Mindfulness Meditation and the Use of Taoist Concepts and Practices to Help Lawyers Relieve Chronic Stress

Mindfulness meditation has gone mainstream in medical treatment. It benefits patients by reducing their stress level and by improving some of the medical symptoms of stress-related disorders. These include psychiatric conditions like anxiety and depression, skin rashes, high blood pressure, heart disease and chronic pain. Lawyers are extremely stressed. They manifest their stress in their high rates of depression (19% of all lawyers), alcoholism (20% of all lawyers) and suicide (double the general population rate).

Law schools should run not walk to incorporate some form of mindfulness meditation training into their required curriculum. It’s high time for lawyers already in practice to utilize mindfulness meditation to control and reduce their stress. Chronic stress is not a new feature of human life associated with the complexity of modern society. Meditation was developed and practiced in ancient India and China as a way to relieve chronic stress in daily life. The central texts of Confucianism and Taoism deal explicitly and extensively with how to relieve chronic stress through meditation.

These days when people think of mindfulness meditation they don’t think of Taoist concepts and techniques for stress reduction. They think of Jon Kabat-Zinn, Ph.D., the person who worked tirelessly and successfully to make his Zen Buddhist version of meditation mindfulness a mainstay of hospital management of chronic pain and chronic stress. Taoism is neither dead nor useless in our modern world. European and American interest in Taoism is increasing with amazing rapidity.

During the past decade numerous new works on Taoism have been published. These include popular books by Wayne Dyer, Ph.D. (Change Your Thoughts – Change Your Life: Living the Wisdom of the Tao) and Derek Lin (The Tao of Daily Life). They also include the academic work of psychologist Robert G. Santee, Ph.D. (An Integrative Approach to Counseling: Bridging Chinese Thought, Evolutionary Theory, and Stress Management) and scholar/poet/translator Stephen Mitchell (The Second Book of the Tao).

Mindfulness meditation, both the Jon Kabt-Zinn version and the ancient Taoist teachings and practices, hold great promise to relieve much of the stress lawyers’ experience. In this blog I will discuss both, but I will concentrate more on Taoism, since Jon Kabat-Zinn’s work is better known and more readily available. As you read my blog, please think about how you could use either or both approaches to decrease your stress response to events in your law practice that appear threatening or harmful at the time.

Jon Kabat-Zinn, Ph.D. and Mindfulness Meditation

These days when a person suffering from stress sees his family physician, he will likely be told to take a course in mindfulness meditation. The pioneer of mindfulness meditation is Jon Kabat-Zinn, Ph.D. Back in 1979 he founded a Stress Reduction Clinic at the University of Massachusetts Medical Center. At the clinic, Dr. Zinn used an 8 week course on meditation and Hatha yoga to help patients struggling with stress, chronic pain and illness. Dr. Zinn named his course MBSR (mindfulness-based stress reduction). He published papers showing his patients achieved significant decrease in mental suffering from chronic pain and significant remission of psoriasis (a stress-related skin rash) by using MBSR.

To publicize and prove the effectiveness of MBSR, Dr. Zinn founded and directed the Center for Mindfulness in Medicine, Healthcare and Society at the University of Massachusetts Medical School. Today MBSR is used in over 200 hospitals in the U.S. and abroad. The MBSR method teaches patients how to stop working against themselves through the use of non-judgmental, moment-by-moment awareness.

MBSR uses ancient meditative techniques to help patients maintain clear awareness of the present without pessimistic judgments and cognitive distortions that raise their stress levels. MBSR teaches patients to stay in the here and now rather than mind-travel to the past (“oh no, this is the same terrible back pain I had last year) or jump ahead to the future (“what if this headache never goes away?”).

Mindfulness is the ability to remain alert and open to what is going on in and around us without letting our emotions overpower us. When we have a problem, such as a pain in our body, consciousness has a tendency to shrink down to a pin point and to become totally focused on the problem. It’s as if nothing else even exists. This is when the problem gets blown all out of proportion.

Mindfulness lets us expand consciousness to include the pain in our body and a whole host of other things, so the problem no longer dwarfs us. We can draw upon the realization that we are getting excellent medical care, that family and friends are in the room with us to support us, that we have medicines to dull the pain, that we can breathe through the pain and we can visualize being in a pain free body. Suddenly we’re back in control and the pain is not our master.

