Introduction

There is a growing literature regarding the benefit of theories and practices of contemplative traditions to people in modern, secular settings. The approach of various Buddhist schools, most notably those focused on mindfulness, have stood out as particularly adaptable and helpful in reducing suffering associated with a wide range of mental and physical health conditions. There may be many reasons for this emerging relationship between science and practice. First, as a non-theistic tradition focused on understanding and working with the function of mind more than on an external deity, the essential elements of Buddhist-inspired contemplations may be practiced independent of religious belief or non-belief. This is true for practices based on mindfulness and also applies to other core aspects of the Buddhist tradition, such as the cultivation of compassion. Next, while ultimately concerned with a version of transcendence called Enlightenment, the goals of Buddhism are equally consistent with improved experience and function in ordinary life. Further, the Buddhist path is scientific at its core. At the time of his death, the founder of the Buddhist tradition, Siddhartha Gautama (called The Buddha by his followers) is reported to have urged his students, “Be a lamp unto yourselves” (Williams 2005, p. 190). In other words, each student should study his or her own experience directly, just as he had done, and not take any teachings on faith alone. His teachings then provided a framework that could support his students in their scientific quest but did not dictate their findings. Further, the essence of the Buddhist tradition is its allegiance to non-dual wisdom, a wisdom inherent to all humans and in synchrony with wisdom in the larger world (Josipovic 2014; Trungpa 2005).

Given these factors, the current intersection of the modern science of human nature and the ancient tradition of Buddhist theory and practice seems organic to our time, and ripe with the potential to enrich the wisdom-streams of both science and practice, thereby increasing the capacity of psychotherapists to benefit a wide range of people. Thus the purpose of this article is to present one framework within which psychotherapists and clients may understand and engage the goals and pathways of their work together that, like mindfulness, take advantage of the humanistic, non-religious aspects of Buddhist theory and practice, to increase the client’s understanding, inspiration, and sense of empowerment in his healing path.

A Buddhist View

Buddhism, either as a quasi-religion or as a journey of personal introspective science, can be quite complex, with divergent interpretations of the original teachings and varying approaches to practice and goals. At times these divergent approaches seem to be in opposition to each other, and it might seem that we cannot actually use the generic term, Buddhism, in a meaningful way. Yet, all Buddhist traditions agree that we need to work with our own mind rather than rely on an outside source for a resolution to our problems (Narada 1988; Trungpa 1970).

As complementary as modern science and Buddhist theory are, there are some key differences. The Buddhist view generally holds an assumption of inherent health at the core of one’s being (Mipham 2013; Thrangu 2011; Trungpa 1984, 2005). This concept informs various approaches in exploring ways to realize and express that health in life. The idea is that by focusing on health first, we can see problems with less fear. Problems become more workable and tend to resolve as a kind of unraveling of a phantom knot. Alternatively, in the scientific tradition, the focus tends to be on isolating and solving problems first (American Psychiatric Association 2013). In doing so, one may or may not come to recognize some underlying form of health. While the assumption of some aspect of inherent health informs much of psychotherapy, this health may remain in the background, thus unavailable as the basis for further growth. The Buddhist focus on innate health influences not only its methods, but also the long-time worldview and ways of life those methods engender.

Beyond Mindfulness and the Practice of Psychotherapy

To begin, consider that if we wish to resolve a problem, and to put the energy in the problem to more productive use than simply trying to eliminate the problem, one way to help may be to hold that problem in a wider, more inclusive context—a perspective able to first contain the problem and then to allow the struggle in the problem to unravel itself. From this unraveling the confused elements in the problem may clarify, integrate and express their underlying nature in better ways. Indeed, the word dharma, which in the Buddhist tradition has a range of meanings from denoting any phenomenon to how things in ordinary life or in the mind itself work, originates with the Sanskrit dhr, which means to hold (Monier-Williams 2002). Mindfulness can be one way to hold experience. However, mindfulness is a generic term referring to any approach wherein the workings of mind are apprehended and taken under executive control in order to go beyond reflexive action and achieve a consciously chosen mode of operation. Kabat-Zinn (2003; p. 145) has defined mindfulness as “the awareness that emerges through paying attention on purpose, in the present moment, and nonjudgmentally to the unfolding of experience moment by moment”. Thus, the term mindfulness describes technique only and says nothing about the mind that is being harnessed to this mode of operation.

