Project Write-up as a Pdf. without document links – HERE
Contents – Click to Jump to
ACTION OUTLINE & ALL DOCUMENT LINKS
RESPONSES TO PARTICIPANT FEEDBACK
Research Question
Can meditation and drawing be used as a social Justice tool in arts education to improve mood, focus and creativity?
How might I bring mindfulness techniques into the practices of myself and other lecturers in Undergraduate Fashion at UAL?
CONTEXT
As a qualified mindfulness practitioner with Zenways and a lecturer in Fashion Design and Development at UAL. I am looking at ways to bring my experiences with meditation into my pedagogy and to see where it might be applied to my colleagues teaching practices too. My previous intervention was a ‘body scan’ meditation conducted with my colleagues before a staff meeting. This active research will be similar but different in that this will be a drawing and mindfulness exercise rather than a meditation alone. The drawing element links mindfulness more closely to creative practice. In that it seeks to enable a focused ‘doing’ flow state where action is possible, rather than a simply ‘being’ meditative one. ‘The important thing is to enjoy the activity for its own sake, and to know that what matters is not the result, but the control one is acquiring over one’s attention.’ (Csikszentmihalyi M. (1997)
In this writing I will speak from personal experience a great deal, For info on my background in mindfulness and positionality in relation to Race, religion and disability it is best to look at the previous posts, of particular relevance may be the Faith blog here: LINK
and the Intervention report of the ‘body scan’ meditation iteration
The premise of this work is that the effect of discrimination, marginalisation and feeling othered, results in poor mental health and low mood. ‘Increased experiences of ableist microaggressions are negatively correlated with positive mental health outcomes, and, the visibility of disabilities/impairments are correlated with experiencing ableist microaggressions,’ (Kattari, 2020). I teach across first and second year students on the BA Fashion Design Development course, And although I don’t have permission to share extracts from students reflective statements, I know from frequent conversations with my colleagues and the statements, how daunting it can be coming to study at LCF. Many mention anxiety, and often initially feeling ‘out of place’ here in many different ways. Our FDD team experience correlates with the 2022 findings of confidential mental health survey conducted by charity Student Minds which states that ‘57% of students said they had a current mental health issue’. (Lewis, Stiebahl, House of Commons, 2024). Many students also mention that they struggle with procrastination and meeting deadlines. The ability to get into the flow state required to make creative work is vital to being able to overcome states of being that include freeze states and self-criticism.
Also in respect of marginalisation and being othered, ‘Experience of racism has been linked to increased likelihood of developing depression; hallucinations and delusions; and if physical assault is involved, post-traumatic stress’. (Bhui, 2018) There can also of course occur a compounding of the different effects of being discriminated against at several intersectionality’s including gender, race and disability. Not forgetting of course that poor mental health in itself (as much as people now often profess otherwise) still has a great deal of stigma. And even if someone is not currently experiencing discrimination or being stigmatised by others, the fear of this (often based on very real past experiences) has an effect too. I have therefore blended mediation, mindfulness and drawing. As ‘despite the well-documented effects of anger, fear, and anxiety on the ability to reason, many programs continue to ignore the need to engage the safety system of the brain before trying to promote new ways of thinking.’ (Van der Kolk, 2014) So my action aims to have a positive impact on the compounding nature of these kinds of emotions and supposes that things can improve through taking simple pressure-less (non-graded) mindful drawing action.