Note you can you can use the very same approach to emotional pain or to sources of irritation in your daily law practice. Instead of back pain, your problem may be harassing conduct by opposing counsel who thinks that zealous representation means flooding you with voluminous and duplicative discovery requests, angry letters over your alleged non-compliance, motions to compel discovery with monetary sanctions against you.

MBSR makes use of a very important distinction between pain (which represents various kinds of physical sensations within the nervous system) and suffering (which is a mental experience) Dr. Zinn teaches his patients that suffering is caused by assumptions, beliefs, judgments and stories the mind generates without regard to the medical facts. Any patient who mistakenly believes his pain is causing irreversible damage to his body, that his pain will never stop or that his pain renders him unable to perform useful activities is harming himself. He’s focused only on the negative aspects of his experience and engaging in worst case scenario thinking. Consequently he’s making himself ill, or at least keeping himself ill, by raising his blood cortisol level, weakening his immune system and raising his blood pressure.

Patients learn they do not have to suffer despite the fact that they continue to experience sensations they used to label painful, frightening or alarming. They develop the understanding that how they see and how they react to sensations in their body determines the meaning and consequences of those sensations. Dr. Zinn helped his patients from having thoughts about or making judgments about their pain that triggered highly charged negative emotions which magnified their pain.

By noticing their pain without judgment, the patients lost their fear and dread of their pain and stopped going into a fight-flight response in an effort to avoid it. By learning to stay relaxed, instead of freaking out when pain showed up, the patients made huge strides in their effort to live a more stress free life. Think about all the benefits you could reap if you took a course in MBSR? If this sounds useful, why not discuss it with your family physician and find out if it’s covered under your medical plan?

The Chinese Roots of Meditation Mindfulness

Dr. Zinn’s views on mindfulness came primarily from his study of Zen Buddhism, a branch of Buddhism that emerged in China in the 7th century A.D. from an amalgam of Mahayana Buddhism, Taoism and other sources. Long before Zen, the Chinese were practicing sophisticated techniques to relieve stress that involved meditation and breathing.

At approximately the same time the Buddha became enlightened and taught the Four Noble Truths and the Eightfold Path in India, Confucius and Lao-Tzu were teaching in China. This was a time of unrest and warfare between competing kingdoms, both within India and within China. Historians believe the Buddha’s followers, Confucius’ followers and Lao-tzu wrote down their teachings so they would survive for later generations and to assist their own societies in safely navigating the crisis of so many wars. Learning to maintain calm and equanimity in the face of constant death and property loss was helpful, and so was knowing that the death of one’s human form is not the ultimate destiny of one’s spirit.

Taoism existed well before Lao-tzu, at least as early as the Shang Dynasty (1766-1122 B.C.E.), but no one had written down its essential teachings and practices before. History attributes the writing of the Tao Te Ching to Lao tzu, who was the keeper of the archives of the imperial Chinese court during the Chou dynasty. The name Lao tzu means Old Sage or Old Master. There is a dispute as to whether Lao-tzu was one person or a group of persons and when he actually lived, but the conventional history goes that he was an actual person who lived during the 6th century B.C.E.

The Tao Te Ching is considered the central text of Taoism. It consists of 5,000 Chinese characters divided into 81 separate chapters. The second most important Taoist text is the Chuang-tzu which was compiled during the 4th and 3rd centuries B.C.E. Both texts are regarded as political, social, philosophical and spiritual classics.

The Concept of Heart-Mind in Ancient Chinese Medicine and Philosophy

Western medicine views the heart as a muscular pump that circulates blood around the body, while the brain does all the perceiving, remembering, thinking, feeling, intuiting and decision-making. In traditional Chinese medicine and philosophy there is no discrete mind or heart. There is only xin (pronounced shin) which stands for heart-mind. The Chinese do not view xin in isolation but always in relation to an ever changing environment. Their goal is to harmonize xin with the environment.

The Confucian Approach to Stress Relief

Confucianism is the system of thought created by the Chinese social philosopher Confucius who lived from 551-479 B.C.E. This was a period of constant warfare between feudal states. Confucius believed individual happiness was dependent upon the existence of social harmony. He taught that individuals contribute to social harmony when they act responsibly by keeping their word and by treating each other with empathy, respect and trust. Confucius urged people to live virtuously and model ethical behavior for each other. His writings set forth ethical precepts for the virtuous life that include respect for and loyalty to one’s family.

