Applied Mindfulness I

Catalog description

This introduction to mindfulness practice and teaching assists students in developing and maintaining a personal mindfulness practice, and defines four essential skill sets of teaching mindfulness programs: stewardship, homiletics, guidance, and inquiry. The course includes experience of the full, eight-week Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) curriculum, with students as the participants. Students reflect on and critique the MBSR course, class by class. In the other six weeks of the course, students work to develop basic competence in two of the four essential skill sets: homiletics, which is the preparation and delivery of informational talks on mindfulness and its applications, and guidance, which is the process of leading a group or individual in formal or informal mindfulness practice. There are focus sessions on mental health awareness and trauma-sensitive practice. As a course-long project, students design a 90-minute mindfulness workshop for a population that fits their professional interests.