Dr. Hyungwon Kang, Ph.D, KMD
Prof. Hyungwon Kang is a professor at the Department of Korean Medicine Neuropsychiatry, WonKwang University and a trainer of M&L (Mindfulness & Loving Presence) psychological therapy. He has great interest in utilizing psychosomatic therapy, an integral part of East Asian Medicine neuropsychiatry, and has been working to carefully untangle, re-interpret, and integrate the various psychological treatments by using East Asian medicine principles.
Today, there are literally thousands of different psychological therapy techniques. However, in order to reach out to patients most effectively, it is important for a therapist to first discover the different strengths (resources) that each patient has. Dr. Kang values using M&L psychoactive treatments because it emphasizes just that - the attitude of the therapist to actively reach out to the patients - and he is using it in his daily clinical practice.
In the clinic, M&L psychotherapeutic treatments combine modern psychology with East Asian Medicine in two ways. One is by making a clinic-friendly program with a manual that has been re-interpreted from the one bequeathed down for thousands of years, and the other is psychotherapy, where the therapist as well as the patient work together to continuously develop and improve the current treatment methods.
In the name M & L (Mindfulness & Loving Presence), “Loving” means literally “to love” and “Presence” means “Presence, Existence, Being, Now, Gift (Present)”. “Loving Presence” together can be interpreted as ‘being together with love’ and ‘to actively love the human being that has existed since the very moment of birth’. It is a concept that can be applied widely in psychotherapy clinics based on the important premise that ‘people live by love’. This is the attitude that the therapist deliberately tries to see the patient with - the attitude of love, rather than seeing him/her as the object of a problem or a defect. In this relationship, the patient feels a sense of safety and has the courage and strength to open up.
In addition, the field of Loving Presence allows the client to enter a state of mindfulness that will help one reflect on oneself. After self-reflection, the patient is able to confront rising conflicts and existing oppressions that was deeply submerged in unconsciousness, and go on to integrate them harmoniously within consciousness.
Korean Medicine Psychotherapy is not merely a counseling therapy. It is a therapy that maintains the basic framework of psychotherapy and sympathetic treatment using East Asian Medicine approaches (medicine treatment, acupuncture, herbal treatment such as depression). Treatments are focused on working with the patient’s internal regularity and encouraging the body to maintain psychological balance.
This lecture will definitely provide a valuable time for participants who want to learn using the neuropsychological approach, which is the key to the healing attitude of the therapist.