My work as participatory action research sees participants / meditators as equal to (or indeed more important than) the researcher and as having a positive inner world where outside influences and preconceived ideas should effectively be removed rather than added to. Meditation in my view contributes to a process of unlearning what is not needed. However for it to function in this way there is an initial hurdle of understanding what the practice is, knowing how to practice and ideally finding ways to bring this into our own lives. This action hopes to address some of the initial hurdles only. To introduce a possible way into a ‘flow’ state which is helpful for getting things done and removing distractions. As well as to assess the opinions of my colleagues on how and whether these small quick actions and exercises could go beyond my own personal practice (I have taught different variations of these exercises for years in many scenarios and institutions) and into their practices on FDD at LCF however. ‘There is little research about how mindfulness can be used to support creativity in education settings.’ P151 (Henriksen et al, 2022)
RESULTS SUMMARY
The results from my questionnaire would suggest that drawing is currently the best way to integrate mindfulness into a fashion design practice at LCF Undergraduate level. When asked if any, which of the sections they would feel comfortable after teaching themselves after the session, the two mindful drawing elements proved the most popular and participants recognised that for them to teach meditation itself they would need more training and development. The mindfulness and drawing exercises were found to be effective in improving mood in four out of five cases with fatigue not mentioned at all in the ‘after’ emotion wheel, this largely seemed to have moved quadrants over towards a feeling of relaxation, calm and focus. On the creativity task they did not produce a higher quantity of responses after the task but one element was significant as participants produced slightly more creative responses after (average = 0.47) the meditation intervention than before (average = 0.42) the intervention, t(4) = -4.42, p = .012.
PRESENTATION: Project Summary – Given on 29th Jan LINK
ACTION OUTLINE & ALL DOCUMENT LINKS
The action itself comprised of the following elements, these and the questionnaires altogether took place in around 45 minutes, Quite a short time to cover everything but my colleagues had several other meetings to attend that day also with only a very short lunchbreak and I knew people would start to enter our room for the next event 10 or 15 minutes beforehand. An ideal timeframe would have been around 60-75 minutes I think, with more time for the relaxing elements of the meditation/mindfulness, questions and discussion.
The action components highlighted below are the activities that are included in the Mindful Drawing script and everything not highlighted are measuring conditions.
Planning for the action is here – Ethical Action Plan Form final Draft: – LINK
Participant-facing document links
Full Questionnaire, Emotions, Creative task & Consent form (blank) –LINK
Talk & Slides on Mindfulness for participants– LINK
Mindful Drawing Script used for bold sections– LINK This is the first draft of my script that will be used in the post PgCert study in Brooklyn (outlined in Ethical Action Plan)
- Emotion Wheel 1 – Before
- Creativity task 1- Before Brick
- Questionnaire
- Talk & Slides shown at the beginning on mindfulness & meditation
- Mindful movements 3 mins
- Breathing guidance 3 mins
- Drawing with the breath (circles) 3mins
- Timed drawing with mindful instructions – 9mins
- Emotion Wheel 2 – After
- Creativity task 2 –After Paperclip
- Questionnaire (where participants could give feedback) – After
- Debrief (verbal) & Consent form
Results document links
Questionnaire results all – LINK
Emotions Drawing & Creative task results – LINK
Acting on participant feedback, from the previous, ‘body scan’ intervention, the ‘talk’ & slides shown at the beginning introduce context, information and some mindfulness principles. I gathered data on mood before and after, and used a task to gauge ‘creativity’ in the form of divergent thinking, and also asked my participants a few questions before and after to look at the effect this mindful drawing exercise had on this occasion in my institution.
PROJECT FINDINGS
Findings: Emotion Wheel – Mood & Focus
Fig 1 & 2. Changes in Affect With and without participant numbers, Smith & Hamshare (2024)
In this small scale action, I first explained that ‘activation’ on the form could mean how energetic you might feel. The ‘before’ emotion wheel shows that participants arrived in a largely positive headspace. When filling the form out a participant asked if they could record their emotion as a line rather than an X on the form. I just said ‘yes of course, why not’, and several participants drew multiple factors and lines on the wheel rather than just an X in one position. I think this was good as it reveals some inadequacy of trying to quantify the human experience as any one single thing at a time. This might make further quantitative analysis of this at a larger scale more complex though.
