To Heal a Wounded Heart: The Transformative Power of Buddhism and Psychotherapy in Action

Interweaving both Buddhist and psychoanalytic wisdom, this book uses the unlikely relationship between a psychoanalyst, her child patient, and a Tibetan Buddhist Lama to explore healing and resilience in the face of pain and injustice in childhood. The book centers around the story of three unlikely [...]
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Interweaving both Buddhist and psychoanalytic wisdom, this book uses the unlikely relationship between a psychoanalyst, her child patient, and a Tibetan Buddhist Lama to explore healing and resilience in the face of pain and injustice in childhood. The book centers around the story of three unlikely friends who formed a family: a silent six-year-old African-American girl born to an HIV-positive mother, a Tibetan Buddhist lama who as a six-year-old escaped the Chinese invasion of Tibet, and a Peruvian-Scottish psychoanalyst whose colorful family-of-origin fell apart in a weirdly handled divorce. Through a strange sequence of events, the three came to know each other in a psychoanalytic program that brings therapy to the inner city. A central theme is the invisible forms of pain and injustice suffered in childhood. But this is only half the story, since the inspiring reality is that children push for wellness. And they don't give up easily. Regardless of the magnitude of trauma endured, children keep trying to get things right. They don't like feeling unknown, to themselves or others. Through this story, the ways in which Buddhism and psychoanalysis address this human struggle to recognize one's own suffering in the face of another, and our common push for wellness, are revealed through the growing relationship between these three unlikely friends.