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Modern Western Buddhism functions remarkably like an avoidant attachment strategy dressed in spiritual robes. This isn't immediately obvious - the language is all about awareness, presence, and acceptance. But watch closely how these teachings typically get enacted: sitting alone on your cushion, maintaining emotional distance through "equanimity," pursuing individual enlightenment while treating intimate relationships as distractions. We've created a spiritual technology perfectly appealing to individuals with avoidant attachment. This isn't a critique of Buddhism itself, but rather of how Western culture has shaped Buddhist teachings through the lens of its own intimacy disorder. As David McMahan explores in The Making of Buddhist Modernism, what we think of as Buddhism in the West is largely a modern creation, filtered through Protestant Christianity, scientific rationalism, and Romantic idealism. But there's another influence at work: our cultural pattern of avoiding intimacy. Cons

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• Carmen Lau