Three participants reported an element of feeling fatigued and only one reported an element of stress. These were all alongside other emotions such as feeling alert, happy and excited. The other two participants began feeling calm with one more towards the pleasant activation than the other. The mindfulness and drawing exercises were found to be effective in improving mood in four out of five cases with fatigue not mentioned at all in the ‘after’ emotion wheel, this largely seemed to have moved quadrants over towards a feeling of relaxation, calm and focus. So I feel the action was successful and shows that this intervention works well as a tool to improve mood and focus.
Participant 2 though had moved from being ‘happy but tired’ over to the more activated quadrant, which is also slightly closer to being stressed. Possible reasons for this could include the nature of the creativity task – more on this in the methods section.
Findings: Creativity Task – Results interpreted by Kalie Smith
- There was no statistical difference in the quantity of responses generated before (average = 6.6) and after (average = 7.6) the meditation intervention, t(4) = 1.41, p = .230.
- There was no difference in participants’ most creative responses before (average rating = 0.74) and after (average rating = 0.75) the meditation intervention, t(4) = -0.28, p = .793.
^ This was done by looking at only the single highest scored response per participant.
- Participants produced more creative responses after (average = 0.47) the meditation intervention than before (average = 0.42) the intervention, t(4) = -4.42, p = .012.
^ This was done by looking at the average creativity scores of all responses per participant.
Findings: Questionnaire
3 out of the 5 educators said that yes this type of Drawing or meditation would be helpful for their students. One said they did not know, and one said that it depends on the context.
One person who said yes also wrote (most) in brackets, I think it is important to keep an awareness that this is not for everyone all the time. And as participant 2 said, it could be ‘good as a sign up’
Four out of five said that they would feel confident teaching some parts of what they experienced with the two drawing elements mostly identified, Although only one participant said they would be comfortable using the ‘talk’ slides at the beginning – One is a low number for this given that as a team we frequently teach each-others material as we often have 6 simultaneous groups. This indicates that there are further barriers to understanding and feeling confident with the concepts of mindfulness that would need to be overcome for participants to feel good about teaching this.
Fig 3. Excerpt from questionnaire results Hamshare (2024) Numbered participants correspond to feedback below
RESPONSES TO PARTICIPANT FEEDBACK
Participant 1 – GREAT this was the intended outcome.
Participant 2. – Yes I too think that this type of activity with the mindfulness elements should always be optional, Although I have integrated the pure drawing techniques into a year 1 drawing and garment investigation class.
Participant 3 – I think that this comment relates to the comparison between this mindful drawing exercise and the body scan meditation I ran for the IP unit as this participant took part in both (like participant 2 and 4 also) (LINK)
The difference between the two sessions is that in this activity we are doing as opposed to just being & listening. It is significant that this person as a year 1 leader, thought that the doing of a drawing activity could make mindfulness more accessible than, as I would call it, a ‘pure’ meditation involving being still and listening.
Participant 4. – I think the embedding is possible in several ways such as:
- Attitude: The way of being mindful encourages curiosity and an open mind. This state in my opinion helps in the creation of work, and generation of ideas. It is what I tried to get across in the PowerPoint at the beginning. It is necessary to remove some self – criticism to overcome the fear of a blank page. I think this is the key to taking my intervention beyond a ‘sign up’ experience and into the curriculum as having an open mind is required for getting things done. This in places could link to documents we use in our teaching for example the Creative Attributes Framework. – LINK (University of the Arts London, n.d.) Or I think further staff training would be beneficial, if staff are relaxed as opposed to fatigued for example, their classes will run better and this will have an impact on student experience.
- As an independent study skill: I think a flow state is very important for our students to be able to access for themselves in order to create work. As is knowing when to step out of the flow state to refine, analyse and edit works created. An understanding of the self and the state of being is important in achieving this.
- Understanding the ‘interconnectedness’ : This is a key idea when teaching sustainability, supply chains and future thinking, all materials are intrinsically linked to the earth and will return to the earth just as we will. This can apply to teaching design circularity in supply chains. As well as considering the impact of one individual or company on the people and planet around them.
