Researchers at Rochester have been studying the effects that a mindful communication course can have on practicing primary care physicians. Their findings, now published, show that doctors who participate in such courses become more present, attentive and focused on the moment. They also become less emotionally exhausted over time, and are able to increasingly empathize with patients. “Mindful communication is one way for practitioners to feel more ‘in the game’ and to find meaning in their practice,” says Dr....

“You could say that I’m Nancy’s friend and that I’ve lived locally for twenty years,” I replied. “Fine,” said the greeter. “We’re glad to have you.” And then she went on to welcome the folks behind me at the door. Nancy and I found seats at one of the twenty or so trestle tables set in rows spanning the length of the hall. “You sit at the end,” Nancy said....

Vacations offer important opportunities to rest, recharge, and put a spring back into our step. Even the word—vacation—seems to shimmer, doesn’t it? It may evoke palm trees and backdrops for perfect selfies. We fantasize about vacations, we save for them, and we hear that they are crucial to mental, physical, and social well-being. And yet, you might plop yourself down in the most glorious sunshine and still find it hard to unhook from the wild and woolly chaos of the un-vacationed brain, essentially vacating your own vacation....

An anecdote about dwindling attention spans, from the article: An eighth-grade teacher tells me that for many years she has had successive classes of students read the same book, Edith Hamilton’s Mythology. Her students have loved it—until five years or so ago. “I started to see kids not so excited—even high-achieving groups could not get engaged with it,” she told me. “They say the reading is too hard; the sentences are too complicated; it takes a long time to read a page....

Maayan Ziv, a Canadian photographer with muscular dystrophy, created AccessNow, a crowdsourcing app that shares accessibility information—from wheelchair-friendly parking and washrooms to Braille signage—for storefronts and businesses worldwide. Ziv says she’s a regular person “who’s interested in going out and doing things in life. And so is every other person who has a disability.” Expectful Available for iOS and Android Expectant and new moms, typically putting self-care last, face high levels of stress....

That’s the gift of compassion. Opening up, and knowing that you have the strength and the space to embrace whatever comes your way. As you go about your days, preparing for the holidays, notice how compassion shows up in your life—where it naturally arises and where it might need some cultivation. 3 Ways to Bring Compassion into Focus Open your heart. To connect more deeply with others, we must face the one person that we’re hardest on: ourselves....

• how satisfied are you with your life nowadays? • how happy did you feel yesterday? • how anxious did you feel yesterday? • to what extent do you feel the things you do in your life are worthwhile? The results show that people are generally happy. 71% of respondents said they were happy yesterday. However, that statistic is almost matched by the number of people who said they were anxious yesterday: 60....

We know bigger isn’t always better. And when it comes to housing, a new breed of homeowner is opting for the freedom of simplicity over the luxury of big houses. The Kasls have lived in their tiny house in Minnesota for three months. They moved into the 207-square-foot home after realizing they couldn’t afford their mortgage and their student loans, even with both parents working full time. “We were going to cut one of our big bills,” says Kim....

Optimistically, the science fiction writer Kim Stanley Robinson wrote in an essay on newyorker.com that “The virus is rewriting our imaginations. What felt impossible has become thinkable… We know we’re entering a new world, a new era. We seem to be learning our way into a new structure of feeling.” The depth of feeling he speaks of seems a lot like mindfulness—the kind that we are all born with access to, not merely the current fad....

We have emotions for a reason. Anger in response to injustice can signal that the situation needs to change; sadness in response to loss can signal that we’d like to keep the people we love in our lives. It’s when we ruminate, or get caught up in our emotions, that they might become maladaptive. That’s when emotion regulation can be helpful and healthy. Previous research has shown that mindfulness can be an effective tool to help regulate our emotions....

Emotions can be a major source of distraction, according to researchers Richard Davidson and Daniel Goleman, who have chronicled what we know thus far about the meditator’s mind in a new book, Altered Traits, Science Reveals How Meditation Changes Your Mind, Brain, and Body. In this whiteboard session for Harvard Business Review, Davidson and Goleman talk about one of the most important discoveries: repeated practice helps us untether from emotional cues that keep us mired in distraction — specifically, rumination....

However, new findings from a research team in the Netherlands suggest that even a small amount of mindfulness meditation can help calm our hyperactive minds and improve our sleep. “With growing pressures at work coupled with smartphone technology, it is really difficult to ‘switch off’ because you continue to receive work-related messages in the evening,” says Ute Hülsheger, an associate professor of work and organizational psychology at Maastricht University and the lead author of the study....

Applied neuroscience—a fancy way of saying “how to use neuroscience knowledge in real life”—helps us understand how to practice the creative process. And it turns out, when you break down the brain processes involved in creative achievement, it becomes clear that mindfulness goes hand in hand with creativity. In fact, there are actually scientific ways to apply mindfulness to the creative process. First, let’s look at the key ingredients for the creative process....

title: “How To Practice Gratitude” ShowToc: true date: “2022-12-30” author: “James Weaver”

Today, Toni talks to us about why it’s so hard to be present to our lives, practices that Toni finds to be personally impactful, why we have to navigate joy, and some personal advice for the rest of us. Elisha: You say that the key to peace and well-being is to be present for your life as it is. Why is that so hard to do? Toni: It’s hard because the present moment is not necessarily a pleasant moment!...

Conversations on compassion: Jon Kabat-Zinn from Emiliana Simon-Thomas on Vimeo. Visit CCARE online.

Tickets are now available at the Zellerbach Hall Ticket Office. Prices range from $15 to $250 (the latter includes admission, the wine and cheese reception with Kabat-Zinn prior to the event, parking, and a signed book). The event takes place at 7:30 p.m. For more information about this event, click here.

How Mindfulness Benefits Children In the four-minute film, kindergarteners talk about coping with emotions and using meditation and breathing techniques. Filmmakers Julie Bayer Salzman and Josh Salzman created “Just Breathe” with their son, classmates, and family members one Saturday afternoon. “The film is entirely unscripted,” says Julie. “What the kids say is based purely on their own neuro-scientific understanding of difficult emotions, and how they cope through breathing and meditation. “They, in turn, are teaching us all....