If you are a member of ACBS you can read the post at the above link. (If you are not a member of ACBS but you are subscribed to this magazine, you really should consider joining. This won’t be the last time I post something that only ACBS members can view).
Here’s a good snippet of the conversation happening over there:
Words above are not mine, they're from a DEI SIG member
The conversation is still ongoing, and there are a lot of emotions being expressed.
I am of the mind that ACT “present moment contact” is not the same thing as mindfulness, should not be called mindfulness, and shouldn’t be sold as mindfulness either. I don’t use the term mindfulness in any of my trainings, but I am totally guilty of using “Mindfulness” in a cheap and easy way in other contexts. Such as my Trashcan Mindfulness series that I did a while back. Why did I do it? Because the name sticks, and it sells. And I suppose that’s why anybody calls something “mindfulness”. It attracts a certain kind of audience.
I do think the “mindfulness craze” over the past 15 years has ultimately left us with a watered down version of a thing that deserves deeper concentration.
In my writing on the ACT Matrix and ACT more generally I use the term present moment contact, and I conceptualize the work of matrixing to be shifting people from a state of not noticing to a state of noticing, and then. . .
It’s worth checking out the discussion on the DEI SIG listserv, and if you do maybe you can add to the conversation. Or just comment and reply here about your thoughts on mindfulness, appropriation, and ACT.
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What I've been reading: The appropriation of mindfulness ACBS DEI Listserv discussion
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Over the past two weeks a great discussion has broken out on the ACBS Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion SIG listserv regarding how to approach mindfulness, and whether ACT is appropriating mindfulness traditions from other cultures. (Full disclosure: I’m on the Executive Committee of the ACBS DEI SIG, and on the ACBS DEI Committee, which is a different thing but confusingly named, though I’m not writing in that capacity here).
If you are a member of ACBS you can read the post at the above link. (If you are not a member of ACBS but you are subscribed to this magazine, you really should consider joining. This won’t be the last time I post something that only ACBS members can view).
Here’s a good snippet of the conversation happening over there:
The conversation is still ongoing, and there are a lot of emotions being expressed.
I am of the mind that ACT “present moment contact” is not the same thing as mindfulness, should not be called mindfulness, and shouldn’t be sold as mindfulness either. I don’t use the term mindfulness in any of my trainings, but I am totally guilty of using “Mindfulness” in a cheap and easy way in other contexts. Such as my Trashcan Mindfulness series that I did a while back. Why did I do it? Because the name sticks, and it sells. And I suppose that’s why anybody calls something “mindfulness”. It attracts a certain kind of audience.
I do think the “mindfulness craze” over the past 15 years has ultimately left us with a watered down version of a thing that deserves deeper concentration.
In my writing on the ACT Matrix and ACT more generally I use the term present moment contact, and I conceptualize the work of matrixing to be shifting people from a state of not noticing to a state of noticing, and then. . .
It’s worth checking out the discussion on the DEI SIG listserv, and if you do maybe you can add to the conversation. Or just comment and reply here about your thoughts on mindfulness, appropriation, and ACT.