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This book argues for the central role played by absorption in the functioning of the human mind. The importance of absorption makes itself felt in different ways; the two studies combined in this book concentrate on two of them. The first study, 'The Symbolic Mind', argues that, largely as a result of language acquisition, humans have two levels of cognition, which in normal circumstances are simultaneously active. Absorption is a (or the) means to circumvent some, perhaps all, of the associations that characterize one of these two levels of cognition, resulting in what is sometimes referred to as mysitcal experience, but which is not confined to mysticism and plays a role in various "religious" phenomena, and elsewhere. In the second st...
Publisher description: As David White explains in the Introduction to Tantra in Practice, Tantra is an Asian body of beliefs and practices that seeks to channel the divine energy that grounds the universe, in creative and liberating ways. The subsequent chapters reflect the wide geographical and temporal scope of Tantra by examining thirty-six texts from China, India, Japan, Nepal, and Tibet, ranging from the seventh century to the present day, and representing the full range of Tantric experience--Buddhist, Hindu, Jain, and even Islamic. Each text has been chosen and translated, often for the first time, by an international expert in the field who also provides detailed background material. Students of Asian religions and general reader...
The human voice is one of the principal conveyers of social and affective communication. Yet relatively little is known about the neural circuitry that supports the recognition of different vocally expressed emotions. We conducted an FMRI study to examine the brain responses to vocal expressions of anger and happiness, and to test whether specific brain regions showed preferential engagement in the processing of one emotion over the other. We also tested the extent to which simultaneously presented facial expressions of the same or different emotions would enhance brain responses, and to what degree such responses depend on attention towards the vocal expression. Forty healthy individuals were scanned while listening to vocal expressions...
Mindfulness (Submitted, Website)
This week Bobbi Conner talks with Dr. Alyssa Rheingold about Mindfulness—an approach to improve psychological wellbeing and reduce stress. Dr. Rheingold is a Professor in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences and Associate Director of the Sleep and Anxiety Program at MUSC.
Biofeedback (Submitted, Magazine Article)
Biofeedback is a mind-body technique that helps teach patients how to influence their autonomic nervous systems – the part of the body that controls involuntary physical functions such as blood pressure, heart rate, muscle tension, and brainwave frequency. This is done by attaching an electronic “cue” (usually a “beep,” tone or visual image on a screen) to a measurable physiologic process. A person can thus monitor his or her internal responses and develop a sense of how to move them in positive ways. Biofeedback machines can detect internal bodily functions with sensitivity and precision, and allow involuntary physical functions to be translated in ways that can be understood. The information, or “feedback,” that the “cue” provides is used to monitor these functions and facilitate treatment for a variety of disorders, while moving the patient toward a more balanced internal state. In this article, healthcare concerns, practitioner expectations, and supplementary modalities are also discussed.
After Coal: Welsh and Appalachian Mining Communities (Submitted, Film)
After Coal profiles inspiring individuals who are building a new future in the coalfields of eastern Kentucky and South Wales. Meet ex-miners using theater to rebuild community infrastructure, women transforming a former coal board office into an education hub, and young people striving to stay in their home communities. The stories of coalfield residents who must abandon traditional livelihoods ...
A Place at the Table (Submitted, Film)
With Jeff Bridges, Tom Colicchio, Ken Cook, Mariana Chilton. A documentary that investigates incidents of hunger experienced by millions of Americans, and proposed solutions to the problem.
Episode 146: Yoga for Kids and Their Grown-Ups with Katherine Priore Ghannam (Submitted, Website)
This week, I talk to Katherine Priore Ghannam all about yoga for kids and her innovative program Headstand, which offered yoga to low-income K-12 schools around San Francisco. We cover some of the lessons Katherine learned from starting her passion project from scratch, and why it’s oh-so-beneficial to introduce yoga and mindfulness in schools. Whether you’re interested in sharing yoga with kids or just need some inspiration to keep working toward your goals, this episode is for you. We talk about: * The story of how Headstand got its start (and why she kept at it despite many of the... Continue Reading
Finding Joe (Submitted, Film)
With Chungliang Al Huang, Rebecca Armstrong, Deepak Chopra, Alan Cohen. A truly inspirational film, Finding Joe explores the studies of famed mythologist Joseph Campbell. Take a journey through the human psyche and discover the pattern hidden in every story.
