The Neuroscience Of Mindfulness

[camerata]

The neuroscience of mindfulness

We generally think of mindfulness as an idea that has been around for thousands of years, originally emerging out of Buddhist traditions. Many Buddhist researchers are doing great studies showing that mindfulness has an impact on many aspects of human experience.

I have a bit of a problem with that. When you understand the underlying physiology of mindfulness, you begin to see that any discussion about human change, learning, education, even politics and social issues, ends up being about mindfulness. That's because mindfulness, in some ways, is simply the opposite of mindlessness. And mindlessness is the cause of a tremendous amount of human suffering.

[...]

A study by Kirk Brown found that people high on a mindfulness scale were more aware of their unconscious processes. Additionally these people had more cognitive control, and a greater ability to shape what they do and what they say, than people lower on the mindfulness scale. If you're on the jetty in the breeze and you're someone with a good level or mindfulness, you are more likely to notice that you're missing a lovely day worrying about tonight's dinner, and focus your attention onto the warm sun instead. When you make this change in your attention, you change the functioning of your brain, and this can have a long-term impact on how your brain works too.

John Teasdale, recently retired, was one of the leading mindfulness researchers. Teasdale explains, "Mindfulness is a habit, it's something the more one does, the more likely one is to be in that mode with less and less effort... it's a skill that can be learned. It's accessing something we already have. Mindfulness isn't difficult. What's difficult is to remember to be mindful." I love this last statement. Mindfulness isn't difficult: the hard part is remembering to do it.

Full article at psychologytoday.com.

[RY12]

If you're on the jetty in the breeze and you're someone with a good level or mindfulness, you are more likely to notice that you're missing a lovely day worrying about tonight's dinner, and focus your attention onto the warm sun instead. When you make this change in your attention, you change the functioning of your brain, and this can have a long-term impact on how your brain works too.

I certainly hope he's right about the long-term impact, I haven't seen much improvement in my mindfulness practice over the last 6 years.

I must admit, I had different expectations about what this thread would be about when you used the word "neuroscience." I personally don't think there is anything that profound about mindfulness- it is merely a samadhi exercise in concentration. I think mindfulness is, neurologically speaking, an attention exercise. Thus it is impossible to keep up mindfulness when attention has to be distributed in many different places, such as when one is working. The example of the guy in the jetty above is not about mindfulness, it's just remembering the 'big picture', which you don't need minfulness to do. Mindfulness does become profound when spasms of vipassana and prajna occur during its practice. Those latter two terms, again in my opinion, are psychologically speaking the complete LACK of attention on any particular thing. When the mind is conscious but attention becomes non-existent, the mind experiences enlightenment. Having had that experience, attention can arise again but without any notions of selfhood attached. This is my view of the neurology of awakening, I'm not pleased with it so if anyone has a better idea, post it!

[camerata]

Thus it is impossible to keep up mindfulness when attention has to be distributed in many different places, such as when one is working. The example of the guy in the jetty above is not about mindfulness, it's just remembering the 'big picture', which you don't need minfulness to do.

I think what he's getting at here is "living in the present moment" and experiencing external stimuli without any judgments, as opposed to multitasking or doing something while fantasizing about the future or replaying the past in your mind. Just give your attention to one thing. But I agree it is not "mindfulness" in the Buddhist sense. I remember a comment in a book where the author saw a sign in a Buddhist meditation centre saying, "Please close the door mindfully."

Mindfulness does become profound when spasms of vipassana and prajna occur during its practice. Those latter two terms, again in my opinion, are psychologically speaking the complete LACK of attention on any particular thing. When the mind is conscious but attention becomes non-existent, the mind experiences enlightenment. Having had that experience, attention can arise again but without any notions of selfhood attached. This is my view of the neurology of awakening, I'm not pleased with it so if anyone has a better idea, post it!

My understanding of mindfulness is to be fully aware of what you are doing in the present moment which, at the simplest level, is being aware of your body. Walking meditation is a good practice for this, as apparently is alms round. After the body, there are feeling, mind and mental-objects. This more advanced mindfulness seems to tie in with the statement that: "people high on a mindfulness scale were more aware of their unconscious processes. Additionally these people had more cognitive control, and a greater ability to shape what they do and what they say, than people lower on the mindfulness scale."

