Mindfulness and clinical psychology.

Summary

Mindfulness can provide more than just a therapeutic technique; it can establish a state of presence linked to phenomenology. This connection offers a systematic method for understanding the non-conceptual basis of everyday experience, which has significant implications for clinical psychology. The paper discusses how this theoretical perspective, combined with the growing training of clinical psychologists in mindfulness, affects clinical practice, qualitative research, and reflective practice.

Study at a glance

Abstract

Does mindfulness offer more to psychology than a useful therapeutic technique? This paper argues that it can also establish a state of presence which is understood in relation to the practice of phenomenology. Mindfulness is then both linked to a Western intellectual tradition and offers that tradition a systematic method. This is an opening for psychological investigation of the non-conceptual basis of everyday experience. The combination of this theoretical stance with the increasingly widespread practical training of clinical psychologists in mindfulness has broad implications for clinical practice; this is illustrated in relation to the descriptive approach to clinical problems, qualitative research, and reflective practice.