Safeguarding Mindfulness Meditation for Vulnerable College Students

Excerpt

Research into mindfulness has tended to focus mostly on beneficial outcomes rather the processes involved or any difficulties (Compson 2014; Farias and Wilkholm 2015). There is however growing anecdotal evidence that despite these undisputed benefits there can also be harmful effects for some people (Britton and Sydnor 2015; Dobkin et al. 2012). The adult literature has recently begun to report that mindfulness meditation has the potential to re-traumatise people with a history of posttraumatic stress through creating too strong a window of awareness before establishing a secure enough base (Razzaque 2014; Treleavan 2010). …