Dr Edo Shonin
Dr Edo Shonin is research director of the Awake to Wisdom Centre for Meditation and Mindfulness Research, and a chartered psychologist for the same. He sits on the editorial board for the academic journal Mindfulness and the International Journal of Mental Health and Addiction. Edo is internationally recognised as a leading authority in mindfulness practice and research and has over 100 academic publications relating to the scientific study of meditation and Buddhist practice. He is the author of ‘The Mindful Warrior: The Path to Wellbeing, Wisdom and Awareness’ and primary editor of academic volumes on ‘The Buddhist Foundations of Mindfulness’ and ‘Mindfulness and Buddhist-derived Approaches in Mental Health and Addiction’. He has been a Buddhist monk for thirty years and is spiritual director of the international Mahayana Bodhayati School of Buddhism. He has also received the higher ordination in the Theravada Buddhist tradition. Edo regularly receives invitations to give keynote speeches, lectures, retreats and workshops at a range of academic and non-academic venues all over the world. He also co-authors the Weblog on Mindfulness, Meditation & Psychological Well-being: Research and Practice: https://edoshonin.com/
less
InterestsView All (27)
Uploads
Papers by Dr Edo Shonin
The purpose of this program is to design, implement, and evaluate MBAT as an approach to meditation and mindfulness that can be adapted to meet the needs of various populations. In the current phase, MBAT was developed in a general format for individuals from the general population who want to increase their levels of wellbeing. A controlled comparison trial has been run to evaluate this version of MBAT: Participants of the study undertook an 8-week MBAT program and comparisons were made with a control group on perceived psychological wellbeing (depression, anxiety, and anger management) and stress. In a second phase (not included in this presentation) MBAT will be adapted to populations with special needs, e.g., elderly people, trauma victims, and forensic inmates.
Findings from the trial will be reported and implications for further development of MBAT will be discussed.
As Buddhist teachers, we have practiced mindfulness for most of our adult lives. However, about four years ago, we decided to commence a programme of empirical research with the objective of helping to improve scientific understanding of mindfulness and related contemplative techniques. The decision to do this was influenced by our growing concern that the rate at which mindfulness is being assimilated by academia (and Western society more generally) means that some researchers, scholars, and Buddhist teachers have overlooked the need to (i) consolidate and replicate research findings, (ii) clarify whether mindfulness (i.e., as it is used in contemporary mindfulness-based interventions) continues to bear any resemblance to the Buddhist model of mindfulness, (iii) investigate potential harmful effects of mindfulness, (iv) control for a ‘popularity effect’ in mindfulness intervention studies, (v) formulate comprehensive training and supervision curricula – that are informed by the traditional meditation literature – for secular mindfulness instructors, and (vi) investigate the Buddhist position that mindfulness has limited utility when isolated from the supporting meditative and spiritual techniques that would traditionally accompany it.
It’s probably fair to say that most people experience different degrees of loneliness at some point in their lives. This could be a short-lived sensation of loneliness that lasts for only a few minutes whilst waiting all alone at an old and run-down train station, or it could be a more chronic and deep-seated form of loneliness that lasts for many years following a relationship breakup or the death of a loved one. Although these two different types of loneliness affect people in very different ways, from the Buddhist perspective, the underlying causes are actually not too dissimilar.
A world-honoured one whose many names include Shakyamuni Buddha, from the limitless expanse of the deathless realm, with divine tongue (using words beyond sound), did spontaneously converse with the world-honoured one whose many names include Jesus Christ. The two beings of unsurpassable omniscience, simultaneously decided to take human form and walk again in the realm known as earth.
Not forgetting about death means to remember that all phenomena are impermanent. All things are in a constant state of flux. Moment by moment all things change. We were born, we live, and we will die. Absolutely nothing escapes the cycle of impermanence.