Last fall, the Women’s Center at the University of Connecticut (which I helped found back in the 70’s) had their 40th anniversary celebration. For the occasion, they invited one of my long-time heroes, the renowned feminist activist, Ms. Gloria Steinem as their keynote speaker. During her talk, she told a story of being asked what […]
Mindfulness Works – Here’s the Evidence
When it comes to introducing mindfulness, people often have a lot of preconceived notions, along with plenty of objections about why the practice won’t work for them. The range of protests can go from “I just don’t have enough focus” all the way to “This simply won’t work for me.” If you’ve ever had a […]
Mindfulness Power Tools For Cancer Survivors
A diagnosis of cancer can change a person’s life in the blink of an eye. And the feeling of helplessness that often accompanies it can remain even after recovery. So how can we help people regain a sense of control over their lives after they’ve experienced cancer? There’s actually a unique program aimed at helping […]
Mindful Change from an Early Age
For a lot of us, success in life starts with learning the right habits. And for parents, it’s essential to start children off on the right foot by teaching them good habits from an early age. In fact, there’s one “habit” in particular that parents can pass on to their children – one that can […]
How Prisoners Are Benefiting From Yoga
The other day, we shared a video of a practitioner who introduced mindfulness to female prisoners (if you missed it, you can check it out here). We received a lot of thoughtful comments, and found out that even among our readers, there are practitioners introducing mindfulness in prisons. Since so many people were interested, we […]
An Unlikely Setting for Mindfulness Practice?
When you picture an ideal place to meditate, what comes to mind? Chances are, it’s not a prison cell . . . . . . and yet mindfulness is making inroads in several areas of the prison system. After discovering a widespread history of trauma and neglect among the female inmates he works with, one […]
Mindfulness: Is it making its way into the mainstream?
At first glance, we might tend to see mindfulness and politics as an unlikely pairing . . . . . . but after my conversation with US Representative Tim Ryan (D-OH) the other night, I was reminded that there is at least one politician in office who makes it seem natural. Not only does he […]
Can Mindfulness Change How the Brain Processes Emotion?
We’d like to think it can, but what does the evidence show? A working definition of mindfulness is that it attentively and non-judgmentally focuses on present experiences. But does this actually affect anything in the brain? To find out, Jacqueline Lutz, from the psychiatry department at the University Hospital of Zurich, led a study investigating […]
Mindfulness and Bipolar Disorder . . . A Life Transformed
A few days ago, we posted a video to share how mindfulness can help patients suffering from anxiety disorders (if you haven’t seen the video yet, check it out here). But how else can we apply mindfulness in our work? What other patients could benefit from integrating mindfulness into their lives? Today, we’d like to […]
How to Make Mindfulness Work in Your Practice
Ever wonder which types of patients benefit most from mindfulness? As it turns out, it has a wide range of applications. To show you the range of ways that practitioners are integrating mindfulness into their practices, we thought we’d share some inspirational stories. We often highlight people who’ve written books or are on the lecture […]