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CONTEMPLATION GOES MAINSTREAM
By Gail
Bernice Holland it’s an old question: how can we create a better society ? here is a new and surprising response: through contemplation. Admittedly, to many people the art of contemplation, whether it’s in the form of a disciplined meditation or any kind of self-reflection, seems far removed from the “activist” image associated with social change. Yet action without the benefit of insight can sometimes do more harm than good and for this reason—particularly in today’s complex age—the time might be ripe for deeper introspection. Thus, in the early ’90s, the Fetzer Institute and the Nathan Cummings Foundation initiated “The Center for Contemplative Mind in Society.” Individuals involved in contemplative traditions readily agree that such practices can advance personal well-being. But the intention of this project goes one step further. Could society-at-large be the beneficiary if contemplation became mainstream? In other words, the goal of this project is to encourage contemplative practice in secular life so that more and more people can develop the qualities of insight and wisdom that hold the potential to transform society. Developing the inner life to transform the outer world might sound like a grandiose challenge but in the last few years the Center has introduced contemplative practices into key sectors of American life, including the legal profession, educational institutions, the workplace, and they have even offered meditation retreats to members of the media. “This is a bold venture,” says Mirabai Bush, director of The Center for Contemplative Mind. But Bush also emphasizes that contemplation isn’t being viewed as an instantaneous “magic wand” to improve society. “It isn’t an intervention that goes in and ‘fixes’ something and then has immediate results,” she cautions. “What we are trying to do is create the conditions that will encourage the increase of compassion and wisdom, and increase the likelihood of solutions to problems. Our work is based on the belief that the potential for positive change comes from within us. If we give people tools to heighten awareness of their inner states, then they are more apt to come up with new ways of creating a better world.” The fact that this project exists at all is a sign many people are more willing to discuss and explore such topics and techniques. Charles Terry, director of philanthropy at the Rockefeller Family Office, who has been active with The Center for Contemplative Mind in Society from the beginning, observes, “Seven years ago it was quite unusual in many settings to talk openly about contemplation or spirituality. An expression of how this has changed is that at last year’s annual family foundations gathering, attended by 1000 people, Rob Lehman, President of the Fetzer Institute, gave the keynote address on the topic of philanthropy, spirituality, and the inner life. And it was very well received. “We have come to a point in our society,” Terry continues, “where there’s a quest for a deeper meaning in life. We have all this wonderful material stuff (and I’m not being negative about the material) but the question is how do you balance ‘stuff’ with a deeper sense of what life is all about? I think the huge accumulation of wealth, which has been fairly lopsided in terms of its distribution, raises these questions. And I think the speeding up of life—how busy everyone is—calls out for something more contemplative, something quieter, some way we can reflect on what really is going on. It’s a natural and welcome evolution.” In answer to whether the mainstream of society is ready to consider contemplative practice as a path to social change in the broadest sense, Terry replies, “When the Center first started it wasn’t at all clear whether our vision would be practical, but it has emerged to be very concrete and have a lot of very relevant ramifications and implications for society-at-large.” What is intriguing is that different segments of society seem to benefit in different ways from introspection. The following comments reveal some of the positive effects that occurred when contemplative techniques were introduced in institutions as diverse as a university, a corporation, and a prison. These changes are subtle, but nevertheless they are an indication of how this kind of work could ultimately have a broad impact in society. “whenever an individual, much less a culture, is moved to seek spiritual perspective and practice, there’s nothing more important.”—paul gorman The Legal Profession Improved Communication. A key foundation stone of society is the practice of law. Many lawyers practice law by applying confrontational techniques and law students are specifically trained to deliver sharp verbal exchanges. What would happen if these students were also taught how to be silent? Could the quiet space, provided by a meditation practice, deepen their capacity for insight and service to society? With these types of questions in mind, The Center for Contemplative Mind in Society sponsored a series of retreats and meetings at one of the most rigorous environments for teaching law: the Yale Law School. “Lawyers tend to learn to listen within a legal framework,” says Jack Himmelstein, co-director of The Center for Mediation and Law, who is involved in the planning and running of the Yale Law school meditation retreats. “But in meditation you really listen to whatever emerges—listening to oneself, but also listening to the world around you, including clients. The idea is to become more sensitive to people at an interconnected and compassionate level. And the goal of the retreat was to connect with the aspirations of the students who will become professionals, and see if their aspirations can become more accessible to them, more a foundation for them, as they go through their legal education, and as they become practicing lawyers.” He laughingly adds, “The reception was positive—like offering a drink in a scorching desert.” Many students commented after the meditation retreats that they felt they