Yung-Jong Shiah - Foundations of Chinese Psychotherapies: Towards Self-Enlightenment

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As a pioneer who has devoted more than 40 years to the development of indigenous psychologies for non-Western countries, it is a really wonderful experience to see that Prof. Yung-Jong Shiah is able to publish this book on Foundations of Chinese Psychotherapies with a serious consideration of my previous construction of culture-inclusive theories about Chinese cultural traditions.

It seems to me that Confucianism, Buddhism, and Taoism, the three major religions in Eastern Asia, are all religions of self-nature.

Goals of psychotherapies or ethical healing for people who believe in any one of them are Enlightenment. In contrast to this, all religions of monotheism, particularly Abrams religions of Christianity, Islamism, and Judaism, are religions of other-reliance. Goals of Western psychotherapies developed by mainstream psychologists are self-enhancement, rather than self-enlightenment.

In the age of globalization, the most important mission of psychologists in Asian countries is the construction of culture-inclusive theories to illuminate the wisdom of self-cultivation toward enlightenment on the basis of Western philosophy of science.

Prof. Shiah has accomplished his mission by the publication of this book. I hope that it may make a significant contribution to help readers to understand the Eastern wisdom of self-cultivation toward self-enlightenment.

This book can be assessed by many readers, inclusive of professionals and undergraduate and graduate students interested in enhancing their Chinese cultural wisdom, therapeutic skills, and humanities. Humanities students and psychologically minded readers may all find the paths to the self-enlightenment. For those readers interested in pursuing advanced lines of inquiry concerning cultivating self-enlightenment, I spiritedly recommend you to access the appropriate reference citations noted throughout the book, as well as the recommended supplementary readings.

Most of the mainstream Western psychotherapies emerged from America and Europe. It is rooted in the context of the Abrahamic religious and philosophical tradition and Greek-Roman tradition. Then the mainstream Western psychotherapies were imported to non-Western countries. Many scholars and practitioners have found that imported Western psychotherapies are not good enough for them to understand and help their people solve their daily problems. Many non-Western psychologists in Asian countries have started to develop indigenous psychologies since the 1970s.

In Chinese cultural traditions, the three major cultures, Confucianism, Buddhism, and Taoism, have offered a reliably useful road map for dealing with lifes adversities and attaining a well-functioning person with full potential along with the authentic, durable happiness for thousands of years. The three major cultures are essentially the psychotherapies. It makes the strong case that Confucianism, Buddhism, and Taoism offer a reliably useful road map for dealing with lifes adversities and attaining authentic, durable happiness. Moreover, they help to provide solutions for many mental health problems. They can help those who are happy and unhappy. People who are happy engaging in self-centered psychological activities emphasize the need to maintain, satisfy, and strengthen the self. They want more happiness. Unhappy people, who suffer from unsatisfied needs in the desire-driven sense of self, want happiness.

This book aims to provide another perspective of psychotherapy as Foundations of Chinese Psychotherapies. This book is the first to offer a systematically based therapy derived from a full consideration of Confucian, Taoist, and Buddhist teachings. The book represents the three psychotherapies altogether along with their self-enlightenment models based on the these three Chinese cultural teachings. The ultimate goal of self-enlightenment is to achieve authentic and long-lasting happiness by helping one move from the self state to the self-nature state. The psychological functioning of the self-nature integrates with two types of self-cultivation process: practicing self-enlightenment and absorbing Confucian, Buddhist, and Taoist wisdom. The psychotherapeutic transition is a profoundly insightful and transformative experience, leading to the well-functioning self with full potential and authenticdurable happiness. It destroys the sense of desiring self and the corresponding psychological structures, identifying and conquering the illusion of self. On the other hand, the psychological function of egoism is to empower the self by causing one to use the hedonic principle to satisfy ones desires. This in turn causes fluctuation in happiness.