Working with Buddhism’s “Three Poisons”
Explore Buddhism's foundational understanding of human psychology through the three poisons - attachment, aversion, and ignorance - learning how these fundamental mental patterns shape our actions and discovering how awareness can transform our relationship with them. Soto Zen priest Koun Franz is your guide.
Introduction: Understanding the Three Poisons
Meet Zen priest Koun Franz as he reframes Buddhism's "three poisons" not as things to avoid, but as the basic psychological mechanisms underlying all human behavior — the constant push and pull of attachment and aversion, and our relationship with what we don't know.
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Introduction: Understanding the Three Poisons
Meet Zen priest Koun Franz as he reframes Buddhism's "three poisons" not as things to avoid, but as the basic psychological mechanisms underlying all human behavior — the constant push and pull of attachment and aversion, and our relationship with what we don't know.
1:18
How the 3 Poisons Work in Daily Life
Discover how attachment, aversion, and ignorance operate unconsciously in everyday situations like watching the news, building identity, and navigating disagreement, learning to recognize these patterns as they create our personal reality maps.
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Working with Total Darkness - A Guided Exercise
Experience a powerful thought experiment of waking in complete darkness, exploring how attachment seeks certainty, aversion pushes away fear, and embracing ignorance becomes the key to moving skillfully through unknown territory.
13:03Related Readings
Detox Your Mind: 5 Practices to Purify the 3 Poisons
Five Buddhist teachers share practices to clear away the poisons that cause suffering and obscure your natural enlightenment.
Three Ways of Working with Emotions
Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche shares a new article and video on the five kleshas — ignorance, aversion, craving, pride, jealousy — how they lead to suffering, and how not to let them.
Pema Chödrön’s 3 Ways to Transform Your Emotions
At the root of our suffering are the destructive emotions that Buddhism calls the kleshas, or poisons. Pema Chödrön teaches us a three-step practice to transform their energy from a cause of suffering into a path to awakening.