had greater clarity of vision. Said one, “We go through so much of our lives doing things that we don’t think about—just reflexes really. I catch myself doing that all the time. It’s disturbing how much of your life you live without really thinking. Contemplative practice makes an effort to break the stimulus-response patterns that have been ingrained in us since we were born. It involves learning to step back and notice your reactions.” Another student mentioned she had gained an important perspective about practicing law from attorney Steven Schwartz, one of the retreat leaders. “Steve talked about how meditation affects his job, how mindfulness helps him stay calm during disputes with hostile clients and gain distance from everything and stay in focus. I thought that these things are valuable to remember. I really hope that when I get to a position in which I’m going into a courtroom that I can be as calm and grounded as he is.” It wasn’t just the students who benefited from the meditation retreats. Harlon Dalton, a law professor at Yale, acknowledges, “I was quite surprised to find how affected I was by the experience. There is something wonderful about quieting the mind. I discovered the sheer pleasure of falling in love with my breath and it was also fascinating to discover the kinds of thoughts that came across my mind.” Part of the practice, he explains, requires observation of these thoughts, without judgment. Along with developing the ability to listen to ourselves, it is a process, he says, that leads to a better understanding of who we are and what we do. “One insight that came to me while I was meditating was that I had not been as present in the classroom for my students as I would like to be; I had been avoiding the kinds of anxieties that often bedevil students, surrounding myself with a shield. Yet lawyers are often called upon to represent clients who are suffering in one way or another. It’s important to figure out how to be absolutely present and available to one’s clients while at the same time not experiencing the suffering as one’s own. I have always been a better than decent teacher, but I realized I needed to be more fully myself and allow students to be more fully themselves without my feeling burdened. As a result of this insight, I have changed my attitude and behavior, and the past semester was a delight.” Universities New Ways of Learning. Teachers can make a major difference in students’ lives, and their crucial role is recognized by The Center for Contemplative Mind in Society. One of the most significant undertakings of the Center is their Contemplative Practice Fellowship Program, administered by the American Council of Learned Studies. They have awarded 54 fellowships in 50 colleges and universities to study contemplative practices from a variety of perspectives. “Our announcement of the program has generated extraordinary interest on campuses,” observes Charles R. Halpern, president and chief executive officer of the Nathan Cummings Foundation, who helped select the fellows. “We received an impressive variety of proposals for courses involving contemplative practice—the study and application of contemplative practice, its history, its relevance in creative disciplines. For the first time since the age of medieval universities, the value of contemplative practice is again being explored in American universities.”
Frederick Buell, one the fellows, is teaching “Contemplative Practice and American Environmental Writing” at Queens College. “What we do, teach, and learn in the university is a matter of critical thought and reason,” he says. “But there is a whole variety of other ways to pursue knowledge—namely imagination, creativity, and contemplation itself. The word contemplation—detached from practice—signifies a kind of mental process that is very much a part of the life of the mind in a university. Knowledge is wonderful, but even better is the process of generating new knowledge. And the process of discovery is deeply relevant to the contemplative mode.” Buell starts his class with a period of silent meditation. “It helps calm students who have hectic schedules and busy lives. And this period of opening meditation also does a great deal to ease students from diverse backgrounds into a space where they can be together, listen to each other, and see each other more completely as colleagues in a classroom.” But besides helping stressed-out students learn the advantages of quiet reflection, these classes also teach students how to apply this sense of peace and awareness in all aspects of life. For instance, Peter Schneider, who was awarded a fellowship, teaches architecture at the University of Colorado and his class explores different ways that mindful practice can be applied to architectural design. “Normally meditation is associated with being still,” he says, “but we try to teach students to pay attention to everything they are doing. I think making students aware that they can be mindful about anything—whether it’s a science experiment, a building design, or their interactions with other people, is where the contemplative project becomes critical. Otherwise so much of what we do is mindless. We function on the most part by tuning things out rather than paying attention to what is around us. Through habitual responses we are in a sense turning our backs on reality; we are not seeing what’s really out there.” When Schneider talks about how to select a window in a home or office building, his comments could be a metaphor for life. “Most people will live their lives picking windows and doors and other things out of a catalog without taking the time to carefully consider their selection. But if you are paying attention you have to begin to ask questions about the window. Am I trying to use the window to make light in this room? Am I trying to let the air in through here, or the view? All of a sudden a window becomes rich in possibilities as opposed to just something you pick out of a catalog and stick into the wall.” Relating mindfulness to the culture as a whole, Schneider comments, “As a society