Understanding Selfhood to Elucidate the Phenomenology of Mindfulness

Higgins, Joe (2022) Understanding Selfhood to Elucidate the Phenomenology of Mindfulness. Philosophia, 50 (2). pp. 551-566. ISSN 0048-3893

Preview	Text (Final published version) Higgins2022_Article_UnderstandingSelfhoodToElucida.pdf - Published Version Available under License Creative Commons Attribution 4.0. Download (654kB) | Preview
Preview	Text (Advance online version) Higgins2022_Article_UnderstandingSelfhoodToElucida.pdf - Published Version Available under License Creative Commons Attribution 4.0. Download (637kB) | Preview
	Text PHIA-D-21-00475_R1.pdf - Accepted Version Restricted to Repository staff only until 26 February 2023. Download (680kB) | Request a copy

Abstract

The health benefits of practising mindfulness are well documented, yet the phenomenological mechanisms of such practice remain under-theorised from both ontogenetic and social perspectives. By leveraging an enactive perspective on selfhood, these lacunae can be addressed: firstly, it is argued that proper understanding of mindfulness – and the health benefits that mindfulness practices seek – relies on recognising the socio-embodied nature of the self; consequently, occasions in which the therapeutic need for mindfulness are most pressing will be shown to be inextricably tied to socio-embodied fluctuations across different stages of life. What emerges is a phenomenological understanding of mindfulness as allowing one to dwell in the sensuous density of the present and, through this, remain connected to the social world of open possibilities.

Actions (login required)

View Item

Downloads