[Pughead]

Has anyone practiced mindfulness as part of therapy? My T recommended it a couple weeks ago and I'm looking at delving deeper into it. I ordered some books and a Beginner's Guide to Mindfulness Meditation by Jon Kabat-Zinn.

For starters, an overview can be found here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mindfulness

Anyone have experience with this or anything to say about it?

[LMo]

I have, but not in a buddhist context. My T and I discuss it as a method for anxiety control.

A book I use often is called "Whereever You Go, There You Are: Mindfulness Meditation in Everyday Life" by the same author as your book.

I like this author because he doesn't go too far "out there". It's practical rather than existential. Good for me.

I've never read it cover-to-cover, though. I just read a chapter every week or two, whenever I feel the need for some grounding.

[Pughead]

Cool, I saw on Amazon that that book is highly recommended by nearly everyone. The other two books I got are by Thich Nhat Hanh;

The Heart of the Buddha's Teachings and Peace is Every Step: The Path of Mindfulness in Everyday Life.

I believe learning about these concepts will really help me, and am looking forward to getting into it.

Yes. I've done mindfulness meditation as part of a DBT program. I can honestly say that I found it to be the most helpful part of the skills training.

While mindfulness meditation has traditionally been linked to buddhism a similar attitude can be fostered with prayer (just in case the buddhist link puts people off).

I found it helped me with relaxation, feeling happier, distress tolerance, pain relief, awareness / acceptance of bodily states / thoughts / feelings etc, sleep... Really can't say enough good things about it :-)

I haven't read the books you have mentioned - but I have heard that those books are the 'standard' books for learning about this stuff. I've seen one of them at borders and I've been tempted... But I really don't have money to spend on books at the moment (health insurance payment coming up soon).

:-)

[Perna]

I like a Japanese therapy, Morita http://www.todoinstitute.org/ that has mindfulness (living in the moment) elements. David K. Reynold's books are good for explaining it, but lots are old, often hard to find now (70s and 80s) http://www.amazon.com/Quiet-Therapie...dp/0824808010/

[Pughead]

Now all I want to do is sit under a tree and become the Buddha!

Oh no, I hope I haven't triggered mania.

[DavidStrong]

Psychologist Richard Davidson and the Dalai Lama did some research on it a couple years back. As I understand, the Dalai Lama had heard about Davidson's work on hemispheric dominance and personality dispositions. He had found that people with left hemispheric dominance were happier than people who were dominant on the right. Most people assumed that you couldn't change stuff like that. The Dalai Lama thought that his monks who were trained in meditation were all happy and that if you trained people in mediation, they would show more activity on the left. The had people who were known to be right dominant and had them trained to meditate by monks. They then had their brains scanned. They found that participants showed a shift to more left processing. So I think there is some scientific evidence that meditation can have long term positive effects.

There has been work done on how teaching mindfulness meditation breaks the 'OCD circuit' (the activation of the neurological pathway involved in acting on compulsive behaviours) as well.

Mindfulness meditation seemed to help people prevent the action and long term it seemed to help prevent the urge.

I'm not sure what studies have been done on mindfulness meditation for ADD and ADHD but I wouldn't be surprised if people who practice meditation regularly have an increased capacity to focus attention.

Higher cortical areas seem to mostly have an inhibitory function. Activation of higher cortical areas seems to allow people to PREVENT acting on urges. If one can prevent acting on urges then one can weigh through the pros and cons of different options before making a (more) informed response (rather than reaction).

Some people think that this capacity to inhibit urges and then think through different options is the seat our our free will. That making a free choice just is making an 'all things considered' choice.

There is stuff (very speculative) on how attention (aka: the power of 'mental force') collapses the wave function. That is to say that the higher cortical areas are in a fairly distributed state of activation and that consciously focusing ones attention on an urge while inhibiting action is what collapses the wave function and throws certain states of thinking through pros and cons (aka certain cortical pathways) into action. This is very controversial... But if it is right...

how bout getting off these antibiotics
how bout stopping eating when I'm full up
how bout them transparent dangling carrots
how bout that ever elusive kudo

thank you india
thank you terror
thank you disillusionment
thank you frailty
thank you consequence
thank you thank you silence

how bout me not blaming you for everything
how bout me enjoying the moment for once
how bout how good it feels to finally forgive you
how bout grieving it all one at a time

thank you india
thank you terror
thank you disillusionment
thank you frailty
thank you consequence
thank you thank you silence

the moment I let go of it was the moment
I got more than I could handle
the moment I jumped off of it
was the moment I touched down

how bout no longer being masochistic
how bout remembering your divinity
how bout unabashedly bawling your eyes out
how bout not equating death with stopping

thank you india
thank you providence
thank you disillusionment
thank you nothingness
thank you clarity
thank you thank you silence

(alanis morrissette 'thank you')

[biiv]

love that song Alex_K. thanks for reminding me of it.

[January]

This is an absolutely fascinating thread. My thanks to each of you for sharing your thoughts and insights.

Jan

[Pughead]

I bought Wherever you Go, There you Are (Kabat-Zinn) yesterday and all I read was the intro but I'm still so excited. I told my T about it and he's really glad that I'm looking into this.

I haven't started meditating yet but I'm just trying to focus on being really attentive in stressful situations and acknowledging what's happening instead of just reacting.

[LMo]

Pughead - that's the point. Attentiveness and acknowledgment is 90% of it. If you add focusing on your breathing and how your body reacts to situations, then you're already there.

IMO, meditation isn't more than that, from a practical standpoint. One could get esoteric, but do so only if you're drawn to such things.

[JonB]

As long as you're reading, I also recommend:

- Build a Better Buddha by James Robbins (one of my favorites- plus the recommended reading list at the back is awesome. Check out the book's web site -you can google it- for many good excerpts from the book that you can preview for nothing. Definitely check this one out!)

-anything by Alan Watts (I love listening to his books/lectures on audio, particularly "Do You do It or Does it Do You?")

-The Only Dance There Is by Ram Dass
-Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse
-The Feeling Buddha by David Brazier (about Buddhist psychology)
-A Path With Heart by Jack Kornfield

I've done lots of reading about mindfulness/Buddhism/meditation and their relationship to psychology. I spend way too much time at the book store (especially the used book stores near me) - and you can often get these (or any book) for great prices on half.com

I've found these books to be very motivating and enlightening (ha ha). Read on Pug and enjoy!

I am currently listening to a book on tape by Pema Chodron and she addresses mindfulness. The book is "When Things Fall Apart" Heart Advice for Difficult Times. Very interesting ideas here.

I am just becoming interested myself.

I hope it's helpful to you.

ECHOES

[JonB]

Hey Pug - I just started reading Peace is Every Step and I like it. No big surprise to me since I've liked most of the books I've read on this topic. Today I had lunch in the tea room at the local Buddhist center/school. A very nice Buddhist nun (that's how she referred to herself) gave me some booklets to read that are also interesting. One is about Buddhist psychology. She was fascinating to talk to.

On an unrelated note - I thought of you today in the grocery store in the beer aisle. There was a micro-brew brand called Ugly Pug (not to imply any ugliness on your part). It has a picture of a very scruffy looking pug with an eye patch and his tongue sticking out and the word "RAHR." It's a local brand (a black lager), so don't know if they carry it in your area.

Happy Reading.

[Pughead]

Ugly pug indeed!



http://www.ratebeer.com/beer/rahr-&-...gly-pug/42671/