Confucius believed that political instability and social conflict caused individual stress, and that individuals could become free of stress only when social harmony reigned. He wrote instructions for the ruling class on how to work for the welfare of society and establish social harmony. Unfortunately the ruling class ignored his advice and continued to engage in wars over territory and to impose burdensome taxes on the general population to finance their wars.

The Taoist Philosophy

In Chinese the term Tao refers to the “Way,” which means the way things are – the natural order. It also refers to the “Path,” which represents the methods one uses to harmonize with the vital spirit of the Way. The Tao represents both the ultimate principle underlying reality and the primordial energy that creates, enlivens and moves all things. For the Taoist there is only the Tao and the world of 10,000 things which consists of the everyday objects that so occupy our attention and desires. The Tao is eternal, timeless, formless and empty. The objects that make up the world of 10,000 things are forms that exist only temporarily, and they are in a state of constant change.

Taoism says we put ourselves under chronic stress by seeking to acquire and hold onto objects within the world of 10,000 things. We cannot still and empty our xin, and harmonize with the Tao, when we are distracted by our quest for wealth, possessions and the power to acquire more wealth and more possessions. We envy the winners who have more, and look down upon the losers with less. We get obsessed with winning and ruminate over our losses and what we need to do to win.

If we think we’re winners, we are stressed by the thought of losing and we become self-protective and defensive. If we think we’re losers we doubt and criticize ourselves. We fear death, because we equate our existence with our material form (the body) and we anticipate the loss of our body as the complete extinguishment of our existence.

Taoism says we will know real peace, happiness and fulfillment when we release our attachment to the world of 10,000 things and experience the Tao, which is our Source. Although the Tao surrounds us and exists within us, it cannot be perceived with any of our five senses. The Tao is also beyond our ability to grasp with rational thought or describe with human language. We can know the Tao through our feelings. We can get there by clearing our mind of conceptual thought and engaging in deep breathing to become still, quiet and empty.

When we are in harmony with the Tao our actions are natural and spontaneous and we do not need abstract, contrived theories of how to behave to guide us. Social harmony is not the precondition for relieving the stress that individuals experience. Rather, it is only when people connect with the Tao and behave naturally that society will become harmonious.

The Taoist Rejection of Confucianism

Taoism rejects the Confucian approach to stress relief. Taoism sees systems of abstract thought with complex theories, instructions regarding the social duties of individuals and moral judgments about individual conduct as causes of stress rather than cures. Lao-tzu seriously questioned the claims of philosophers and sages to know how to solve the problems facing society or the individual. He noted that merely winning an argument does not prove the winner has the correct solution to the problem of stress or any other problem. He expressed distaste for people who engaged in constant arguments and debates in order to parade about their stores of accumulated knowledge

Lao-tzu was an older contemporary of Confucius. Both lived at a time when multiple Chinese kingdoms were at war with each other. During this period many self-appointed sages came forward to debate each other in flowery language and to parade their knowledge about how to achieve peace and stabilize society. Taoist texts, especially the Chuang-tzu, say that all the philosophers running around with their separate and conflicting theories about how to achieve the good life pose a danger.

The sages of the Chou dynasty had fallen in love with the sound of their own voices and seduced themselves into believing their words were true. The more self-confident they appeared, the greater their power to convince others they actually knew something about what was good, worthy and should be pursued versus what was bad, unworthy and fit to avoid.

Taoist texts caution the reader not to confuse the theories, names and words used by various sages to define reality with reality itself. They say it is a huge mistake to invest the words of sages with more substance than the reality that underlies everything. Words are mere approximations of reality. Words are forms and part of the ever-changing world of 10,000 things that arise from and return to the Tao, but they are not the Tao.

As a result of pitting his ideas against his competitors, each sage comes to believe he is wiser than the others, and ends up convincing himself it is his duty to impose his absolute standards of behavior and ethics on individuals for their own good. When you have a large collection of elite intellectuals arguing over how rulers should rule, how society should be structured and how individuals should conduct themselves and none of them agree on anything, you are catalyzing stress not relieving it.

The Tao Te Ching and Chuang-tzu say that holding onto absolute beliefs serves to erect a wall that cuts you off from the Tao. Psychological freedom and freedom from chronic stress cannot be won until you cease believing the truth of anyone’s beliefs, including your own. If you can laugh about the absurdity of a human being knowing reality through rational thought, so much the better. Stephen Mitchell is a well known translator and scholar of the Taoist texts.