it would be better to see things for what they are—whether it’s windows, people or events. More awareness would allow us to be more humane and compassionate.” Workplace Finding Meaning and Purpose. Could the introduction of the contemplative mode to any type of business be advantageous? Mirabai Bush believes that today’s frenetic lifestyle, especially in the workplace, desperately needs the balance of reflection—a time when employees are given the chance to practice techniques that not only reduce their stress but also clear their heads enough to make decisions more thoughtfully, more carefully. The Center for Contemplative Mind in Society approached the business world through the Monsanto Corporation. Why did they choose Monsanto? Bush responds, “Monsanto is at the heart of a major international controversy over genetically modified food, and some people have criticized us for working with them. On the contrary, I think it is exactly the reason to be there. They are being challenged to rethink their position on the future of agriculture, in which they will play a very significant role. Who could benefit more from a practice that awakens wisdom and compassion?” Monsanto held their first meditation retreat with top-level executives in 1996, and have continued to provide both executives and employees with opportunities to explore the advantages of contemplation, on a completely voluntary level. Employees say that these practices can increase concentration and creativity in the business setting. April Wilson, a project coordinator at Monsanto, states, “Contemplation helps clear all the chatter that goes on constantly in your head, and you begin to find out what’s real for you in your life. What makes this program so great is that it can affect long-term evolution in individuals, and therefore in the organization. It has provided more purpose and meaning to what I am doing at work.” “I agree with April,” adds Bill Bettis, a research biologist at Monsanto, “that when you uncover your purpose and your passion and can align your work with this passion it is tremendously empowering. “How effective you are as an organization,” he continues, “depends upon how effective you are in relationships. The thing about mindfulness is it directly starts opening up those areas about yourself that you might not be aware of, and this contributes to how you are acting in any relationship at work or at home. I have seen an enormous shift in my own personal development—how I relate to people, how I communicate with people. More importantly, I don’t see it as some place I ‘got’ to, but an as on-going process.” Clearly, the reactions of Wilson and Bettis are personal, and do not directly affect the controversy surrounding the work of this organization. But Bush believes that social change for the common good has to start by cultivating awareness within each individual. Any insights gained on a personal level, she says, might ultimately influence professional decisions on a broader scale. The Media A New Perspective of ‘News.’ TV and newspapers directly influence the way we see the world. Recognizing this, the Center for Contemplative Mind in Society invited members of the mainstream media—including The New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and the major networks—to attend a meditation retreat and reflect on their craft. Susan Mills, a director of program development for the McNeil/Lehrer NewsHour television program was one of the individuals who participated in this retreat. “I have never done anything like meditation before so I found it very interesting. When you are in this kind of business it’s always rush-rush-rush-rush. Right now, as I’m talking, I’m trying to do three or four different things at the same time. So it’s nice to be able to realize that you can stop, you can contemplate, and that you need this quiet time to expand yourself and know yourself better.” But can a heightened self-awareness enhance the shape and content of the stories delivered by the media? Many people complain that the major headlines of today tend to dwell on tragedies or potential crises, or anything negative. Daniel Goleman, a psychologist who reports on behavioral and brain sciences for The New York Times, suggests, “A contemplative journalism might reflect on the conditions that underlie those incidents, teasing out what Gregory Bateson called ‘the pattern than connects’ the event to a larger web of meaning. “Consider an investigative mode,” he continues, “that might be called ‘the position of no position’: a completely open, spacious inquiry into a state of affairs, free of prior commitment to any point of view—a contemplative mind. Such a deeply reflective look at events could produce a very different version of ‘news.’ The contemplative journalist might notice key relationships and changes that are typically beneath our everyday threshold for perception. One example of this mode is Rachel Carson’s 1962 New Yorker articles which became The Silent Spring; by observing closely the changes in a single pond, she sounded a warning on global environmental calamities.” Goleman offers this challenge: “I propose that a contemplative mode could move news closer to truth.” Prisons Behavioral Changes. To bring out the best in us, it may help to look into the worst aspects of human nature. Therefore a vital part of the Center’s program is with prisoners. Joan Halifax is the founder and director of the Upaya Prison Project in New Mexico, and for the past three years she and other volunteers have been encouraging inmates to pursue some form of contemplation. “We’re hoping to create the kind of behavioral changes in individuals that make coming back to prison extremely undesirable,” says Halifax. “Recidivism is such a big problem. Many of us realize that it’s important to humanize the prison system—to really stress rehabilitation and help people move off the punitive model.” Halifax is a well-known Buddhist teacher but she stresses that they don’t proselytize Buddhism. “We work with prisoners very kindly and respectfully. We try to help them develop mental stability