Hope for All: Unsere Nahrung - unsere Hoffnung (Submitted, Film)
With Joachim Kerzel, Marc Bekoff, Monica Bielenstein, Detlef Bierstedt. A life-changing documentary uncovering and revealing the effects of our typical Western diet on our health, the environment and animals. The film has a clear message: By changing our eating habits, we can change the world.
Exploring personal practice and contemplative education in higher ed contexts
Of the Land (Submitted, Film)
Within the last half century, our agriculture and food has changed more than it has changed before in several thousand years. New technologies and scientific ingenuity have given rise to genetically modified organisms (GMO) and other novel foods. Some people have raised concerns about the safety of GMOs in our food supply, given their incredible dominance in the majority of our diet. Traditional,...
Biofeedback (Submitted, Website)
This podcast hosts John G. Arena, Ph.D., President of the Association for Applied PsychoPhysiology and Biofeedback. Dr. Arena is also the Lead Psychologist at the Veterans Hospital in Augusta, Georgia and Professor of Psychiatry and Health Behavior at the Medical College of Georgia. The practice of biofeedback is discussed along with potential health benefits.
Mother: Caring for 7 Billion (Submitted, Film)
With Esraa Bani, Albert Bartlett, Lester Brown, Martha Campbell. Mother, the film, breaks a 40-year taboo by bringing to light an issue that silently fuels our largest environmental, humanitarian and social crises - population growth. Since the 1960s the world population has nearly doubled, adding more than 3 billion people. At the same time, talking about population has become politically incorrect because of the sensitivity of the issues surrounding the ...
Mama Earth: EcoEcon 101 (Submitted, Film)
Another gloom and doom film? No! Quite the contrary, this film revels in innovation, invention and creativity. An inspiring road map of successful ways to achieve sustainability through reinventing old business methods and finding new paths to healthy communities, protecting natural resources and attaining a more profitable bottom line.
The Chikukwa Project (Submitted, Film)
A feel good film out of Africa. See how 7,000 Shona Africans moved from malnutrition to abundance. Using sustainable farming including permaculture methods they have turned their lives around.
How Far Would You Go To Help Others? (Submitted, Website)
Larissa MacFarquhar writes about extreme altruists, people who make great sacrifices to help others. She says most of us aren't prepared or willing to do that — which is why we don't give more.
60 Minutes Mindfulness featuring Jon Kabat Zinn (Submitted, Website)
Denise Schrier Cetta produces & Anderson Cooper reports on what it’s like to try to achieve “mindfulness,” a self-awareness scientists say is very healthy, but rarely achieved in today’s world of digital distractions.Jon Kabat-Zinn, who is Professor of Medicine Emeritus and creator of the Stress Reduction Clinic and the Center for Mindfulness in Medicine, Health Care, and Society at the University of Massachusetts Medical School is interviewed
How Can We Be More Effective Altruists? (Submitted, Website)
Philosopher Peter Singer's work focuses on "effective altruism" — how to do the most good to make the world a better place. He argues effective giving involves balancing empathy with reason.
Toward a Lifestyle Medicine Approach to Illness Anxiety Disorder (Formerly Hypochondriasis) (Submitted, Journal Article)
Lifestyle medicine may be the most effective way of treating illness anxiety disorder (IAD), formerly hypochondriasis. IAD as defined in the DSM-5 can now be diagnosed using positive symptoms, which means it is no longer a diagnosis of exclusion. Tools used in lifestyle medicine including motivational interviewing and mindfulness based stress reduction (MBSR) may be particularly useful in the management of IAD.
