The therapeutic role of self-transcendence in moral injury recovery: theory, mechanisms, and clinical implications
Frontiers in Psychiatry June 10, 2026 Wesley H. Fleming
Moral injury involves disruptions in self-referential processing, including rigid negative self-appraisals and impaired meaning-making after morally injurious events. This paper proposes self-transcendence—a metacognitive state of reduced self-focus, expanded awareness, and prosocial meaning—as a mechanism for recovery. Drawing on Mindfulness-to-Meaning Theory, mindfulness practice is theorized to cultivate self-transcendence via decentering and meta-awareness, which broaden attentional scope and modulate habitual self-processing. The integrative review suggests that fostering self-transcendence through mindfulness-based and contemplative practices may reduce rigid self-focus, expand interpretive frameworks of meaning, and support moral identity repair. Implications for designing interventions that cultivate self-transcendence are discussed, along with limitations in measurement and reliable induction of such states.