ABSTRACT
This chapter presents an overview of the essential elements of Buddhist psychology as a mental discipline. Right mindfulness, right concentration, and right effort constitute the entire terrain of the Buddhist mental landscape. The mind is trained, disciplined, and developed through these three practices, which aim at cleansing the mind of impurities and disturbances such as lustful desires, hatred, ill-will, indolence, worries and restlessness, skeptical doubts. The goal is to cultivate such positive qualities as concentration, awareness, intelligence, will, energy, the analytical faculty, confidence, joy, and tranquility, leading finally to the attainment of the highest wisdom which sees things as they are. These qualities have a direct bearing on how we live our lives and how we conduct ourselves toward others in any relationship, including the leader–follower relationship. This chapter briefly discusses two basic forms of meditative practices—Samatha and Vipassana—and the concomitant practices of mindfulness of breathing and insight meditation. As a case in point, this overview is followed by a detailed description of the author’s recent experience with a form of Buddhist meditation called Vipassana as taught by S.N. Goenka in the tradition of Sayagyi U Ba Khin.
