Awakening and Insight: Zen Buddhism and Psychotherapy

a function still now to continue feeling let down and feeling entitled to demand

reparation; that in some, at first unconscious, way he cherished his early trauma.

It is fundamental that the client can then let go of this identification, to disidentify.
This will result in there being room for more openness, equanimity and energy.

And for John this letting go brought an ability to better be and experience in the

here and now, aware of his feelings in the present situation instead of these feelings

so much being colored by the past. In that way he needed no longer to live the

extremes of self-contempt and self-importance as if he were just that; as if they formed

his identity, as if he had a fixed identity. Instead, now he could more realistically

explore the different aspects in his passing feelings, tolerate and accept the

ambivalence and ambiguity in the situation.

It seems often more attractive to distract, to cover up and wait for better times, than
to go through pain and hollowness and survive. Often something else happens,
namely that the client has to fend off this recognizing something as being of himself,
that he wants to externalize and project onto others. For John this might mean that
he would just blame Rose. Often, letting go and dis-identifying will not be fulfilled,
meaning that the client remains linked with his fixed identifications, unconsciously.
John might continue to live the hurt, entitled child; and with every enacted conflict
where he felt let down, his entitlement would grow and he might end up a bitter man.
Being with our acute, intense feelings seems very hard; often we avoid them in a
phobic way.
Psychoanalytical (re)construction of the way something may have happened and
has been experienced in the past can give meaning, and thus make it easier to let it
go; but sometimes just such a construction, as a new piece of identity, can lead to
holding on to it. It was right for John that he could feel all the emotions that have
been described as his, and also see that they were temporary, passing by, and that he
is more than his emotions. After John had cried in despair, while he recognized his
identification with the angry let-down boy, his acceptance of the pain and anger freed
the energy contained in them, which then he could use for constructive activities. It
was also good for him to feel that his friend’s criticism (and possibly mine, and possibly
his to me) were passing and could not really touch him.
To be able to recognize all this, with non-judging attention, is similar to the
perceptual abilities cultivated in ‘mindfulness’. In what follows I will go into what
has been called the special gift of Buddhism to the world: mindfulness meditation.

Mindfulness

In all Buddhist approaches, attention is given to the right meditative concentration
and to non-judging mindful awareness of what comes floating up. Often observance
of the breathing is taken as the base from where to start and where gently to return,
when being distracted. As concentration grows and gradually we get less easily

A MINDFUL SELF AND BEYOND 97