- Into drawing and design classes. Simple prompts at the beginning of design classes such starting with a blind drawing or drawing the circles with the breath could enable students to move from the fatigued state of inaction to a relaxed state of action. These could work well as ice-breakers.
Participant 5 – Yes I too think this activity is a great pre-cursor to starting design work. Starting can often be the hardest part of a design project, and the mere act of getting a student in the right physical situation (sitting with pen, paper and a quiet space) coupled with the instruction to start drawing anything or something of no consequence e.g. with their eyes closed/ blind, I believe can enable students to step away from all the distractions available to them (phones, people etc) to overcome creative block.
Findings: Drawing
The power of drawing as a tool for thinking in creative work is not to be underestimated. Artist and Educator Elina Lazareva explains, ‘I start by asking participants to sketch on paper, and in that moment they become connected, something happens: a student recently said, “literally while you draw, you get more ideas.” The core principle is that you are doing something; there is action, which is generative’ (2022)
In order to get there though, first you need to step away from the attention black holes of phones and laptops and put yourself in the right frame of mind to draw. That is where these short drawing exercises can help. For me certainly, creativity also thrives where there is less possibility for decision paralysis. For example If I work in black and white, I don’t need to constantly choose and mix colours. I can focus on form, material, shape, function, texture. And make decisions only on those things. As Lazavera (2022) explains the power of drawing is in allowing yourself to let go of what you think you want and just “let it happen”.
Henrickson, Heyward and Gruber (2021) were able to conduct mindfulness sessions as part of a semester and deliver weekly sessions for the same group of students who were able to experience the longer term benefits of meditation. One student said, ‘I am not creative when I am stressed, depressed, bitter, or angry. We all will endure those feelings once in a while, but I’ve learned how to let go of feelings that hold me back from reaching my creative potential’. They also described how mindfulness can address the ‘voice of Judgement.
In my work I must be mindful of the ways in which structural inequalities including socio-economic status, parental status and neurodiversity – affect all social relationships, including those that are formed in the course of research. Where relevant, attention should be paid to the ways in which such inequalities specifically affect vulnerable individuals and their relationships. Sensitivity and attentiveness towards such structural issues are important’ (BERA 2024)
‘Mindfulness meditation may be especially well suited to help POC cope, given its emphasis on gaining awareness and acceptance of emotions associated with discriminatory treatment.’ (Ramos et al, 2022) I would argue here that discriminatory treatment is not something that should be experienced at all, let alone accepted (in a conventional sense). However in the context of mindfulness and meditation the aim is to ‘see’ the things in life that we cannot control and acknowledge the full truth of them. My training explains that It is only through acknowledgement of truths that they can begin to change. ‘Mindfulness is a mental state that involves intentionally attending to experience, adopting an attitude of curiosity, openness, acceptance and kindness’ (Kabat-Zinn, 1990). I would also contest that it is the job of the discriminating group to meditate, look within, and change their actions. Rather than the responsibility of marginalised groups to meditate and cope or ‘feel better’ about it.
However we can never dispute that harm has taken place and that mediation must be offered as a gift that can be refused, it must be opted-in to rather than opted out of. I must also be wary of using it in a way that, ‘extols ‘the virtues of mindfulness education but unwittingly demonstrates the white saviour trope.’ (Cannon, 2016) It must not be imposed or even ‘applied’ onto marginalised groups.
When entered into with a truly open mind meditation and mindfulness can be tools for relaxation and a better mental state. It can help to define the difference between ‘seeing’ and ‘looking’ at something versus actually embodying it and allowing it to define your emotional state of being. Meditation can enable us to gain separation from the harms enacted upon us as well as self-critical voices or the ‘voice of judgement’ as Hendrickson, Heyward and Gruber put it. It can help us choose what to embody. There may well be situations that we cannot change or feel we cannot change, but we can be in control of our responses to them and try to create and maintain a positive inner world. So I think initially at least it can be integrated into existing creative education (In the ways seen in the responses to participant feedback)to remove the aspects of the compounding layers of the problem that are added by the self.