Can Altruism Be Learned? (Submitted, Website)
At the prison where Cheryl Steed works, certain inmates are chosen to be caregivers for elderly inmates. The program has made her wonder — can altruism be learned?
Carpool Q&A on Mindfulness (Submitted, Website)
Mindfulness expert Jon Kabat-Zinn answers supporter questions about how to put mindfulness skills into practice and live more wisely and mindfully in response to life's challenges.
A Guided Walking Meditation from Jon Kabat-Zinn (Submitted, Website)
This 9-minute guided meditation from Jon Kabat-Zinn explores embracing mindfulness with every footfall — varying the practice for speed and distance.
Are We Wired To Be Altruistic? (Submitted, Website)
When Abigail Marsh was 19, a complete stranger risked his life to save her from a car accident. Today, she studies what motivates us to help others — and why some of us are "extraordinary" altruists.
Business Altruism (Submitted, Website)
Commentator Paul Raeburn examines an Exxon-Mobil project to drill oil in the Central African country of Chad. Proceeds are set to go to help the people of the struggling nation, and Raeburn says if the plan works, it could start a new trend for business endeavors with developing countries.
Sex, Empathy, Jealousy: How Emotions And Behavior Of Other Primates Mirror Our Own (Submitted, Website)
De Waal writes about primate empathy, rivalry, bonding, sex and murder in his new book, Mama's Last Hug. The title of the book was inspired by a tender interaction between a dying 59-year-old chimp named Mama and de Waal's mentor, Jan van Hooff, who had known Mama for more than 40 years.
Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction: What it Is, How it Helps (Submitted, Website)
What is "Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction"?
Sustainable Development Goals Explained: Good Health and Well-being (Submitted, Audiovisual)
What? (Submitted, Website)
If we want to make the biggest difference, what are some actions we can take that really help, what causes do we have the biggest potential to affect, and what is the link between poverty, malaria, and bednets?
Human development and environmental governance: a reality check (Submitted, Book Chapter)
The impacts of the global political economy of oil and the entrenchment of underdevelopment in Africa and parts of Asia are endangering planetary resilience and making many people's livelihoods and wellbeing more precarious. In some resprects, the world has moved further away from sustainable development, not towards it.
MBSR Online Course (Submitted, Website)
MBSR Online Course
Responding Empathically: A Question of Heart, not a Question of Skin | SpringerLink (Submitted, Website)
How? (Submitted, Website)
If we're trying to do the most good, how should we think about finding out what works, how can experimental methods give us better insights, and how do we face up to evidence that challenges our existing beliefs?
Persuasive Cities for Sustainable Wellbeing | Agnis Stibe | TEDxBeaconStreet (Submitted, Audiovisual)
Need Stress Relief? Try Mindfulness Meditation (Submitted, Website)
This practice is about paying attention in the present moment.
Why? (Submitted, Website)
In our first episode, we explore the reasons we have to care about other people, why being more effective is so important, and why helping others also makes our own lives better.
The Science of Doing Good: My Conversation with William MacAskill (Submitted, Website)
In this inspiring interview, William MacAskill, co-founder of The Centre for Effective Altruism and associate philosophy professor at Oxford University, shares how we can be better at doing good and compounding our efforts to make the world we live in a better place.
Mindfulness for Stress Reduction (Submitted, Website)
Would you like to reduce your stress? Very few people would say no to that offer! But what exactly does it mean?
Food, Inc. (Submitted, Film)
With Michael Pollan, Eric Schlosser, Richard Lobb, Vince Edwards. An unflattering look inside America's corporate controlled food industry.
Joanna Macy — A Wild Love for the World (Submitted, Website)
A philosopher of ecology, Joanna Macy’s path wound from the CIA to Tibetan Buddhism, to translating the poetry of Rainer Maria Rilke. We take that...
Sustainable Nation (Submitted, Film)
In a world where water is everything, Sustainable Nation follows three individuals who are doing their part to bring sustainable water solutions to an increasingly thirsty planet.
