«In discussing the nature of ‘the self’ and the meaning of ‘I’ it is important to remember that the questions raised by these words are practical ones and not theoretical. From birth we are fundamentally engaged with the world and things in it. We have to be able to deal with the world before we can talk about it. When we think about ourselves and wonder who we are, we are in a context. In dreaming, or meditating alone in a cave, we are still somewhere. It makes no sense to abstract ourselves from our practical relations to the world, to what is already given, and imagine ourselves as without a context, a sort of essence in a vacuum that we can define. The meaning of a word is not in me but in its place in the symbolism and this is shown by the way it is used.»

— John M. Heaton. Wittgenstein and Psychotherapy: From Paradox to Wonder

«The word ‘I’ means, but it does not mean a thing. Then who am ‘I’? I am not nothing, as if I put my hand up for coffee you would not give coffee to nothing! You would give it to me but not to ‘I’. I am not something or nothing. The use of ‘I’ has nothing to do with being or non-being. You can refer to me, pick me out from others, describe me in all sorts of ways, know all sorts of things about me. But is ‘I’ something that can be known? As we have said, it is not a thing as it has no properties, so cannot be picked out and known. When you say ‘I’ you speak from no place, there is an interval born by the difference between us.

[…]

We tend to imagine that ‘I’ can represent an image of myself if we are wedded to creating meaning-objects; we take this image to be some sort of substance, a fixed entity, a meaning object, which exists over time and is in my mind, our ‘real self’ for example. But this is a concept having no substantial existence.»

— John M. Heaton. Wittgenstein and Psychotherapy: From Paradox to Wonder

рабочий стол

«It turns out that the Latin roots of the word patient lie in words connoting “one who suffers,” whereas the roots of the word client point to “one who depends.” Indeed, client derives from the Latin cliens—freed (Roman) slaves who are still dependent on their masters. Thus, one can make a strong case that the word patient is more empathic with the person’s suffering and the word client is unwittingly demeaning.»

— Wachtel, P. L. Inside the session: What really happens in psychotherapy

«The rubric of the two truths has its origins in hermeneutical worries about the resolution of prima facie inconsistencies in the discourses of the Buddha. In some suttas, for instance, the Buddha talks about the self or the person, emphasizing the fact that we are each responsible for the kinds of beings we become; in others he emphasizes that there is no self, and that persons are illusions. The hermeneutical mechanism for reconciling such statements is the device of upāya, or skillful means. The idea is that the Buddha adopts the language and framework of his audience in order to best communicate what those in the audience are capable of understanding and need to hear. For some, who cannot really understand the doctrine of selflessness, he speaks with the vulgar about a self; for others, whose difficulties are conditioned by their adherence to a belief in the self and who are capable of moving beyond that, he talks about selflessness. But the exegetes who deployed upāya in this way do not want the Buddha to be convicted of lying, of speaking falsely, or deceptively. So there must be a sense in which when he says something at one level of discourse, or in one context, that he disavows at a higher level of discourse, or in a more sophisticated context, he nonetheless speaks the truth in that discourse, in that context. Enter the two truths.»

— Jay L. Garfield. Engaging Buddhism: Why It Matters to Philosophy

Phyllis Shafer. Black Rock Dome (2022)

Phyllis Shafer. Moonrise (2015)

«A significant moment in my own development as a psychotherapist occurred when I realized that my wish to make my patients better was actually interfering with my ability to do so. I was overattached to the idea of cure and frightened of the aggressive implications of detachment. I was unable to synthesize attachment and detachment into a position of nonattachment, one in which I could see my narcissistic need to be a successful therapist for what it was, to balance therapeutic zeal with realism, and realize that ultimately what helps patients to get better is an impersonal force that I needed to recognize and align myself with but could not control.

What does this position of nonattachment mean in practice? Again, there have been various attempts to describe what the therapist should do with her mind in relation to the patient: "listening with the third ear" (Reik 1948); active receptiveness (Winnicott 1971); "evenly suspended attention" (Freud 1912). The therapist must be both active and passive, penetrative and containing, motherly and fatherly, in control but not controlling. I find the idea of focus helpful; one has to focus on the patient, while at the same time being aware of oneself focusing. An appropriate therapeutic mantra for nonattachment might be, "Focusing on the totality of the patient, and the totality of my response to the patient, I am aware that I am focusing on the patient and my response to her.”»

— Jeremy Holmes. Attachment, Intimacy, Autonomy: Using Attachment Theory in Adult Psychotherapy

Важнейший навык терапевта — не слишком активно кивать головой и нераздражающе повторять “угу” на разные лады.

Вспомнил противоположный пример — документальный фильм с беседами Билла Портера (Red Pine) с буддийскими отшельниками в горах Чжуннань, в Китае.

“This documentary reveals the daily lives of Zhongnan hermits. It took the crew 3 years and 14 visits deep into the mountains to accomplish this film. The whole film was shot with prime lens and static camera positions. To avoid dramatic effects, the film has no zooming, no panning, no artificial lighting, no voice-over, no music. It was made as a low budget filming to reveal the simple and peaceful way of the hermit’s life.”

“Everything moves except the camera position. The dynamic state of men, wind, water, birds, grass and trees contrasts with the static state of the camera. No zoom shots, no pans and tilts, no dolly or crane shots. The balance of composition is pursued, with the steady scenes to reveal inner peace and quietness.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3R0h3dvL73w