1st Edition
The Healthy Mind Mindfulness, True Self, and the Stream of Consciousness
In The Healthy Mind, Dr. Henry M. Vyner presents the findings of twenty-seven years of research spent interviewing Tibetan lamas about their experiences of the mind. The interviews have generated a science of stream of consciousness that demonstrates that the healthy human mind is the egoless mind, given the paradox that the egoless mind has an ego. Vyner presents this science and also shows his readers how to cultivate a healthy mind. The Healthy Mind features extensive interview excerpts, theoretical maps of the egoless and egocentric mind, discussions of the history of science, and thought experiments that unpack the implications of his findings. This is a useful book for all those interested in the dialogue between Buddhism and psychology and in understanding the nature of the healthy mind.
Preface
Semantics & Synonyms
Acknowledgments
I. Introduction
1. Ego & War: 9/11
2. The Healthy Mind Assumption
3. Lopon Tegchoke Interview: The Primordial Wisdom of the Egoless Mind
II. Science of the Stream of Consciousness
4. Tibet: Entering the Stream of Consciousness
5. A Cultivated Scientific Blind Spot: A Phenomenon is a Phenomenon is a Phenomenon
6. Ode to the Stream of Consciousness
III. The Egocentric Mind
7. The Place of the Ego in Nature
8. The Egocentric State of Mind
9. The Vicissitudes of the Ego
IV. The Egoless Mind
10. The Goodness of the Natural Mind: The Control of No Control
11. The Egoless State of Mind
12. Meditation: The Cultivation of the Egoless Mind
13. The Future of the Egoless Mind: Science
14. The Future of the Egoless Mind: The Psychology of Peace
Biography
Henry M. Vyner, M.D., M.A. is an adjunct professor at the Center for Nepali and Asian Studies at Tribhuvan University—the national university of Nepal. He is a physician and cultural anthropologist, and has spent the last twenty-seven years doing a body of research on the nature of the healthy mind amongst Tibetan lamas living in south and central Asia. While in Nepal, he was also a visiting scholar at the University of California at Berkeley, and held a prior position as a research fellow at Tribhuvan University. Prior to his work in Asia, he served as Director of Research at the Radiation Research Institute in Berkeley, California.
"In this impressive work, Dr. Vyner aims to construct and demonstrate a science of the stream of consciousness. From this, he argues for his conclusion that an egoless mind defines a healthy mind, that this healthy mind can be cultivated and taught, and that doing so offers hope for a humanity in the grip of destructive forces."
—Jay A. Phillips, MD, training and supervising analyst at the Washington-Baltimore Center for Psychoanalysis and clinical assistant professor of psychiatry at the University of Maryland School of Medicine