[honu]

Greetings! Great forum.

A Christianity professor I knew used to express the same idea in terms of changing the boundary between consciousness experience and the unsconcious. It's essentially the same thing but it changes the context a little from awareness of unconsious processes. Part of the trick here is that people filter out most of what they experience for a good reason, to get on with focusing on what is deemed important, the stuff that makes it through that process. Lots of focus on raw sensory experience would diminish wool-gathering but perhaps not in any productive way (maybe unless it's part of a well-informed introspective technique). My professor's main emphasis was on psycho-social awareness, getting to know the level of assumptions that relate to the self-image that provides context for conventional self-awareness, but I'd guess that he experienced more related to immediate experience than he got around to discussing. He taught from a great introductory book on the subject, Stages of Faith by James Fowler (a bit dated since it came out in '81 but still full of interesting starting points).

One more aside: we studied the window of conciousness related to the mental filtering process in a human factors class once (industrial engineering). It's been far enough back that I've lost the details but the amazing part was that you can measure the window of short-short term awareness that you have before the sensory stimulus that you don't react to gets away from you (on the order of part of a second). After a full second elapses (roughly) if you didn't catch it whatever happened is gone, but there is a short gray area, a processing stage, where your mind can either ignore something or bump it up to a concious experience. We measured it using images flashing on a computer screen and such. There was no key to enlightenment to be had in that class, just some interesting results.

[Ijustwannateach]

I can appreciate the social point that the author makes at the beginning of the article- but on the other hand, since Buddhism came up with the vocabulary and many of the meditative approaches, it's hardly fair to complain now that it's tied to a 'religion' (at least by some definitions). And, on the other hand, perhaps the Buddhists know what they're doing (the '3 breaths before dinner' example he gives doesn't really strike me as a significant enhancer of mindfulness or self-awareness- more like a fast-food philosophy gimmick for Americans (sorry, I am one) to avoid scaring them off the long, real, genuine work that it takes).

[Brucenkhamen]

I must admit, I had different expectations about what this thread would be about when you used the word "neuroscience." I personally don't think there is anything that profound about mindfulness- it is merely a samadhi exercise in concentration. I think mindfulness is, neurologically speaking, an attention exercise. Thus it is impossible to keep up mindfulness when attention has to be distributed in many different places, such as when one is working. The example of the guy in the jetty above is not about mindfulness, it's just remembering the 'big picture', which you don't need minfulness to do. Mindfulness does become profound when spasms of vipassana and prajna occur during its practice. Those latter two terms, again in my opinion, are psychologically speaking the complete LACK of attention on any particular thing. When the mind is conscious but attention becomes non-existent, the mind experiences enlightenment. Having had that experience, attention can arise again but without any notions of selfhood attached. This is my view of the neurology of awakening, I'm not pleased with it so if anyone has a better idea, post it!

I thought that article was a very good overview of how mindfulness works.

What you appear to be getting confused over is usage of the term mindfulness. The word mindfulness is often used in Buddhist circles to describe exersizes or techniques designed to enhance mindfulness and form a habit. Things like noting, watching the breath, observing body sensations these are not mindfulness in and of themselves, they are momentary samadhi on changing objects, these are techniques used to train the mind to be mindful.

Mindfulness is when the mind naturally and spontaneously inclines towards what is reallty being experienced, rather than the story the mind conconcts about what is being experienced or something totally different.

Mindfulness is a translation of the word Sati which I understand means remembering, one naturally remembers to be present rather than tries to make an experience.

[Xangsamhua]

From the article:

Practice, but you don't have to sit down and breathe.

Building mindfulness doesn't mean you have to sit still and watch your breath. You can find a way that suits your lifestyle. My wife and I built a 10 second ritual into the evening meal with my kids, which involves just stopping and noticing three small breaths together before we eat. The added bonus is it makes a great dinner taste even better.

What ever practice you do develop, practice it. The more mindful you become, the better decisions you will make, and the more you will achieve your own goals, rather than other people's goals for you.

