heart leads the head, but must not try to do without the head. Quan means to look deeply. Yin means tears, crying. Shi refers to generations of people. Quan Shi Yin looks deeply into the tears that have come down through the generations. The therapist attends carefully to the distress that has come to the client, knowing it as an instance of the suffering of all beings.

Prajna is cognate with “diagnosis”. There is a surface presentation and a deeper meaning. There is an immediate manifestation and a longer term process. Paramita refers to the other shore, beyond the rushing torrent of emotion and karma. The therapist has confidence that together they will reach the other shore, and that the way to get there will actually be revealed within the torrent itself.

Then the group divided into small groups to discuss the material presented.

Then we did an exercise: each person made a list of who they would choose from the group to represent different members of their family or other significant people in their life. After the break there were a series of pairings exploring the relationship between projection and reality.

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