What is Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction or MBSR?
We already outlined what mindfulness means. Next, what is
Stress and what is Mindfulness Based stress reduction? Let us start with a link
to a short video to hear what Dr.Jon Kabat-Zinn, the originator of this concept
has to say.
https://www.mindful.org/jon-kabat-zinn-defining-mindfulness/
Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) program is a
technique developed by Dr. Jon Kabat-Zinn in 1979 at the University of
Massachusetts Medical center for stress management. Dr.Kabat-Zinn started this
program to help relieve pain and suffering of patients with chronic diseases
who were not responding to available treatments. Since
then it has been modified to include body awareness, yoga exercises and self
inquiry (into one’s patterns of ineffective and harmful thinking). The method has
been used to alleviate suffering associated with physical, psychosomatic and
psychiatric disorders. It has also been used in conjunction with behavior
modification programs.
Although Dr.Zinn started with Mindfulness meditation adapted
from Buddhist teachings, he renamed his program “Mindfulness-Based Stress
Reduction” (MBSR), removing the Buddhist framework and placing it in a
scientific context. This helped MBSR to enter mainstream clinical practice
followed by excellent neurophysiological research which has provided adequate
scientific proof for its efficacy.
What is Stress?
As we all know, Stress is a fact of life. For some, every
moment of life is a stress. For some, it takes a lot before they feel stressed.
In other words, there is a subjective element to it. Stress, which our
ancestors experienced in the remote past, when they were hunting or were being
hunted, and of animals in the wild, was existential stress. It was acute, short
term, had a beginning and an end with death or survival as the only options. It
was physical stress. Basic parts of our nervous system are built primarily to
respond to this kind of stress.
We do not face those challenges our ancestors experienced
under primordial conditions. But we live in a complex society and as the famous
saying goes “there is a jungle out there”. At least that is the way our mind reacts
to the ups and downs of modern day living, making our lives stressful! That is
why there is so much professional burnouts and mental illness such as anxiety
disorders and depression. That is why there is so much interest in eastern
teachings on calming the mind such as yoga and meditation.
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