Mindfulness

This chapter considers the role that mindfulness and compassion can play in helping people who come from difficult and traumatic backgrounds. These individuals often have a highly elevated sense of threat – both from the outside (what others might do to them) and from the inside (feeling overwhelmed by aversive feelings or memories; or their own selfdislike/ contempt for themselves). The basic view is that traumatic backgrounds sensitise people to become overly reliant on processing from their threat systems.

The group met on a weekly basis, consisting of two facilitators and an average of five participants who were inpatients of the unit. The sessions lasted for

Journal of Psychiatric and Mental Health Nursing, 2007

The group met on a weekly basis, consisting of two facilitators and an average of five participants who were inpatients of the unit. The sessions lasted for

Social and Cultural Geography 17(4):553-573, 2016

This paper opens up a dialogue between mindfulness and the discipline of geography. As a meditative practice that cultivates ‘present-centred non-judgmental awareness’, we claim that the practices and insights of mindfulness have important implications for various forms of geographical enquiry. This paper argues that mindfulness can inform geographical practices in relation to epistemology and methodology, and contribute towards geographically informed critical psychological theory and action. More specifically, we claim that mindfulness could offer a practice-based context to support the study of affects, extend the application of psychoanalytical geographical methods beyond the therapeutic, and contribute to emerging geographical studies of behavioural power and empowerment. This analysis explores these sites of interaction through a series of reflections on the Mindfulness, Behaviour Change and Engagement in Public Policy programme that was developed and delivered by the authors. This more-than-therapeutic mindfulness programme has been delivered to approximately 47 civil servants working in the UK Government.

This paper describes the development of the Lee's Inventory of Mindfulness Skill (LIMS). The initial 95 items were constructed based on the conceptualized five elements of mindfulness. The scale was completed by 160 students in HELP University. Items with corrected item-total correlations lower than .3 were eliminated. The remaining items were analyzed using exploratory factor analysis constraining the process to five factors. The new scale consisted of 42 items and has five subscale: Attention and Awareness, Here and Now Concentration, Describing and Labelling, Acceptance and Non-reactivity, and Mindlessness. The final scale has good internal consistency. A scoring system was also developed. Further suggestions for further validation are discussed. Readers are allowed to use the scale for academic, research and clinical purposes.

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— The study aimed to explore how, if at all, therapists' experiences of their work changed in the wake of engaging in an intensive eight-week mindfulness training program. We used a hermeneutic phenom-enological approach to interview and develop in-depth descriptions of four therapists' experiences in relation to mindfulness and their therapeutic practices. Therapist-participants completed semi-structured interviews before and after the mindfulness program. The results pointed to several common themes indicating changes therapists described after participating in the mindfulness program. Themes on the reported changes were organized into three categories: (1) personal relationship with mindfulness; (2) relationship

The aims of this pre-test post-test quasi experimental design were to examine the impact on health and well-being and mindfulness scores of an 8 day mindfulness based intervention (MBI) on a group of incarcerated young offenders. The relationship between mental health symptoms and substance dependence is also explored. The Health and Well-Being Tracker and The Five Facet Mindfulness Questionnaires were used as tools in measuring the differences of both the pre-test and post-test conditions. Mental health symptoms and substance dependence were assessed via the DSM-IV-TR and used to measure potential changes in participant scores before and after the MBI. The paper predicted an increase in general health and well-being and higher mindfulness scores on completion of the MBI and a positive correlation between mental health symptoms and substance dependence. A total of twelve (N=12) participants between the ages of 18 to 21 (M=19.33, SD=1.00) were selected of which nine (N=9) completed the group. Results indicated a statistically significant positive correlation between mental health symptoms and substance dependence. Although health and well-being scores showed numerical differences in the predicted direction, neither health and well-being or mindfulness scores increased significantly. The limitations of the research are examined in detail.

Secular descriptions and practices of therapeutic mindfulness in the West have claimed positive physical benefits and improved mental wellbeing. Alongside these developments, the Himalayan Kingdom of Bhutan is addressing unprecedented social problems through emerging counselling and psychotherapeutic services. Approaches seek to align with Bhutanese values, ethics and cultural mores, integrating mindful awareness training from the country’s Buddhist heritage. The present research project took a critical approach to deconstruct the place of mindfulness in the personal lives and professional practices of counsellors and psychotherapists in Australia and Bhutan. An interpretive and collaborative narrative research methodology was adopted to encourage reflexive, relational and dialogical understandings of participants’ views on mindfulness. The design comprised three sites of enquiry. First, as it is widely accepted that Buddhist traditions offer precise concepts and skills for mindfulness and given that Bhutan is founded upon the Kagyu and Nyingma schools of Buddhism, individual interviews were held with senior monastic and lay Buddha Dharma teachers from both the Mahayana and Theravada traditions to provide an historical context. Second, senior organisational managers who have promoted mindfulness, directly or indirectly, in their social service organisations were consulted individually. Third, in keeping with the principal aims of this project, six counsellors and psychotherapists in Perth, Western Australia and five counsellors in Bhutan were interviewed deploying a four-part cooperative group inquiry. To enhance reflexivity, these primary research partners were witnesses to each other’s interviews in their own countries, bringing forth their values, beliefs, and commitments in their professional and personal lives with regard to mindfulness. They were interviewed twice with impressions of the interviews being shared between the two countries to produce a conversational reciprocity. Throughout I situated myself as an active interpreter and co-author of the emerging discourses and practices while making transparent my research intentions. Storying noteworthy events and turning points in the lives of the counsellors and psychotherapists and revealing the significance of relationships with secular and spiritual teachers highlighted how meanings about mindfulness were shaped by diverse cultural conditions and personal circumstances. Everyday embodied storied lives and the broader discourses of cultural meaning-making generated similarities, uniqueness and novelty. The recognition of relational and contextual influences provided a foundation for reconsidering the descriptions, purposes and applications of mindfulness in personal life and professional settings.