In Mitchell’s translation of the Zhuang-zi there is a delightful verse that goes like this:

There was a beginning of time.
There was a time before the beginning
of time. There was a time
before the time before
the beginning of time. There is being.
If there is being, there must be
non-being. If there is non-being,
there must have been a time when even
non-being didn’t exist.
Suddenly there was non-being.
But can non-being really exist,
and can being not-exist?

I just said something,
But did what I just said really
say anything, or not?

In his commentary of this verse Mitchell says, “Here’s the open secret: There is no beginning of time, only a beginning of thought. It arises from the I, the subtlest thought of all, which splits reality down the middle, creating this and that, inner and outer, and all the other mirrored 0’s and 1’s that make up this apparent universe. Then, suddenly, one fine day, mind realizes that it knows nothing, that it is nothing, and sets itself free. Being? Non-being? Give me a break.”

Taoism teaches the way to relieve individual stress is to cultivate your own connection with the Tao. The goal is not be in harmony with society but to be in harmony with the Tao. Once you are in harmony with the Tao everything falls into place and you automatically have good relations with yourself and others. In order to connect with the Tao you must stop interfering with yourself and those around you. Taoism teaches the individual to stop imposing his labels, standards, values and judgments on himself and others; to stop criticizing himself for not living up to his expectations; and to stop quarreling with others because they resist his efforts to control them.

Taosm tells us that you free yourself from your views on how to live the good life, and just start living, life will finally become good. In the Chuang-tzu it says:

Consider a window: it is just a hole in the wall, but because of it the whole room is filled with light. Thus, when the mind is open and free of its own thoughts, life unfolds effortlessly, and the whole world is filled with light.

At the office, our minds are filled with conflicting goals that we believe we must achieve. We want to become partner, but we don't want to work so many hours that we ruin our health or disappoint and alienate our families. We want to impress by our boss by helping him win the Jones case, but we don't want to condone the client's unethical behavior.

When we are given work we operate with conflicting standards and methods for doing it that come from the views of our law school teachers, our mentors, our current law firm supervisors, our clients and the judge. We also have our own standards of ethics and workmanship that our supervisor may be pressuring us to drop or water down.

We can get so caught up in the mental jumble of absolute views and standards in our minds that we cannot function effectively and we break down under the stress. Taoism is telling us to take a step back, to sit quietly, to become still and empty and listen with our whole being to what the Tao is telling us. Taoism has a threefold path for harmonizing with the Tao.

The Threefold Taoist Path for Relieving Chronic Stress

The first step is to become still (jing) in one’s thoughts and feelings and to empty (xu) the mind-heart (xin) of all absolute values, standards, distinctions, dichotomies, judgments, concepts and theories that someone has contrived to explain reality or to control our behavior. The second step is to cease interfering with oneself and others (wu wei). The third step is to avoid becoming entangled in the affairs of the world (wu shi).

All three steps are associated with a practice of self-cultivation that involves non-judgmentally observing and engaging the environment in the present (guan). Guan is a state of tranquility, receptivity and clear-seeing in which one seeks understanding by opening oneself to what is, rather than approaching reality through a pre-existing theory. Through guan, the individual experiences reality (the Tao) in the present as it is without any interference from someone else’s preconceived biases, opinions or worldviews about the nature of existence.

When you are in a state of stillness and emptiness, you become open and impartial in your thinking, feeling, decision-making and behaving. You recognize nothing is fixed or pre-determined and every situation is replete with possibilities. You become aware of many options for how to view and act in the world. You realize you have been disconnected and separated from the ever changing natural world by rigid theories that seek to freeze and fix reality. With this break-through in awareness there is no longer any separation between you and the natural, ever changing world. This is a great source of stress relief.

When your heart-mind (xin) is still and empty you are able to have an unconditioned experience of the Tao (the timeless, formless emptiness from which all forms arise and to which all forms return). Robert Santee, Ph.D. explains that this experience provides you with “the power of being natural, in harmony with the process of change, free from chronic stress and fully engaging the possibilities of existence.” This power is called de which Dr. Santee translates as “gentle power.”