What Does it Mean to be Human? (Submitted, Website)
Ecologist Steven Harding discusses the need to break away from self-centered consciousness and awaken the "ecological self."
Being Good and Doing Good: A Conversation with William MacAskill (Submitted, Website)
In this episode of the Making Sense podcast, Sam Harris speaks with Oxford philosopher William MacAskill about effective altruism, moral illusions, existential risk, and other topics.
How Biofeedback Supports Mindfulness in Stress & Anxiety Management (Submitted, Magazine Article)
Mindfulness is an increasingly popular tool for training the mind, and specifically, attention. Research shows it helps reduce stress, anxiety and depression, and improves focus and other aspects of cognitive and executive function.But if you want to realize these benefits for yourself, you have to commit to consistent (roughly daily) practice, for the longer term. The problem is, that's not easy.
You can take a six or eight week course in mindfulness - there are lots around these days - but what happens after the course has finished? In my experience, a lot of people don't persist with a regular mindfulness practice (and some research bears this out), even when they experienced benefits.
This article looks at why not, and how supporting mindfulness with biofeedback might help.
Interactive Biofeedback Sensors May be the Future of Treating Chronic Pain (Submitted, Audiovisual)
For those with chronic pain, the most basic movements can be unbearable. Some patients even develop kinesiophobia – a fear of, or aversion to, movement. Using interactive digital interfaces, the chronic pain sufferer Diane Gromala, professor of interactive arts and technology at Simon Fraser University in Canada, is developing new ways to help alleviate symptoms that could serve as a supplement or alternative to pharmaceuticals. Through a biofeedback system, Gromala’s interfaces track users’ physiological responses to different movements and mental states.
We probably believe morally monstrous things. What should we do about that? (Submitted, Website)
Oxford philosophy Prof Will MacAskill points out that Kant was one of the earliest proponents for democracy - but he also thought that women had no place in civil society...
Tanya Singh on ending the operations bottleneck in effective altruism (Submitted, Website)
Every great project needs people who get lots of stuff done - reliably and fast.
Meditation and Mindfulness for Anxiety (Submitted, Website)
Research findings show significant benefits.
Prof Ng's take on ethics, economics, revolution and making a much happier world.
Mindfulness and Biofeedback (Submitted, Website)
Mindfulness is a meditative or therapeutic technique that engages the individual in his or her awareness of the present moment. It is particularly relevant in terms of their ability to recognize their own present feelings and reactions to events around them. When considering biofeedback and its goal of building awareness of an individual’s own psychophysiological reactions, via breathing, heart rate, muscle tension, temperature and sweating, it is not surprising that mindfulness and biofeedback are two fields that “marry” well together. Mindfulness and biofeedback both offer individuals helpful ways to respond to difficult emotions and physical pain. When asked about the benefits of combining the two methods, Dr. Inna Khazan explained, “Mindfulness enables us to pause long enough to make a choice of response. Skills learned through biofeedback are a large part of that chosen response.”
Singapore puts health at the heart of green buildings (Submitted, Website)
On the final day of this year's International Green Building Conference, Singapore's Building and Construction Authority unveiled new strategies that put occupants at the centre of green building...
Human well-being the ultimate aim of green buildings (Submitted, Website)
Technology – with all its innovations and advancements – is merely a tool to make people's lives better, say panellists at the close of the International Green Building Conference.
Neuro Meditation: The New Way of the West (Submitted, Website)
Neuro Mediation combines traditional meditation techniques with modern technology. With the use of brainwave training equipment as well as other biofeedback modalities individuals can learn to meditate more quickly and easily than in the past.These modern techniques grew out of decades of scientific research and the clinical use of EEG biofeedback (also know as neurofeedback or brainwave training) to train deep states. More recently groundbreaking research through brainmapping, such as Richard Davidson’s work at Keck Labs, University of Wisconsin, has added valuable information that is guiding efforts internationally to better understand and implement these new technologies.