and insights, and we also explore values and the relationship of value to behavior.” One tool is a writing meditation, where the prisoners are encouraged to write about their anger and contemplate the behavioral changes that result from those feelings. Halifax also points out, “The actual practice of meditation is in some way parallel to what happens in the prison system. Often there’s solitude, silence, and simplicity in prison anyway. But all of these things are negatively valued. We’re trying to shift the valuation of those elements for these prisoners, and I think this has had a tremendous effect on their morale.” When people hear about this prison program they want to know if these tools and techniques can realistically change individuals. The ideal person to answer this question is Bo Lozoff, who has been encouraging the practice of contemplation in prisons since 1973, at a time when the concept of meditation for inmates was totally foreign. (Lozoff was awarded the IONS Temple Award for Creative Altruism in 1994.) He and Sita Lozoff founded the Human Kindness Foundation, and one of their assistants is a man who spent 23 years in prison. “We were in touch with him while he was in prison for about 15 years,” reveals Bo Lozoff. “He started practicing meditation in prison and became very serious about it. He’s the most well adjusted prisoner I have ever seen come out of a really bad prison system. He has now been out for a year and a half and is one of the most valuable people at our foundation.” The community at Kindness House, he explains, specifically invites ex-offenders to live and work with them in an ashram setting, providing support and friendship. “There are 40,000 people a month being released from prison and most of them are going back to rotten conditions, with $50 in their pocket, no job, no home, no resources. You and I would hardly be able to make it under those conditions.” Although contemplation can be transformative, says Lozoff, it is only part of the picture. “The honest truth is that a meditation course in prison is not enough. There have to be resources on the outside which can steer people in the right direction.” “what we are trying to do is create the conditions that will encourage the increase of compassion and wisdom, and increase the likelihood of solutions to problems.” —mirabai bush The Hope As Mirabai Bush stated at the beginning of this article, contemplation isn’t a “magic wand” that will resolve all problems in our society. As The Center for Contemplative Mind in Society continues to offer diverse meditation opportunities in secular settings many questions still remain. One of the main concerns is whether contemplative practice can retain its integrity and power when taught outside traditional contexts. Paul Gorman, executive director of the National Religious Partnership for the Environment, who has been involved in The Contemplative Mind in Society project from its beginning, reflects, “What the Center is trying to do is help identify ways in which these practices can be integrated into the various fields, whether education, the workplace, or the like. It’s commendable, and it’s very important to have more conscious lawyers, doctors, teachers, and executives. But the great risk is that it will be contemplation in the service of the professions, rather than the professions in the service of the spirit. I’ll put it another way. In the effort to facilitate integration of contemplation into the American professions and culture there is a danger of seriously downplaying the moral content of the teachings. Contemplative traditions don’t exist in isolation of moral precepts,” he stresses. “This relates to whether you seriously invite executives to look at what they’re doing to the planet, law students to look at the political system they have chosen to enlist in, and journalists to look at the definition of news as it leans more and more toward entertainment. In its intention to mainstream and integrate contemplative practice into the professions of daily life we run the risk of sacrificing the ultimate goal of liberation in our effort to be utilitarian.” On the other hand, Gorman’s honesty about the pitfalls of trying to mainstream contemplation and the willingness of its leaders to keep questioning how, why, and what they’re doing could serve to keep this project on a successful course. “The individuals who are involved in this project,” says Gorman, “are experienced, wise, compassionate practitioners from a variety of disciplines who are coming from long histories of service and honorable lives that have embodied values; they have no interest whatsoever in celebrity or profiteering from the new American spiritual marketplace. “There is obviously growing interest in inner life in this culture right now in all its forms,” adds Gorman. “Whenever an individual, much less a culture, is moved to seek spiritual perspective and practice, there’s nothing more important. We have to ask ourselves: How do these techniques and practices lead to more appropriate, authentic, practical, effective virtues? How does one love more openly? How does one forgive more completely? How does one understand the truth more deeply? These are the perennial questions. Moreover, how do we instruct, receive, guide, counsel, mentor, and sustain any form of contemplative practice? These questions have enormous significance particularly in our culture at this time.” And there is no better time to seek these answers. In today’s externally-oriented culture, a great deal can be gained on a personal and social level from any program that can help develop the wisdom within us. That is the hope of this project. For information contact The Center for Contemplative Mind in Society, 38 Village Hill Road, Williamsburg, Massachusetts 01096; 413-268-3003; email cmind@crocker.com Gail Bernice Holland is an associate editor of IONS Review, and former editor of Connections magazine. She is the author of A Call for Connection: Solutions for Creating a Whole New Culture (New World Library, 1998).
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