This work feels vital and timely to me as our attention spans become smaller and we all have many simultaneous windows open on our computers competing for our attention and time. For example, ‘The mere presence of a smartphone reduces basal attentional performance’ (Skowronek J 2023) We live in an attention economy where our passivity is monetised. My practice sits in and acknowledges this context of modern life as both students and educators face challenges in terms of the cost of living in relation to wages, in addition to long NHS waiting lists for treatments and appointments. It is more than ever vital that we are able to look after ourselves partly by controlling our attention and finding the flow state.
RESEARCH METHODS
Fig 4 & 5. Relevant excerpts from Lury & Wakeford Inventive methods: The Happening of the Social (2012)
Participants
I decided that measuring the effect of the action on specific marginalisation’s or demographics was in this case not an appropriate course of action with such a small specific number of participants. So I specifically did not collect data on age, race, gender or disabilities as in the context of working with my colleagues this would be unnecessary and potentially inappropriate as although anonymised here, no-one was anonymous to me. Participants will also be able to find their comments in this writing and be sent a link to this blog too. This is towards the action being truly participatory so that ongoing conversations can be had and when I send the link I will add that I welcome any further feedback, comments or disagreements. It is also important to acknowledge that my having working relationships with the participants may bias them towards making me happy I hope this is mitigated with the next iteration. As, ‘change involves ambiguity, ambivalence and uncertainty about the meaning of the change’ Effective implementation is a process of clarification’ (Robson & McCartan K 2016)
I had a small number of participants, I hoped for ten and would have had seven had two tutors not had to go and mark some work together. My actual number was five participants. It is also very important acknowledge that in this case, as well as on the body scan day, although I had some diversity in terms of genders and ethnicities, I had no black participants. If we look at access to mental health services in the UK. ‘‘The most pronounced inequalities in use of treatment related to age, sex and ethnic group.’ And ‘people who were Black, Asian, non-British White, or of mixed or other ethnicity were less likely to obtain treatment than those in the white British group.’ So currently both of my interventions have missed the inclusion of a specific group that I would hope to benefit. Through conversation with Kalie in Brooklyn however, it is clear that the student population there is very diverse so I am hopeful of the wider impact of this work in including and having a positive effect for marginalised communities and obtaining more specific data, feedback and opinions. Robson & McCartan (2016) express that I should not. ‘expect all or even most people or groups to change, progress occurs by increasing the number of people affected’ (K 2016) The Brooklyn study will also have student participants rather than staff. This post-PgCert study is described in my Ethical Action plan. I also think that universal design principles are relevant here in that what makes things better for any one group can improve things for everyone.
Method: Emotion wheel
Other methods of looking at mood and wellbeing were considered, the main ones being the
Perceived stress scale and satisfaction with life surveys, (LINK) I used these when I taught an 8 week Mindfulness for health and wellbeing course. I discounted these for this exercise as I knew that my action would take place on a single day measuring before and after rather than over a longer period of time. I was looking for the simplest way to measure mood, emotion and affect before and after the exercise in a way that could be easily understood by my participants, and upon discussion of this in our tutorials and with Kalie in Brooklyn, I showed my colleagues some different options resulting in my choice of the circumplex model of affect: (Posner, J., Russell, J. A., & Peterson, B. S. 2005).
https://positivepsychology.com/emotion-wheel/
This person reported, ‘feeling like they were doing the wrong thing the whole time’. It may also be that this person preferred ‘pure’ meditation to the active mindfulness exercise. Perhaps they simply needed rest rather than doing any activity at all. I think it could also be a result of the sheer number of prompts and instructions given to participants in such a short time. A different thing is required of people every minute or two during this exercise. This is a technique I employ to keep the participants attention, and to keep them engaged. However I feel it worth reconsidering though and reducing the volume of instructions, pens to swap, things to draw etc. and allowing a longer period of uninterrupted drawing for the next iteration of this. There is a balance to be struck between keeping attention and allowing participants to relax into the exercises. There are also some changes to be made to the script in terms of making it clearer when a new page is necessary, giving people a better pen etc.