The staff at New Mind Centers has been studying both traditional and modern technologies regarding meditation and other altered states for decades and teaching hundreds how to use these technologies together for transformation and transcendance. We believe that the way westerners will fully come to embrace meditation is through the use of modern technology.
Come join our workshops and lets us teach you how to meditate the new modern way using scientifically based methods and equipment. The New Way of the West is dawning.
Empathy and moral development: Implications for caring and justice. - PsycNET (Submitted, Website)
Neurofeedback (Submitted, Website)
According to Dr. Andrew Hill, neurofeedback is a form of Biofeedback in the brain. It was invented about 50 years ago. Neurofeedback was developed through the work of Dr. Joe Kamiya at the University of Chicago in the 1950s. It was eventually followed by Dr. Barry Sterman’s work at UCLA in the 1960s. Primarily, neurofeedback trains the brain to efficiently function. It is also known as EEG Biofeedback based on the EEG or electroencephalogram. The EEG is a test to monitor the electrical activity of the brain. This podcast also discusses the techniques of neurofeedback; related interventions; and the role of diet and nutrition.
Transform Loss Into Legacy With Mindfulness; Sandra Millers Younger (Submitted, Miscellaneous)
Sandra Millers Younger helps people build personal resilience as a result of a tragedy she experienced. In 2003, she lost her home and nearly her life in a catastrophic California wildfire. Her book about the disaster, “The Fire Outside My Window,” is praised by Amazon reviewers and studied by top-level emergency professionals. After the fire, Sandra discovered personal resilience is both a natural strength and a skill set we can build like a muscle. Combining her own experience with leading academic research, she developed The ComeBACK Formula™—five common-sense practices that transform disaster into opportunity and loss into legacy. Sandra now shares her resilience-boosting message as an international speaker and frequent media guest.
Chloe Brotheridge: Anxiety, Meditation and Being kind to yourself. (Submitted, Website)
Anxiety affects nearly a quarter of the population and as it's a topic that has come up more than once during podcasts with my guests I felt it was time to dig a little deeper into the topic. While it's completely normal to experience anxiety you may not be aware that you have it. Instead you may feel as though you're just highly stressed, a bit hormonal or just going through a rough patch. I've spoken on this podcast before about anxiety with guests including Luke Hersheson and Pixiwoo's Sam and Nic, as well as my own struggles, and in realising this was a much bigger issue was keen to speak to an expert on the subject. Chloe Brotheridge has written the book The Anxiety Solution, which is a really important read whether you suffer with anxiety yourself, or know someone who does. As well as detailing her own experiences with anxiety and panic attacks the book also offers realistic solutions to bringing down your anxiety levels as well as the comfort of reassuring you that you're not alone.In this podcast we talk about Chloe's book, her own experiences with anxiety, how to spot the warning signs that you're not just stressed, how to help someone you know through anxiety and the benefits of meditation and yoga.
Chloe's website www.calmer-you.com provides another resource with links to helpful sites as well as a downloadable meditation and details of her upcoming events, as well as how to get in touch with her.
I hope you find this podcast helpful. Leave comments on the page here, over on twitter @emmaguns or you can email me at thebeautypodcast@gmail.com
How Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy Works (Submitted, Miscellaneous)
Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy (MBCT) is a type of psychotherapy that involves a combination of cognitive therapy, meditation, and mindfulness.
Do Mirror Neurons Give Us Empathy? (Submitted, Website)
Ep 006: Tara Tonini | Exhale to Inhale and Trauma Informed Yoga (Submitted, Website)
Tara Tonini is a yoga teacher, Doula, Reiki Master and Acupuncture student with a passion for women's health. She leads trauma informed teacher trainings for Exhale to Inhale and mentors teachers serving survivors of domestic violence and sexual assault in New York and Los Angeles.
Mindfulness is not a waste of time – it can help treat depression (Submitted, Miscellaneous)
The critics of mindfulness are getting louder. But there are a few good studies pointing to the benefits of mindfulness-based cognitive therapy.
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