From Mental Health Crisis to Existential Human Suffering: The Role of Self-Transcendence in Contemporary Mindfulness

Our paper addresses the so-called college mental health crisis and the adoption of the strategy of mindfulness-based interventions. We offer a critique of their underlying medical–therapeutic paradigm by engaging the notion of self-transcendence in Viktor Frankl’s Existential Analysis and Buddhism i...

Ausführliche Beschreibung

Gespeichert in:  
Bibliographische Detailangaben
VerfasserInnen: Cueto de Souza, Renata (VerfasserIn) ; Scott, Charles (VerfasserIn)
Medienart: Elektronisch Aufsatz
Sprache:Englisch
Verfügbarkeit prüfen: HBZ Gateway
Journals Online & Print:
Lade...
Fernleihe:Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste
Veröffentlicht: MDPI 2022
In: Religions
Jahr: 2022, Band: 13, Heft: 8
weitere Schlagwörter:B Existential Analysis
B contemporary mindfulness
B Buddhism
B Medicalization
B mental health crisis
B Suffering
B Self-transcendence
Online Zugang: Volltext (kostenfrei)
Volltext (kostenfrei)
Beschreibung
Zusammenfassung:Our paper addresses the so-called college mental health crisis and the adoption of the strategy of mindfulness-based interventions. We offer a critique of their underlying medical–therapeutic paradigm by engaging the notion of self-transcendence in Viktor Frankl’s Existential Analysis and Buddhism in dialogue. We argue that the current mindfulness movement has decontextualized and appropriated mindfulness from its Buddhist foundations in favor of a model that offers objectively verifiable biophysical and mental benefits. Self-transcendence, whether from the perspective of Buddhism or Frankl’s work, offers what we feel is an existentially viable path forward for college students, in lieu of the current paradigm promoted by those advocating use of these mindfulness-based interventions. We conclude by considering Existential and Buddhist notions of self-transcendence in dialogue, suggesting they offer an educational practice worthy of implementation.
ISSN:2077-1444
Enthält:Enthalten in: Religions
Persistent identifiers:DOI: 10.3390/rel13080681