That mindfulness is beneficial suggests that there must be an inherent health in the mind itself that mindfulness is bringing to the surface. Nevertheless, in most approaches to mindfulness there is no clear delineation of the characteristics of that health, of ways to go beyond technique and identify that health as innate to all humans, or of ways to employ that health as a support for a more holistic, engaged approach to living in these difficult times. Here, we will go further and look at ways in Buddhism beyond our common understanding and use of mindfulness to explicate and employ the natural health in mind to hold and thus contain, settle and more effectively resolve daily life energies (Campos 2002; Tirado 2008; Trungpa 1984; Wei-lun and Chiang 2007).

We propose an exploration and adaptation of traditional Buddhist teachings beyond basic mindfulness, with which we can gain more direct access to our fundamental human health, and from that a wider, more inclusive and helpful context from which to understand the healing path. Containing and resolving life issues within this broader context presents an opportunity to uncover an expansive wisdom that can support and guide therapeutic efforts in more effective ways. Initially, this exploration may seem complicated; however, looking beyond terminology we might see how this unfolding parallels and illuminates the basic processes of every person’s mind and healing path, and from that, the evolution of the core processes and common factors (e.g., the therapeutic alliance) of psychotherapy.

The Three Turnings of the Wheel of Dharma

This more inclusive view can start with a view of the evolution of the Buddhist tradition called the Three Turnings of the Wheel of Dharma—a term referring to one exposition of three major successive streams of thought and practice in the Buddha’s life and teaching career (Ray 2000). The term wheel here refers to an encompassing view of the cycles of human existence. If we are ignorant of the nature of our mind and life, this wheel is seen as the Wheel of Becoming or of Life, which graphically depicts the endless recycling of suffering known as samsara. When we understand the nature of life, as did Siddhartha, this wheel represents our awakening to the true nature of all existence and our shedding the constraints of accumulated negative factors that obscure awareness of inherent health and by doing so cause unnecessary suffering. Showing the nature of life is said to take place in sequential stages called the Turnings of the Wheel of Dharma. Siddhartha’s teachings reflect the three stages of awakening, and they offer a structure that all humans can use to support their examination and engagement of their own lives as well (Ray 2000).

The First Turning focuses on exploring, understanding and engaging the basic mechanics of experiencing. Here attention is placed on how to view life through a lens that goes from recognizing the nature of problems in life to engaging the workability of those problems. This begins via a shift in view, attitude and conduct in one’s meditation practice, ultimately transitioning into a wiser approach to daily life (Ray 2000). The Second Turning focuses on the basic nature of experience, including sunyata or emptiness (a condition of experience and its lack of a fixed core), and subsequently, compassion (Ray 2000). The Third Turning focuses on clarifying the nature of the presumed experiencer, and the realization of an inner quality known as Buddha Nature, the inherent, inalienable wakefulness and primordial health at the very heart of each person’s innate awareness (Ray 2000).

Each of these stages offers increasingly profound contexts in which to hold experience and to see through ever more subtle habitual patterns and expose successively more fundamental layers of an innate awareness at the core of all health. As we study and practice the methods of these turnings we see how each addresses and resolves successive layers of our tendency as human beings to ignore the real nature of life, and empowers our potential hidden in those layers to live a satisfying life in all circumstances. These layers are the same aspects of our humanity that the process of psychotherapy and its common factors seek to invoke and remedy (Kelly 2000; Menahem and Love 2013; Safran 2003; Tirado 2008; Trungpa 2005).

Each of these layers of ignorance arises from our propensity to focus on objects of experience rather than appreciate the awareness having experience. Since we normally try to cling to pleasant experience, and since experiences are always transient, our attempts to grasp pleasure via these experiences eventually fail, and we become frustrated and fearful. Unexamined, these fears promote rigid ways of reacting to life circumstances, thus obscuring the workability of our mind and life. This in turn leads to disconnection with the vibrancy of our experience and the reality and power of our innate awareness. In effect we make our deepest fears come true. We give illness power over our life. For example, the notion that one is an anxious person who is unable to engage in meaningful life experience until anxiety symptoms abate, gives more power to the illness than to the notion of inherent health as the focus.

The wakefulness realized in the Third Turning is the ultimate health of unconditional awareness, the confidence to live fully beyond fear of life and death (Thrangu 2011). Buddha Nature is the health that pervades all experience. As such, this awareness contains and powers the wakefulness in the two previous turnings, and appears in a final set of three functional essences known as the Trikaya, or bodies of inherent wisdom.

