Melissa Curley, an assistant professor in the Comparative Studies department, will be lecturing on how Americans have recently shown great interest in the possibility of adapting Buddhist techniques in order to deal with forms of psychological suffering and pain particular to the contemporary world. A century ago, some Japanese thinkers grappling with the stresses of modernity likewise made a turn to Buddhism, inventing new kinds of meditation to suit their modern patients. The lecture introduces two styles of Buddhist-inspired psychotherapies, one developed on the basis of Japanese Zen and the other on the basis of Japanese Pure Land, arguing that although they start from different premises, they arrive at the same conclusion: the healthiest mind is no-mind, and the happiest self is no-self.
Religions of the World: Past and Present A Free Community Lecture Series
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