As an intellectual tradition that codeveloped with Tibetan Buddhism for over a thousand years, Tibetan medicine has cultivated clinically-focused knowledge around tracking individual differences related to cognitive-affective patterns and their contingent contexts that impact health and illness in body and mind across the life course. In particular, Tibetan medicine places specific attention on the role …
Continue reading “Examining Individual Differences in Contemplative Practice Response”
In our daily life, we encounter various people, objects, or environmental context that can evoke memories of unpleasant events. Some of us might be able to quickly move on from these memories, whereas others might get stuck repeatedly thinking about them. The tendency to repeatedly think about stressors is called rumination, which is closely linked …
Science has served as a double-edged sword for meditation. On the plus side, scientific research has helped adapt meditation into secular settings, which has provided broad access to Western audiences. It has also led to innovations in healthcare, education, social activism, workplace culture, and other areas. At the same time, there are valid critiques to …
Continue reading “Bridging Psychology and Contemplative Practice to Benefit Hearts and Minds Today”
Robust learning requires substantial effort. Our recent studies, conducted in a sleep laboratory as well as in typical home environments, have showed that sleep contributes to learning. Indeed, sleep is important for solidifying memories of various types. By extension, in a contemplative practice when people strive to develop enduring prosocial qualities, such as compassion, kindness, …
Continue reading “Sleep’s role in realizing the prosocial benefits of contemplative practice”
Research has begun to show that the benefits of meditation practice can extend beyond the individual to influence the well-being of others. An important next step in the field is to look at how this happens. We will therefore examine how participation in a Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction course impacts the amount of negative emotions, specifically, …
“If people can learn to hate, they can be taught to love.” With tendrils of hate, disrespect, and arrogant dismissiveness implicated in the senseless loss of too many lives to COVID-19 and police brutality, these touchstone words of Nelson Mandela become ever more pressing. Yet it remains unknown how best to teach love. As we …
As we all navigate the current moment of uncertainty surrounding the U.S. Presidential election, we recognize that many of the challenges in today’s world have roots in the mind—and that there, too, lie solutions. Through bringing science and contemplative wisdom together, we seek to foster insights that can contribute to individual, collective, and planetary flourishing. With this in mind, I would like to share five kernels of wisdom, gleaned from members of Mind & Life’s expanding community, to help guide the way forward.
There’s growing concern that the COVID-19 pandemic is exacerbating another ongoing epidemic: the opioid crisis. Recent reports point to an increase in fatal overdoses in the United States since the pandemic began. Could mindfulness-based approaches offer long-term relief for those grappling with chronic pain and addiction? Dr. Eric Garland, Director of the Center on Mindfulness …
In the last twenty years, a sharp increase in contemplative research has created the need for an academic home for interdisciplinary scholarship, community, dialogue, and collaboration. This special Think Tank grant goes to a multidisciplinary group of leading contemplative researchers to begin the development of a new professional society for the field. This is a …
Continue reading “International Society for Contemplative Research”
The 2014 International Symposium for Contemplative Studies (ISCS) drew a diverse, talented and enthusiastic group of attendees, and brought together distinct, though overlapping, fields of research and scholarship across the sciences, humanities, arts and other domains. ISCS 2014 focused on advancing our understanding of the human mind, and how training through contemplative practices can lead …
Continue reading “2014 International Symposium for Contemplative Studies”