I suppose the three breaths practice isn't mindfulness, but it is a technique for re-centering the mind, bringing it back to where you are and what you're doing. Nothing very profound, but helpful, especially when practised throughout the day. (I particularly liked the little signs at the urinals in Plum Village inviting you to do the three breaths while you're standing there. )

In both Thich Nhat Hanh's school of thought and that of Santi Asoke here in Thailand, I gather that sitting meditation, though practised, is not emphasised. Rather, the idea of being mindful while going about the day's business, at the same time being attentive to the significance of these activities in relation to the "big picture", is essential to practice, especially in view of the commitment to "engaged Buddhism" espoused by both TNH and SA.

Incidentally, there were renunciates and meditators aplenty before the Buddha's time, so is it valid to suggest, as the author does, that the idea of "mindfulness" originated with the Buddha's school?

[Brucenkhamen]

Incidentally, there were renunciates and meditators aplenty before the Buddha's time, so is it valid to suggest, as the author does, that the idea of "mindfulness" originated with the Buddha's school?

It's generally accepted that the practice and importance of mindfulness was one of the Buddha's unique teachings, I haven't heard anyone suggest it was around before him.

[Xangsamhua]

Incidentally, there were renunciates and meditators aplenty before the Buddha's time, so is it valid to suggest, as the author does, that the idea of "mindfulness" originated with the Buddha's school?

It's generally accepted that the practice and importance of mindfulness was one of the Buddha's unique teachings, I haven't heard anyone suggest it was around before him.

Interesting. I thought there might have been something in the philosophical culture into which the Buddha was born. After all, Brahmanism predates the Buddha by over a millennium and philosophical/metaphysical speculation, as well as reflective practice was well developed in India by the time of the Buddha. (I'm assuming asceticism was accompanied by reflection and some kind of meditation, but I may be wrong.)

I thought at least there'd be something in Jainism, which goes back to the 9th century BC and has some things in common with Buddhism, but no: a trawl through the internet indicates that the teaching of mindfulness seems to have begun with the Buddha.

Assuming that not much, if anything, has a true "beginning", I wonder if there was some approximation to the Buddha's teaching on mindfulness prior to his time. Some philosopher's stone that the Buddha was able to turn into the gold of Dhamma.

Regardless, it highlights the qualitative leap that took place with the Buddha's enlightenment, that he didn't just build on what had come before, but actually "broke through" with original ways of seeing and doing things.

[sabaijai]

Agreed.

[Svenn]

Incidentally, there were renunciates and meditators aplenty before the Buddha's time, so is it valid to suggest, as the author does, that the idea of "mindfulness" originated with the Buddha's school?

It's generally accepted that the practice and importance of mindfulness was one of the Buddha's unique teachings, I haven't heard anyone suggest it was around before him.

Interesting. I thought there might have been something in the philosophical culture into which the Buddha was born. After all, Brahmanism predates the Buddha by over a millennium and philosophical/metaphysical speculation, as well as reflective practice was well developed in India by the time of the Buddha. (I'm assuming asceticism was accompanied by reflection and some kind of meditation, but I may be wrong.)

I thought at least there'd be something in Jainism, which goes back to the 9th century BC and has some things in common with Buddhism, but no: a trawl through the internet indicates that the teaching of mindfulness seems to have begun with the Buddha.

Assuming that not much, if anything, has a true "beginning", I wonder if there was some approximation to the Buddha's teaching on mindfulness prior to his time. Some philosopher's stone that the Buddha was able to turn into the gold of Dhamma.

Regardless, it highlights the qualitative leap that took place with the Buddha's enlightenment, that he didn't just build on what had come before, but actually "broke through" with original ways of seeing and doing things.

You're thoughts are correct Xangsamhua, it's my belief that mindfulness and certainly Enlightenment were already existent in India long before the time of Buddha. Gautama merely expounded them more simply and clearly, but he certainly wasn't the first to discover the truths of his teaching. Look at the creation hymns of the Rig Veda (ca. 2000 BC), or the Upanishads (ca. 600 BC), they all speak of desire as the origin of mind and suffering, and the union of self and object. Religiously you can believe whatever you want, but historically speaking it is highly probable that the student Gautama already knew something of sambodhi and what it was roughly, and probably received some instruction close to mindfulness techniques.

Taoism (ca 500 BC) as well has uncanny resemblences to Buddha's teachings, and indeed the Chinese Zen masters often equated the two as aspects of the same truth.

