ABSTRACT
The libraries of medicine and psychology contain many manuals about specific forms of suffering. This chapter focuses on the fundamental causes of suffering that whatever the specific form may play a role, and the possibility of freeing people themselves from them. When we look at old Buddhist representations of the wheel of life, samsara, we see images of various realms in which the mind can dwell, and they all symbol-ise different forms of suffering. The three causes of suffering as pointed out in Buddhism can also be found in important schools in Western psychology. The liberating processes of Eastern psychology show similarities with the technique of first generation behaviour therapy Self-inquiry into our inner world, where we can find the causes for our suffering as well as the keys to free ourselves from it. The chapter describes the development from mindfulness training to compassion training in the mental health care sector in the next chapter.
