THE
FUNDAMENTAL IDEAS for Constructive Living (CL) can be traced to the
psychological foundations of ancient Buddhism, Sufism, the
Judeo-Christian tradition, and related pursuits. Some of these ideas
were codified by Masatake Morita (or Shoma Morita, an alternative
reading of his given name) and Ishin Yoshimoto in twentieth-century
Japan. Both of these innovative geniuses tried to make their insights
known to the West, but failed primarily because of language
difficulties. Some of their students' students also worked to
introduce these ideas into the West: Akira Ishii had success
establishing Naikan centers in Europe based on Yoshimoto's methods,
and F. Ishu Ishiyama brought Morita therapy to clinical psychology in
Canada. Related principles of mental health can be found in the
writings of Milton Erickson, Fritz Pens, Ram Dass, Robert Heinlein,
and many others.
Those
who gave me most of the basic building blocks for Constructive Living
were Japanese. Morita and Naikan psychotherapies are more narrowly
practiced in Japan than in the West, but they provided theoretical and
practical guidelines around which Constructive Living was put
together. I began studying Morita therapy and Yoshimoto's Naikan in
Japan in the 1960s. My doctoral dissertation in the Department of
Anthropology at UCLA was based on fieldwork in these methods. The
doctorate was awarded in 1969. The dissertation was rewritten as
Morita Psychotherapy (1976). It was followed shortly by The Quiet
Therapies (1980) and Naikan Psychotherapy (1983). With these books,
chapters in academic edited works, and journal articles (see
Bibliography) I aimed to found a scholarly literature on the subject.
Many popular books followed in both the United States and Japan.
In the early 1970s, I was teaching at the University of
Southern California School of Medicine in the Department of Human
Behavior. There were a few opportunities to formally teach material
about Morita psychotherapy and more opportunities to use Morita's
ideas during individual counseling of medical students and others who
had come across this approach in popular-magazine articles. By the end
of the 1970s, the need for a combination of Morita's and Yoshimoto's
systems was clear to me.
In the early 1980s, I had begun teaching certification courses
with both Morita and Naikan elements outside the formal academic
setting. Because the courses emphasized Moritist thought, the
certifications were in "Morita Guidance." I wanted to avoid
the medical and psychotherapeutic implications of calling what I did
Morita psychotherapy. Certainly, the lifeways Morita and Yoshimoto
taught were not useful solely to those who carried the clinical
diagnosis of neurosis. I sought to avoid the restrictions that would
follow from installing within the mental health field what was coming
to be called Constructive Living. Using the English term Constructive
Living, I could avoid both potential anti-Japanese prejudices in the
West and criticisms from conservative Morita therapists in Japan that
I was not practicing classic Morita therapy. The book entitled
Constructive Living (1984) marked the formal beginning of the Western
extensions adaptations of these Eastern ideas, but it was not until
1991 that "Constructive Living" became a registered
trademark in the United States.The name itself emerged following a
discussion with Dr. N. Shinfuku about the merits and limitations of
using Japanese names when introducing these ideas into the West. The
exotic East attracted attention but distanced Westerners, who might
consider the principles inapplicable to their own lives.
By
1995 Constructive Living certification training courses had been held in
Los Angeles; Hawaii; Florida; New York; San Francisco; Washington,
D.C.; Chicago; Cleveland; Vermont; Denver; New Zealand, Canada and
Japan. About 250 individuals were trained during courses, with more
than 130 of them certified as instructors.