My theory is that it was only natural that these massive monsoonal farming civilizations of India and China, with long traditions of giving deference to the shaman or holy man, would at one point engender humans inclined toward meditation, and a few of those would take that practice to the limits and discover something unprecedented. People were more individualistic and distrustful in the fertile crescent and Nile delta, and the nomads of europe and central asia would never have had time to form a meditation culture.

Edited October 30, 2009 by Svenn

[sabaijai]

Meditation of all kinds existed before the Buddha, extending back to Vedic times no doubt. Gautama himself is said to have practiced among sramana (renunciates) inspired by the metaphysics of post-Vedic thought, mostly Upanishadic.

At least from written records, it appears that known methodologies before the Buddha's time all fall into the general category of samatha, ie, concentration/absorption/tranquillity. AFAIK nowhere in Indian philosophy will you see a written description equivalent to mindfulness as described in the Digha Nikaya (Mahāsatipaṭṭhāna Sutta) and the Majjhima Nikaya (Satipaṭṭhāna Sutta ).

Most specifically what appears to be original to Buddhist mindfulness is sampajañña, clear comprehension, especially with regard to observing transitions and physical and mental actions. This differs from samatha practices which are linked to static postures and an eternal atman or soul.

Nothing I've seen in Taoist practice equates at all.

[Svenn]

Meditation of all kinds existed before the Buddha, and exteding back to Vedic times no doubt. Gautama himself is said to have practiced among sramana (renunciates) inspired by the metaphysics of post-Vedic thought, mostly Upanishadic.

At least from written records, it appears that known methodologies before the Buddha's time all fall into the general category of samatha, ie, concentration/absorption/tranquillity. AFAIK nowhere in Indian philosophy will you see a written description equivalent to mindfulness as described in the Digha Nikaya (Mahāsatipaṭṭhāna Sutta) and the Majjhima Nikaya (Satipaṭṭhāna Sutta ).

Most specifically what appears to be original to Buddhist mindfulness is sampajañña, clear comprehension, especially with regard to observing transitions and physical and mental actions. This differs from samatha practices which are linked to static postures and an eternal atman or soul.

Yes, it's certainly true as I said that mindfulness was not clearly explained before the Buddha, but it was certainly hinted at:

Two birds with fair wings, inseparable companions,

have found a refuge in the same sheltering tree.

One incessantly eats from the peepal tree;

the other, not eating, just looks on.

-Rigveda samhita 1.164.20-22 (ca 1700-1100BC)

I don't think it's reasonable to believe that texts written down 300 years after Buddha's death accurately described the mental state of all yogis in pre-Gautama India. The belief that vedic hindus all believed in an eternal atman is a common misconception- the fact is that what many Upanishads describe as the atman is in fact equivalent to the Buddhist anatman. The atman Gautama was condemning was merely the uneducated populace's fallacious interpretation of the vedas. I can cite examples if anyone is interested (this has actually been recognized in academic religious studies for some time, but often comes as a surprise to religious Buddhists that have never critically looked outside their own schools).

What is important to remember here I think is that 'mindfulness' is merely one of many mental manifestations of the more basic mental act of loosening the distinction between subject and object, which Chuang-tzu (ca 400BC) also likely experienced when he was in the butterfly's dream.

Edited October 30, 2009 by Svenn

[sabaijai]

I don't think it's reasonable to believe that texts written down 300 years after Buddha's death accurately described the mental state of all yogis in pre-Gautama India.

That's speculation. In the history of world religion and philosophy all we have to go on is literary evidence. Hermenutic readings of Indian philosophic texts don't support this notion IMO.

The belief that vedic hindus all believed in an eternal atman is a common misconception- the fact is that what many Upanishads describe as the atman is in fact equivalent to the Buddhist anatman.

That is only one interpretation. The actual texts, in the original Sanskrit, clearly support the idea of an eternal soul, whether universal or discrete. A universal soul is still atman, not anatman.

The atman Gautama was condemning was merely the uneducated populace's fallacious interpretation of the vedas. I can cite examples if anyone is interested (this has actually been recognized in academic religious studies for some time, but often comes as a surprise to religious Buddhists that have never critically looked outside their own schools).

Speculation again. If you read the actual texts (I have), this does not come across in my opinion. Yes many people have tried to make this connection between Upanishadic thought and Buddhism, and while there are links they fall short of both the methodology and the teleology found in the Pali canon.

