Abstracts
Day 1 - The Benefits of Meditation: Scientific, Medical and Buddhist Approach
The Benefits of Meditation: A Scientific Reality
Dr. Frédéric Rosenfeld
In contrast to Europe, it is in the East and Far East that countless meditative practices—some now forgotten—have flourished for centuries. For some reason, however, these treasuries of wisdom have been ignored, or misunderstood, by the West.
It has only been since the 1920s, with the development of medical and scientific measuring tools, that the western world has turned its attention towards the careful study of meditation and its physical benefits.
To begin with, these pioneering research efforts between the fields of exact science (medicine, physiology) and Eastern spiritual traditions were rare and tentative. But since the 1970s and 1980s, as scientific research methods have become more and more sophisticated (MRI scanners, cognitive sciences, etc...), the West has entered into a closer relationship with meditative practices. In parallel with this, modern psychology has taken a fearless step forward, exploring the innermost depths of human consciousness and the effects of meditation. This beautiful alliance of psychology and spiritual practice has given rise to different psychotherapeutic techniques, of which the best known is Mindfulness, created by Jon Kabat-Zinn.
Over the past 10 years, the alliance between science and consciousness has crystallised (see Professor Richard Davidson's studies on the brains of medittators, with the collaboration of His Holiness the Dalai Lama and the participation of Matthieu Ricard), allowing meditation to offer its treasures, which have been lying undiscovered for centuries, to modern medicine.
The Buddhist Approach to Meditation
Sogyal Rinpoche
No abstract available
Mindfulness in the Mainstream of Medicine, Psychology, and Neuroscience:
How It Came About, and Recent Experimental Findings.
Jon Kabat Zinn Ph.D
Dr. Kabat-Zinn will review the theoretical origins and history of Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) and clinical mindfulness-based interventions in general. He will discuss the early findings of MBSR with chronic medical patients including those with chronic pain conditions, and compare those outcomes with recent brain studies on MBSR and laboratory-induced pain, as well as laboratory pain studies with long-term meditation practitioners. He will touch on recent findings related to self-referential pathways in the brain that are up and down regulated by MBSR training, and discuss their possible relationship to insights into the nature of self and the direct experience of anatta. He will also describe a range of new studies from many laboratories demonstrating the effectiveness of novel applications of MBSR in different settings and with different clinical populations, and how this emergent field is contributing to the potential reconfiguration of the health care system in the UK and the US based on a deeper understanding of the mind/body interface.
Training the Mind: Attention and emotion-regulation changes during the course of intensive meditation.
Clifford Saron, Ph.D.
Clifford Saron will present the methodologies and findings of The Shamatha Project, a longitudinal randomized wait-list controlled study in how attentional, emotional and physiological processes are modified over the course of three months of intensive full-time training in meditative quiescence (Shamatha) and emotional balance. The initial findings, demonstrate wide-ranging benefits of the retreat experience, including improvements in adaptive psychological attributes, perceptual and attention-related skills, brain activation changes related to visual perception and attention, improvements in inhibiting habitual responses, decreased mind-wandering, changes in the emotional response to the perception of human suffering, diminution of habituation to positive emotional stimuli, and changes in biomarkers associated with stress and cellular repair.
Meditation and Neuroscience
Sara W. Lazar Ph.D.
Regular practice of meditation is associated with changes in mood, attention and cognition. In an attempt to understand some of the neural mechanisms underlying these changes we have documented changes in brain structure in novices before and after embarking on an 8-week meditation based stress reduction program. Findings will be discussed in relation to changes in stress and well-being.
Meditation and Emotion: Observations from the interface of science, teaching, and practice
Erika Rosenberg, Ph.D.
Erika Rosenberg will discuss how the practice and teaching of meditation can inform meditation research, and how experience with science can inform meditation teaching and practice. Her focus will be the emotions: understanding how they unfold in the individual, how they affect behavior and thought, and how working with them, rather than against them, can promote balance and well-being. She will discuss the development of research questions, hypotheses, and methodological approaches based on an understanding of how meditation affects experience from inside, including the emotional challenges presented by deep inner inquiry.
She will also explain how the integration of Western science and eastern perspectives in teaching provides a richer framework for understanding how to work with emotions in daily life and makes the dharma more accessible to Western students. She will also consider the challenges of training a new generation of meditation researchers, and the value of integrated science/dharma curricula.
Day 2 - Meditation for the Modern World: Integration in Daily Life and Future Perspectives
Therapeutic Applications of Meditation (MBCT)
Lucio Bizzini
Mindfulness for the prevention and the treatment of depression has been well illustrated and validated. Based on his personal experience as a clinician and MBCT instructor, the speaker will discuss some questions after approximately fifteen years of application of MBCT such as: the adaptation of MBCT to patients still depressed, the identification of the psychological factors which predict the success of MBCT with resistant depressive patients, the attitudes of the instructor which facilitate the integration of mindfulness in daily life.
Therapeutic Applications of Meditation (MBSR)
Dr Edel Maex
Mindfulness training has shown to be effective in the prevention of relapse in recurrent depression. Dr Maex will illustrate from his experience as a psychiatrist and mindfulness trainer what happens in depression, in relapse of depression and how meditation can help a person to deal more effectively with circumstances and stimuli that otherwise might provoke such a relapse.
Meditation Methods in the Buddhist Tradition
Mindrolling Jetsün Khandro Rinpoche
No abstract available
Mindfulness in the Public Health Service in Ireland
Ursula Bates, M.A.
Ursula Bates will present the development of a Mindfulness Service in a generally public hospital setting and in a hospice based palliative care service. Both services are historically Roman Catholic and publicly funded in a national health service that now has a commitment to cultural diversity. The presentation traces the service development, the psychological results from the mindfulness groups, and the research undertaken. It is especially relevant for people with an interest in service development and working in services with oncology patients and elderly patients at the end of life.
Being present when we care
Rosamund Oliver
Our clients and patients know whether we are present or not when we listen and care. The profound and ancient methodology of mindfulness mediation is proving to be a highly beneficial technique that enables compassionate presence with an other. Mindfulness meditation as been used for over twenty-five years as a training tool by the speaker with staff in hospices, prison and psychiatric work. This presentation will show how simple meditation skills can be applied in a variety of care situations to aid listening and develop presence.
Meditation as a means of taking care
Dr Cathy Blanc
Meditation is a tool we offer systematically in all of our trainings for health care professionals. The different studies we have undertaken and the testimonies we have received demonstrate that meditation is undeniably successful both as a personal and professional practice. Combined with an understanding of the human being as a whole and the process of thoughts and emotions, meditation is a highly effective tool for preventing stress and burnout. As such, it has the potential to become a method applicable in all professions. Moreover, because meditation leads us to adopt a radically different attitude towards ourselves and our environment, it is an ideal way of learning to be present with others in the midst of professional constraints and in circumstances where we have less and less time.
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