Very few people have de. Are you are controlled by notions from others as to what is good, valuable and desirable and what is not? Is your xin filled with longing for wealth, fine possessions, approval, admiration and status? Are you are afflicted with the desire to win and to acquire stuff, the fear of not getting what you want, the envy and hatred of those who have more or the fear and suspicion of the losers who seek to take what you have? If so, then you cannot help but be attached to what happens around you, to become reactive and to get yourself entangled in the affairs of others. Only when you are free can you live without feeling the need to force other people to behave in a certain way.

When you lack de, you either want certain people in your life (because you find them attractive, they treat you well or they have something you desire) or you want them out of your life (because you dislike them, they have nothing you want or they are threatening to you in some manner). When you lack de, you become so entangled in the lives of others as to put yourself at risk of harm on a social, psychological, financial or even a physical level.

Using the Breathe to Take the Threefold Path

Having de sounds great doesn’t it? But how do you still and empty the heart-mind (xin) and acquire de? How can anyone possibly release everything that distracts him, takes him out of the here and now and limits his choices? How can anyone let go of all his memories, his desires, his future expectations, his turbulent emotions and all the distinctions, notions, ideas and theories stuffed into his brain by the educational system and his mentors? The process of unloading all this interfering mental material is called heart-mind fasting or xin zhai.

What’s the key to xin zhai? In his book Dr. Santee discusses He Shang Gong’s commentary to the 10th verse of the Tao Te Ching, which says we should aim to breathe in the natural, uncompromised way of infants. The way for us to breathe like an infant is to bypass all the confusion and tension that comes from our object-directed thoughts and emotions.

The Tao Te Ching is saying it boils down to freeing the breathe. As creatures with a physical body breathing is our most fundamental activity. We take a first breathe of life when we are born, we breathe all through our lives and we die when we take our last breathe. When we breathe freely we are in harmony with ourselves and our environment. When our breathe is restricted we suffer tension and fatigue on a physical-energetic level, but in the realm of thoughts and feelings (the realm of xin) we are closed, tight, rigid, inflexible, agitated, worried, fearful, anxious, hostile, depressed and so forth.

Dr. Santee interprets the Tao Te Ching to say that compromised breathing causes compromise of our social interaction. This loads us with stress that compromises our breathing, and triggers a vicious circle. .

In Chapter Six of the Chuang tzu, Dr. Santee notes there is a distinction between shallow breathing from one’s throat and deep breathing from one’s heels. The author of the Chuang tzu links shallow breathing with restriction, confusion, upset and stress, while linking deep breathing with a mind-heart that is calm and aware. This distinction between the consequences of shallow chest breathing and deep diaphragmatic breathing corresponds with what modern physiology and psychiatry tell us.

While infants breathe naturally from their heels without restriction, we adults do not. Breathing is not like bike riding, since we never stop doing it and we do forget how to do it right. You can practice deep breathing on your own or you can practice guided breathing using an audio CD. Dennis Lewis has written a book called The Tao of Natural Breathing and produced an audio CD called Natural Breathing. You can go to his website at www.authentic-breathing.com

The Benefits of Spaciousness

Deep breathing not only frees the heart-mind from the constriction of ideas, values and judgments, but deeply relaxes the body. This purifies and balances our inner energies, allows them to flow freely and creates a feeling of expansion. In his book Gesture of Balance Tibetan Lama Tarthang Tulku said, “ This feeling of expansion is much more powerful than the physical sensation of joy – it is deep, vast, infinite.”

Conclusion

The Tao Te Ching draws a portrait of existence as being fluid, continually changing, non-interfering, non-entangled, supportive and integrated. A person who does not expect the world to stay the same or behave according to his definitions is in harmony with the Tao. He is able to adapt to change, to stay flexible and solve problems as they arise. A person with absolute, unchanging ideas will find himself acutely stressed, because the world keeps changing. The key to coming into harmony with the Tao and acquiring de is releasing all of the mental content that controls, rigidifies and constricts your heart-mind and engaging in deep breathing.

If you keep up Taoist practice, over time you will progress beyond being a tense, constricted person who has moments of spaciousness and freedom during consciously guided sessions of meditation and deep breathing. According to Robert Santee, Ph.D. you will continually be aware of and experience “the natural stillness, emptiness, and mysteriousness of the person and existence itself.”

I wish you the best of luck in learning to become more free of stress, more free of ideas that serve only to constrict and upset you, more spacious and more fluid. I hope that you will take a course in MBSR, explore Taoist practices and try Taoist breathe work. Namaste.