The Trikaya

The Trikaya refers to three primary modes of wakeful operation we use to process and hold all experience in a metaphoric, active sense of body or embodiment. Here, the term body refers to not only what appears as the usual physical body, but also the way in which all experience is held in a metaphorically embodied form in mind. These three levels appear sequentially as successively deeper or more fundamental processes in the life and realization of Siddhartha: as first, his actual physical form; second, as the form or essence of his teaching; and third, as the essence of his realization. From his example, when we understand how his and all human minds work, we see these three operational levels in the processing of all experiences in life: the literal experienced, the symbolically felt, and the inherently realized. In particular, the Third Turning teachings on Buddha Nature point out that for Siddhartha to attain a state of transcendent awareness (in Buddhist terminology, Enlightenment) he had to have an embryonic version of that wakefulness in his being all along that he then realized in his life and practice. As a non-dual spiritual path, all humans are understood to have this same wakeful nature. Harnessing this wakefulness illuminates the path through successively deeper layers of healing, going from ordinary symptom relief to the recognition of a profound, spiritual nature. This progression points to the ultimate health that both powers ordinary healing and that satisfies our most basic human need for a oneness with life itself.

Dharmakaya

The most fundamental Kaya is Dharmakaya, the body of ultimate awareness of appreciating what is called the suchness, or the basic goodness, of all experience just as it is; this is the non-conceptual essence of health beyond illness and ease, beyond life and death. Thus the Dharmakaya can be seen as the fundamental wakefulness of mind process that emerges in the Third Turning teachings and powers the wisdom in all three turnings. As the non-duality of ultimate awareness, in which all things are known as refractions of the oneness of the cosmos, this may be one view of the fundamental awareness or innate health that contemplative human traditions are based on and strive to realize. This kaya may be seen as the metaphoric embodiment of complete confidence in universal, non-dual awareness.

Nirmanakaya

Once the ultimate health of the Dharmakaya is recognized, the actual physical body, or the experience of body in which this awareness arises, is called the Nirmanakaya. This is the literal, physical manifestation embodiment of the mind process of the entire set of teachings. This kaya is the metaphoric embodiment of the power of committing to the path of ultimate awareness.

Sambhogakaya

All intermediate states, including all the qualities and ways of attaining and manifesting awareness in ordinary life, are collectively called the Sambhogakaya. This is the symbolic body of complete joy, the luminosity joining Siddhartha’s teachings and the natural capacity of our human mind to recognize and progress along the road to health in a symbolic, resonant way. This kaya is the metaphoric embodiment of the unstoppable, joyful inspiration in ultimate awareness.

While this conceptual map shows the stages of Siddhartha’s journey and his realization of the intrinsic awareness and health in his being, all humans have the potential for this same realization. That is, we all have these layers of health and healing power within, and in this paper we would like to show how working with these layers in the context of The Four Postures can inspire and guide our psychotherapy process as part of our overall journey in life.

Working with the Trikaya Principle in Healing

Having an understanding of these natural aspects of awakened mind can assist and guide the therapist in leading an individual to a sense of confidence in his capacity to stay fully present in, work with, and actually appreciate the inevitable vicissitudes of life as paths to healing. This confidence allows the individual to hold all experience in compassionate engagement, thereby providing a foundation from which to work through life issues in positive, wholesome ways. As we build confidence in the brightness of our natural Dharmakaya awareness by means of our Sambhogakaya practice, we see through surface difficulties of our life to the Nirmanakaya experience of realizing all life experience as workable parts of our healing path. From this inclusive view of how we can join ultimate awareness with ordinary life we can now turn our attention to an adaptation of an early teaching found in the First Turning to find ways to actually apply these teachings to daily life situations.

The Four Postures

This teaching appears in the original mindfulness exposition, the Satipatthana Sutta, as the Four Modes of Deportment (Nanamoli and Bodhi 2001; Thera 2013), which describe four ways that Buddha Nature (inherent health) can manifest in very basic dimensions of action and awareness that are inherent in any human body. Each of these postures can be experienced and expressed in the three levels of the Trikaya—in the Nirmanakaya as base dimensions of physical manifestation and activity; in the Sambhogakaya as qualities of both active and felt experience; and in the Dharmakaya as a state of being—in each of four basic dimensions of the human body. These postures are: the human body’s horizontality, its verticality, its natural drive to move, and its capacity to just be as it is and recognize its own openness. While the Trikaya describes levels of mind operation, the Four Modes of Deportment describe four functional dimensions of the human experience of health metaphorically delineated along these primal dimensions of human embodiment. Here, we will refer to the Four Modes of Deportment as the Four Postures. Thus, bringing the Trikaya together with the Four Postures can present an overview of how mind and body can harmonize and work together to move from inner health to the outer process of life.

In the literal sense of this teaching, Siddhartha exhorted his students to know the full experience of what they are doing when they are doing it. He said when they are lying down they should know that they are lying down; when standing, they should know they are standing; when walking, they should know they are walking; and when sitting, they should know they are sitting. Using the word know in this context suggests that there is some quality in knowing that we need to more fully understand and realize if we want to be fully awake to our inherent health. In addition to giving us direct contact with innate health, these embodied ways of knowing will also emerge as ways to structure and express that health.

