Tag: Buddhism

The Great Divide – Non Dual/Dual Meditation

Dualism is a crucial issue in the understanding and practice of meditation.

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Author: Josipovic, Z.

Year: 2014

Title: Neural correlates of nondual awareness in meditation

Summary: Many practitioners of nondual meditation have a theoretical and experiential understanding of nondual awareness (NDA). NDA has been described simply as an appreciation of the limitations of subject-object dichotomies. Perception of phenomena as dualistic and non dualistic permeates every aspect of our lives, but NDA is the relative state when we become aware of our habitual fluctuation between dual and nondual views. Neurologically speaking NDA increasingly appears to be fundamentally different from dualistic thought and indeed dualistic meditation. In terms of methodologies, meditation systems can be divided many different ways. But one of the most important and least researched categorisations is between the dual and nondual approaches. Josipovic offers an insight into the nondual approach and explains why and how it is different from other forms of meditation.

Supported both by contemporary experimental evidence and traditional explanations (to some extent). Josipovic presents a study exploring a neuroscience basis for NDA through the relational activity in intrinsic and extrinsic networks during three different forms of meditation (NDA, focussed attention and fixation). Results indicate a reduction during nondual meditation of the negative correlation between the intrinsic and extrinsic networks when compared to both fixation and focussed attention. It should be noted  that there are neuroscience and cognitive studies that both support and contradict Josipovic’s hypothesis. However only when reviewed alongside research demonstrating the limitations of intrinsic network suppression can the full potential of his insight be appreciated.

 

Editor’s Note: The scientific exploration of meditation in all its forms has been hampered by a (much reported) failure to establish authoritative theoretical frameworks. Josipovic has provided an approach which appears to successfully encompass the traditional explanations of NDA and can support phenomenological accounts integrated within a neuroscientific context.

Perspective: Contemplative science, neuroscience

Link: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/nyas.12261/full

Putting the Meditator at the Centre of the Research

Meditators know the most about meditation, if science ignores them they miss a trick.

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(The research is now complete, thanks to all who participated)

Do you meditate or practice mindfulness?

I am currently undertaking an academic survey into meditation and wellbeing. I would like to ask meditators over the age of 18 to complete a short anonymous questionnaire about their practice (it should take around ten minutes). The research has been ethically approved and conforms to all the usual academic norms.

This important research seeks to capture the meditation and mindfulness experience of practitioners of different levels of experience and backgrounds. Based on meditators self reported insights, this projects follows recent signposts in contemplative science putting greater emphasis on the experiential nature of mindfulness and meditation.

Regards

SGM

Is Mindfulness Buddhist and Does its Social Context Matter?

Can mindfulness be regarded as a Buddhist practice?

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Title: Is mindfulness Buddhist? (and why it matters)

Author: Robert H. Sharf

Year: 2015

Summary: Modern mindfulness meditation is often associated with the state of ‘bare attention’, paying attention in the moment, non judgementally but deliberately. This particular state is not without established precedent in different schools of Buddhism and Robert H. Sharf outlines examples from Burmese reformed Buddhism, the Chinese Chan and Tibetan Dzogchen traditions. This paper also highlights issues associated with the theoretical framework for mindfulness in Buddhism and the relationship between the transformative potential of meditation and the wider context within which meditation is undertaken.

Perspective: Religious studies, psychiatry, health psychology

Link: http://buddhiststudies.berkeley.edu/people/faculty/sharf/documents/Sharf%20Is%20Mindfulness%20Buddhist.pdf

No Agreement over the Meaning of the Term Mindfulness

What is the authentic meaning of mindfulness?

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Title: What does mindfulness really mean? A canonical perspective

Author: Bhikkhu Bodhi

Year: 2011

Summary: The mindfulness movement is inextricably linked with Buddhism, both Buddhist teachings and meditation practice. It is then of particular interest when Buddhist scholars of the Pali Cannon, such as Bhikkhu Bodhi question one of the most widely used definitions of mindfulness; ‘bare attention’. This is not simply a philological debate regarding the development and use of the term mindfulness but also a discussion of the fundamental understanding of the human behaviour of meditation. There is also the question of the appropriation and ‘translation’ of the term mindfulness into secular contexts and the implications for both Buddhism and the secular meditation schools.

Perspective: Religious studies

Link: http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/14639947.2011.564813?src=recsys

 

Does Meditation Need a Social Context?

Is the social context an essential element of meditation?

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Author: Laurence J. Kirmayer

Year: 2015

Title: Mindfulness in Cultural Context

Summary: Whilst western psychology has acknowledged the strong relationship that exists between the mindfulness movement and Buddhism. There appears to be a limited appreciation of the implications of social context in understanding either the traditional Buddhist or western approaches to mindfulness.

Perspective: Psychotherapy

Links: http://tps.sagepub.com/content/52/4/447.full.pdf+html

Mindfulness: Towards A Critical Relational Perspective

A critical perspective of mindfulness. Understanding the contemporary mindfulness movement in a wider perspective.

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Author: Steven Stanley

Year: 2013

Title: Mindfulness: Towards A Critical Relational Perspective

Summary: This research acknowledges the increasing role of mindfulness in the west; enabling people to engage with new approaches to cope with issues connected to subjective wellbeing such as stress, depression and anxiety. It also discusses the appropriation of ‘mindfulness’ by psychology and the potential for conflict between its role in traditional and modern westernised meditation movements. A social critique, exposing the failure (and thus the potential opportunity) of psychology to integrate mindfulness as a personal and social practice.

Perspective: Social psychology, discursive psychology

Links: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1751-9004.2012.00454.x/abstract