Teaching Transnational Buddhist Meditation with Vipassanā (Neiguan 內觀) and Mindfulness (Zhengnian 正念) for Healing Depression in Contemporary China

Abstract

This paper examines how the teaching of embodied practices of transnational Buddhist meditation has been designated for healing depression explicitly in contemporary Chinese Buddhist communities with the influences of Buddhist modernism in Southeast Asia and globalization. Despite the revival of traditional Chan school meditation practices since the Open Policy, various transnational lay meditation practices, such as vipassanā and mindfulness, have been popularized in monastic and lay communities as a trendy way to heal physical and mental suffering in mainland China. Drawing from a recent ethnographic study of a meditation retreat held at a Chinese Buddhist monastery in South China, this paper examines how Buddhist monastics have promoted a hybrid mode of embodied Buddhist meditation practices, mindfulness and psychoanalytic exercises for healing depression in lay people. With analysis of the teaching and approach of the retreat guided by well-educated Chinese meditation monastics, I argue that some young generation Buddhist communities have contributed to giving active responses towards the recent yearning for individualized bodily practices and the social trend of the “subjective turn” and self-reflexivity in contemporary Chinese society. The hybrid inclusion of mindfulness exercises from secular programs and psychoanalytic exercises into a vipassanā meditation retreat may reflect an attempt to re-contextualize meditation in Chinese Buddhism.

The Effect of Juingong Meditation on the Theta to Alpha Ratio in the Temporoparietal and Anterior Frontal EEG Recordings

“…Cardoso et al define meditation as a procedure that includes (1) the use of a specific technique, (2) muscle relaxation (3) logic relaxation (4) it must necessarily be a self-induced state, and (5) the use of "self-focus" skills [2]. Meditation is one of the methods of practicing Buddhism and it has also been popularized in the non-religious sphere under the concept of mindfulness [3,4]. The origin of mindfulness is "Vipassana," and the primary feature of this meditation is "choiceless awareness" [5] or "open monitoring" [6], which is a non-selective perception that focuses on recognizing actions such as one's mind or breathing [7].…”

Equality of Access? Chinese Women Practicing Chan and Transnational Meditation in Contemporary China

“…It tries to imply that practicing dongzhongchan does not greatly differ from Chan in the Han Chinese Buddhist tradition. It can also be one of the common features developed for adaptation in the contemporary Chinese context-a hybridity of the transnational and Chinese Buddhist style, due to the restriction of the socio-political situation, as I argue in my previous study (Lau 2020a(Lau , 2021b. Apart from the increasing number of meditation retreats and sites of transnational meditation, it was surprising to find the establishment of public Chan halls at monasteries and female Chan halls at nunneries.…”

“…Since the turn of the century, with the influence and support from Taiwan and Hong Kong, meditation retreats with various traditions from Myanmar and Thailand, such as vipassanā or satipattana, have been held in Chinese Buddhist monasteries, so that Chinese nuns and laywomen have chances to learn and practice transnational meditation in mainland China (Lau 2021b). After the first vipassanā meditation retreat in the Goenka tradition was organized at Bailing Chan Monastery in 2001, an increasing number of vipassanā meditation retreats have been held in Chinese Buddhist monasteries in mainland China.…”

“…For details, see "Bright and Shining Mind in a Disabled Body" https://dharma-documentaries.net/bright-and-shining-mind-in-a-disabled-body (accessed on 18 October 2021) 45 As I mentioned in another study, Wuyou, who ordained in Yangon, returned to China with dressing in Theravāda tradition. Yet he changed his robe to Chinese Buddhist style later, see footnote 23 of Lau (2021b).…”

On the Value of the Chinese Pre-Qin Confucian Thought of “Harmony” for Modern Public Mental Health

“…Vipassana therapy is to guide the subject to self-awareness and correction by means of individual experience recalling and reviewing personal emotional experience, which helps to "heal depression and anxiety full of negative thoughts, disgust, and hatred." The main method is to guide the subject to consciously observe the precepts, train the mind, limit desires, and control impulses (Lau, 2021). Introspection is also to use the method of self-reflection to comprehend truth and to seek virtue from oneself by means of strengthening self-reflection, self-examination, self-discipline, and self-enlightenment, which is conducive to people's development of a generous and openminded character, and resolves various mental diseases caused by narrow-mindedness and quibbling about unimportant things.…”