Lying Down Posture

In the lying down posture, humans touch earth (as do other animal forms) and make contact with a metaphoric quality they can recognize as earthiness, in Earth itself. This quality can then be recognized in situations in life, and most important, within themselves.

Standing Posture

In standing, humans rise up from earth to achieve an uplifted, reflective view of earth, distinct from the presumably more imbedded, reactive view of animals. The vertical stance is natural to humans and is said to have been the cause of cooler blood getting to the brain, thus promoting brain growth and the capacity to think in language forms (Neimitz 2010). Standing reflects the natural uprightness within. Furthermore, standing precariously on two feet may also be the factor that allows human beings, by the very distancing of the head from earth, to appreciate the reality of eventual death—a quality which the ancient Greek philosophers thought separated humans from animals.

Walking Posture

In walking we alternate between touching earth and rising up as unique individuals and put that process in motion in life.

Sitting Posture

Finally, in sitting, we invoke the groundedness of lying down, the uprightness of standing, the engagement of walking and the healing, unifying and encompassing power of context and the natural luminosity of the timeless moment of the space of releasing a thought and of simply being open to ourselves, our life and our world. The physical posture of sitting pervades the other three dimensions of health in our human existence and calls into awareness the primal openness and containment function in mind we can call our natural human dharma.

One example of this progression in spiritual practice appears in the teachings of the Zen master, Suzuki Roshi, who said, “The point is to accept who you are and then stand on your own two feet” (Roshi 1968, para. 34). Further, to quote Suzuki Roshi in a point others have also made, “Strictly speaking, there are no enlightened people, there is only enlightened activity”(as cited in Farrell 2007; King 2014). Thus, these four postures can be seen in varying depths as paradigms of enlightened activity, activity that can help us realize and express dimensions of our innate awareness, our dimensions of ultimate health.

Bringing it All Together: The Three Turnings, Trikaya, and Four Postures

Looking at the four postures from a literal, Nirmanakaya perspective, this instruction may seem to be simply an expanded, more detailed version of mindfulness. However, as Suzuki Roshi has said, “The state of mind that exists when you sit in the right posture is, itself, enlightenment” (Roshi 1970, p. 17). Thus, we can expand our understanding of this directive to see each posture as a kind of enlightened teacher, manifesting on each of the three levels of Buddhahood: the literal Nirmanakaya level, the symbolic Sambhogakaya level, and the inherent Dharmakaya level. Each level of embodiment as teacher corresponds to a different perspective on teaching. The Nirmanakaya teacher shows the path and inspires discipline. The Sambhogakaya teacher expands discipline and inspires compassion. The Dharmakaya teacher invokes identification with discipline, compassion and inherent health and awareness and inspires confidence. Thus, these posture-dimensions can be profoundly helpful and appear in ordinary healing practice, in ordinary life and in psychotherapy in particular, as shown in Table 1.

Table 1 Integration of the four postures and the Trikaya in psychotherapy and social systems
Full size table

This process of bridging the wisdom of mind, life and body in this way is supported by current understanding of embodied awareness (Gallagher 2005; Johnson 2008; Thompson and Varela 2001), namely, how the basic structure and operations of the body shape functions of mind. The approach we are presenting in this article differs in its more fundamental sense of body as expressing itself in these four dimensions of embodiment rather than in its functions. Again, this idea is captured by Trungpa’s description of the foundations of mindfulness in which thoughts are described as taking on the functional shape of the thinking body as one experiences those thoughts (Trungpa 1991).

The Four Postures in Psychotherapy

Following the advice of Suzuki Roshi (1968), one can see that therapy starts with some form of contacting earth, in a protected, accepting connection between client and therapist. Just as Earth can be rugged, feelings can be as well. In therapy, feelings, like Earth, are accepted as workable, no matter how difficult they are. From the previous example, awaiting anxiety symptom abatement before engaging in activity, presumes that anxiety symptoms and the role they play as barriers to living create an illness orientation that is unworkable. The grounded nature of the therapeutic relationship provides space to safely expose the thoughts that tend to pull the client off of the vertical posture (e.g., “I cannot live/function with this anxiety”) and the experience of being at home on the ground. The practice is to gain confidence in the earthiness within by making friends with earth again and again. Each time the client is pulled off earth by distorted thinking within the therapeutic process, the practice is continually returning to earth, verticality, and its attendant reminder of the wholesomeness of inner earth. Eventually the client can actually claim the earth of his or her being and stand in his or her values. Then, as the Buddha did, this person must start walking through life and engage the creative process in his or her life. This process is made possible by awakening to the space found in wakeful moments of sitting practice and of the therapeutic relationship, with the realization of the other three dimensions of primal health—laying down, standing, walking—within those moments.

