Introduction to Buddhist Psychotherapy Foundations

Course Description

This course covers the fundamentals of early Buddhism and its theory of mind, the theoretical base of mindfulness, as well as many of the third wave treatment intervention.  Topics are selected to provide the philosophical, practice and psychotherapeutic aspects of the Buddha Gotama’s psychotherapeutic treatment approach to human suffering as he claimed when he said:“both formerly and now what I teach is suffering and the cessation of suffering” (MN 22.38).  

Course Objectives

• Know the theory from which mindfulness and meditation was derived. 
• Knowledge of the mechanism linking the mind and the body, thus able to understand and gain beginning proficiency in meditation as explicated in the Satipaṭṭhāna Sutta 
• Know how the notion of a self is constructed and gain beginning knowledge in the deconstruction and reconstruction of the notion of self for the purpose of psychotherapy.