Contemplative Practices Facilitating Awareness, Compassion, and Healing in Study Abroad: A Reflective and Explorative Study

Summary

Contemplative practices can facilitate self-understanding, reduce stress, enhance connections to host communities and cultures, and promote healing during short-term study abroad trips. The essay uses personal experiences from such a program to examine these benefits and integrates relevant literature on meditation and mindfulness to suggest ways to incorporate these practices into study abroad experiences for individual and collective growth.

Study at a glance

Abstract

This reflective essay focuses on the relationship between contemplative practices and participation in a short-term study abroad trip. The study explores how contemplative practices help facilitate self-understanding, alleviate stress, enhance connection to the host community and culture, and enable healing. We use our experiences participating in a short-term study abroad program as an example for examining the role of contemplative practices in the context of study abroad. We discuss and integrate relevant literature on the topic of meditation, mindfulness, and contemplative inquiry to offer insight into how contemplative practices can be integrated into study abroad in a way that enhances growth, connection, and healing on an individual and collective level.

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