What is important to remember here I think is that 'mindfulness' is merely one of many mental manifestations of the more basic mental act of loosening the distinction between subject and object, which Chuang-tzu (ca 400BC) also likely experienced when he was in the butterfly's dream.

Mindfulness isn't about a 'loosening the distinction between subject and object.' That's samadhi.

[Svenn]

^Very conventional, common platitudes used by commercial Buddhists to dismiss Vedic literature. When you're open-minded enough to take me up on my benevolent offer to post examples of the connections, rather than just dismissively accusing me of "speculation," I'll gladly do so . We both made it clear it's all just our opinions anyway, so maybe we should end it there.

[Brucenkhamen]

Yes, it's certainly true as I said that mindfulness was not clearly explained before the Buddha, but it was certainly hinted at:

Two birds with fair wings, inseparable companions,

have found a refuge in the same sheltering tree.

One incessantly eats from the peepal tree;

the other, not eating, just looks on.

-Rigveda samhita 1.164.20-22 (ca 1700-1100BC)

A poem about one bird eating while another bird looks on is supposed to be evidence of a teaching on mindfulness? You're going to have to do better than that.

Now if the poem had said that the bird that was eating was fully aware of the present moment, aware of greed, aware of taste and texture, while the bird watching was fully aware of the present moment, aware of watching, aware of it's emotional reaction to what he saw, then you'd have a teaching on mindfulness.

Edited October 31, 2009 by Brucenkhamen

[sabaijai]

^Very conventional, common platitudes used by commercial Buddhists to dismiss Vedic literature. When you're open-minded enough to take me up on my benevolent offer to post examples of the connections, rather than just dismissively accusing me of "speculation," I'll gladly do so . We both made it clear it's all just our opinions anyway, so maybe we should end it there.

Post away, Svenn. Your line of argument is one commonly used by Hindus to 'prove' Buddhism is nothing but a branch of Hinduism, and the one example you've posted so far demonstrates just that

Buddhist philosophy rejected the Upanishads, which are still heavily grounded in theism. Examples from the Isa Upanishad;

16. O Pûshan, only seer, Yama (judge), Sûrya (sun), son of Pragâpati, spread thy rays and gather them! The light which is thy fairest form, I see it. I am what He is (viz. the person in the sun).

17. Breath to air, and to the immortal! Then this my body ends in ashes. Om! Mind, remember! Remember thy deeds! Mind, remember! Remember thy deeds!

18. Agni, lead us on to wealth (beatitude) by a good path, thou, O God, who knowest all things!

As for platitude, it seems to me it's more common for people to misinterpret Buddhism as carrying the same essential message as Taoism and/or Vedanta than it is for people to point out the uniqueness of mindfulness. Buddhist studies scholars generally don't follow this line of argument, whether they are practicing Buddhists or not. In other words the argument for Buddhism's sameness is more the platitude, it seems to me.

When sati arises there is no loss of subject-object distinction or any other experience of 'one-ness' (samadhi). When sati arises the multiplicity of paramattha dhamma (absolute realities) are understood, eg the way in which nama (mentality) and rupa (physicality) arise independently.

There are many more aspects of Buddhist thought that are completely unique in terms of what we know from written records to have come before in Indian or Chinese philosophy. For Vedic thought as well as Vedanta, for example, change is an illusion. For Buddhism change is a core reality upon which much of the philosophy is based.

Nibbana is another example. Nibbana is not form, it is not consciousness and it is not related to any mental factor arising together with consciousness. In the Upanishads the summum bonum of the orthopraxy (which includes, for example, yoga and fire sacrifice) is still consciousness.

[rockyysdt]

In the Upanishads the summum bonum of the orthopraxy (which includes, for example, yoga and fire sacrifice) is still consciousness.

Where does yoga sit in terms of Buddhism & the practice of sitting meditation & mindfulness.

I didn't realise yoga meant many different and opposing things.

I always viewed yoga exercises as a way of preparing the body and mind in order to achieve a quicker & deeper level of meditation.

[sabaijai]

In Vedanta yoga generally has the objective of union (the literal meaning of 'yoga') of the atman with the paramatman but within the sphere of Buddhist praxis, yoga is just another activity (whichever branch of yoga is practiced) and as such can be an object of mindfulness or not.

That said, any physical activity that promotes a healthy body and mind no doubt helps one's practice.