In general we are often unaware of the health within these dimensions, even though each individual embodies them all along. For example, we may contact our sense of earth, but we may find it boring or less desirable than someone else’s earth. We stand, but we may not know why we stand or what standing actually means. We walk in the flow of our life, but not knowing these inner dimensions of health we often walk in circles following repetitive, fear-driven thoughts. Finally, we often see space as the ultimate threat. The case example illustrates that acquiescing to anxiety symptoms serves to create that circular process and narrow the scope of activities in which one engages because he fears the space associated with those symptoms.

Integration of the Four Postures and the Trikaya

Holding the Four Postures within the broader view of the Trikaya, supports moving from an unsteady awareness of our innate health, or Buddha Nature, to a lived experience of this innate health in all of life. Through use of the Nirmanakaya approach to earth practices (i.e., creating a safe holding space for the healing relationship between client and therapist to arise, an appropriate physical space for practice and supporting a commitment to practice), the client begins to appreciate the felt sense of the Sambhogakaya experience of earth in those practices (i.e., practices including: meditations such as sitting and body scan; movement practices such as yoga and tai chi) and thereby gains confidence in the reality of Dharmakaya earthiness within (i.e., grounded wakefulness and workable health in one’s situation). See Table 1. Eventually more aspects of the earth of her life become workable, and become pathways to the earth wisdom in her life. Simply enacting whatever form of earth wisdom works for her (e.g., walking meditation or body scan) becomes the natural way to realize earth wisdom in her actual life just as it is. A shift occurs, from having little understanding of the struggles of life, to actively seeing through those struggles and engaging them in constructive ways. In the process, wisdom is gained through the productive use of the client’s life issues. Continuing with the case example of a client experiencing anxiety, through the act of noticing the variability of the anxiety symptoms within different contexts of her life, the energy once devoted to controlling the symptoms is intentionally invested in valued-activity. Simply put, the end result of avoidance becomes mindful engagement and living with heart.

The structure of the Four Postures and the Trikaya provides a framework for client and therapist to build a shared confidence in the reality and nature of inherent health. It provides a shared vision for the therapeutic alliance and for the integration and expansion of the full range of the Four Posture-practices as ways to cultivate health in a range of life activities.

In particular, the practice of sitting meditation, with its balanced approach of working with both the transient displays of mental experience in mind-fullness (as in allowing thoughts to arise) and the underlying, encompassing space at moments of mind-emptiness (as in recognizing the instantaneous dissolution of thoughts), holds a unique place in the array of health activities for two reasons. First, it unites all postures into one practice. That is, one grounds body and mind by touching earth while sitting in a comfortable seat; one stands in body and mind while maintaining an upright mental or physical posture; one metaphorically walks with life while relating to the movement of breath; and the process is completed when one lets go of the breath as a mental support and opens to the space of just being present with one’s life. Concurrently, with the development of a stable sitting practice, one can develop a more grounded, upright, engaged, flexible, and open stance in life. This stance is the core from which one can contact the non-conceptual, primordial health always present in one’s being—the health that mindfulness alone points us to but does not engage in our being—and from which one’s energy may be directed into living a healthy life.

There are many variations of functional Nirmanakaya earth experience. In psychotherapy, earth may be in a safe and secure relationship with the therapist, it may be in respecting and relating fully to the treatment, or as in more purely spiritual endeavors, earth may simply be having a dedicated place to practice. In most situations, some of all three will apply depending on the needs and experience of both the client and the therapist. A psychotherapeutic approach focusing on the four postures may begin by relating to earth through the Nirmanakaya practice of finding a place for practice, then through a Sambhogakaya form of lying down posture appropriate to development of Dharmakaya confidence in an inner earthiness. See Table 1. This view is particularly relevant as so much of modern life draws us away from healthy contact with literal, Nirmanakaya Earth, and the Dharmakaya Earth within.

Summary

Increasingly, elements of mindfulness, originating from a Buddhist view, are being incorporated in psychotherapeutic practice and research. Broadening the context of understanding within which these mindfulness practices are currently held will bolster the practice of mindfulness for the client and therapist both within and outside of the therapeutic setting. Psychotherapy provides a safe container for realization of the innate health within each individual (Buddha Nature) through the practice of the Four Postures informed by the Trikaya. This realization illuminates our potential to live a satisfying life by waking up to the mechanics of the mind in both distress and healing.