Internationally known scientist, writer, and meditation teacher, Professor of Medicine Emeritus and founding director of the Stress Reduction Clinic and the Center for Mindfulness in Medicine, Health Care, and Society at the University of Massachusetts Medical School, discussed “Coming to Our Senses: Living Life As If It Really Mattered".

Jon Kabat-Zinn, Ph.D. is internationally known for his work as a scientist, writer, and meditation teacher engaged in bringing mindfulness into the mainstream of medicine and society.

Professor of Medicine emeritus, and founding director of the Stress Reduction Clinic and the Center for Mindfulness in Medicine, Health Care, and Society at the University of Massachusetts Medical School, he is the founder of MBSR (mindfulness-based stress reduction), a method that combines mindfulness meditation and hatha yoga. This work has been widely studied and applied with groups ranging from chronic medical patients suffering from stress, pain, and illness, to lawyers, business people, prison inmates and staff, school children, and Olympic and NBA athletes. Professor Kabat-Zinn is the author of Full Catastrophe Living: Using the Wisdom of Your Body and Mind to Face Stress, Pain, and Illness and Wherever You Go, There You Are: Mindfulness Meditation in Everyday Life.

In this talk, Jon Kabat-Zinn will describe mindfulness-based practices for restoring perspective and for waking up to our lives, beginning with our senses. Waking up to our senses at any age, and in any condition, we have the potential to heal and to wake up to the actuality of the world in which we live. This way of being allows us to inhabit both body and world with greater ease and freedom, even in the face of pain and fear, of numbness and feeling overwhelmed. As a result, we can contribute to the healing of mind and body with tenderness, compassion, and integrity in ways that matter profoundly.

Directions to HPNP Auditorium: HPNP Auditorium (Health Professions Nursing & Pharmacy Building, room 1404) is located between Center Drive and Newell Drive on the north side of the Health Science Center. Enter the HPNP through the door under the covered walkway and go up the curving (unfinished) stairs; an elevator is just around the corner left of that door.

Further information is available from Anne Newman by e-mail at anewman@religion.ufl.edu or Shaya Isenberg by e-mail at sri@religion.ufl.edu and either of them can be reached by telephone at 352-392-1625.