Aion Institute

This seminar will focus on the skill and use of cultivating and strengthening the capacity to observe one’s inner process in psychotherapeutic work. It will focus on Buddhist Psychological roots of this process, while also covering Psychoanalytic, Jungian, and Somatic Psychotherapy (Hakomi) theories. A basic understanding of the principles of Buddhist Psychology will be discussed. The importance and function of the inner witness will be traced through the three main schools of Buddhism- Hinayana, Mahayana, and Vajrayana- with a specific focus on the Mahayana concept of Bodhicitta. The clinical benefit of building a strong inner witness will be discussed, specifically as it relates to transference, countertransference, affect tolerance, mirroring, empathetic listening, the transcendent function, memory reconsolidation, and the creation of new neural pathways.