Abstract
The basic message of the Buddha has to be seen as a liberation quest from the wheel of suffering. Thus, his basic goal was not to offer ‘a therapy for mental health’ in the current use of the concept, although, as I discussed in the chapter on sickness and health, there are clear analogies to consider the Buddha as a physician of the mind and body and as a therapist. Yet, the dominant mindfulness therapies in the West today hardly offer a liberation quest in the sense of what the Buddha offered as the complete cessation of suffering and reaching sainthood (arahant). Secondly, the term ‘mindfulness’ is located in different mindfulness-based therapeutic orientations: according to the goal of their therapies. In my own life as a Buddhist and a therapist, the two dimensions have enriched each other, but this is something personal and one cannot adjudicate that there is only one way of blending the two.
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de Silva, P. (2014). Mindfulness-Based Therapeutic Orientations. In: An Introduction to Buddhist Psychology and Counselling. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137287557_13
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137287557_13
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