As mentioned earlier, One participant asked to record their emotions as a line across two quadrants rather than a cross in one place. This I feel was good and could be a good change to future iterations as it captures more facets of the participants’ experiences. It should be said here that in workplaces in general there is often an expectation of a certain level of ‘happiness’ and it may be that despite my encouragement to acknowledge the truth of however they are feeling participants may not have felt comfortable disclosing purely negative emotions in this way.
Method: Questionnaire
I used this to gauge previous experience levels and understanding and to capture the information I needed on whether my educator participants would consider applying this to their teaching. I deliberately asked open ended questions on the forms as well as Yes or No questions. I believe in simply listening and giving space for participants to critique any aspect that they choose to. I did not ask if the participants definition of mindfulness had changed after the exercise. – this would certainly be worth doing for future iterations.
Method: Drawing
As a shortcut to enable the flow state I use ‘blind drawing’ meaning you look only at the object on the page instead of the page you are drawing on. This removes the participant’s capability to intellectualise, analyse, compose or evaluate their drawing. I take some of their ‘thinking’(or mind objects) away so that they can focus on the action, on ‘doing’. I effectively do some of the ‘thinking’ for them by choosing the object (their bag) choosing the media and choosing the time frame that they work for.
Method: Creative tasks
The method for measuring creativity was decided on as part of the collaboration with Kalie Smith who recommended to use the tasks set out by, (Beaty, R. E. & Johnson, D. R. 2020)
The task measures divergent thinking, along the lines of, ‘Think of as many uses as you can for a brick’ and record them all in two minutes. This measures divergent thinking or, how you get from one idea to the next. ‘For example, the word chamber and choir often occur in similar contexts so there would be low semantic distance between them. But, the word chamber and relic do not often occur in the same contexts, so there would be high semantic distance between them’ (Beaty & Johnson 2020)
I ran this twice before and after the meditation/mindful drawing with different objects. Having never done in this way before it was certainly a test as I relied on an existing tool. Participants will have two minutes to write down as many responses as possible and the divergence is recorded using an algorithm here: Link http://semdis.wlu.psu.edu/
Measuring creativity is not something I have ever done previously,. I think that this relates to whether the definition of creativity is more about potential output – creating something, in which case, all participants also created drawings under specific instructions, with limited media chosen by me. So although we can look both at the drawings themselves and the creative task to see creativity the drawings are focused on peacefully going through a process not the result. The creative tasks specifically relate to divergent thinking or however relates to how one gets from one idea to the next. In my view creativity can also be both logical and illogical. This relates to my strong suspicion that these mindful exercises could improve the quality and nature of creative work.
As tutors we often see students delay their active design processes preferring to stay in the research stage, finding images that suit them, which involves taking in information as opposed to producing their own creative output I feel that drawing blind while looking at research images is a good transitional exercise to help us transition from one to the other. So applied to their actual research matter as opposed to their bags used in this case, my feeling is that this too can starts to impact the content and quality of the creative work.
Participant 2 particularly struggled with the creativity exercises and I can identify with this struggle, as alone I tried and failed to think of very many uses for a paperclip. However if you asked me, (and I suspect participant 2) to design as many garments as I could in 2 minutes the results might be different. This relates to the different ways that we understand creativity and I think that visual creativity is often devalued. And I think it also relates to which forms of creativity we practice and feel ‘practiced’ in. Which pathways are familiar ones for our brains rather than unfamiliar? Forms of creativity different to those we are experienced in need new neural pathways to travel on. Which is to say that designers start with visual inspiration, images, pen and paper, not an abstract ‘item’ held only in the mind with the uses then expressed in words. So the exercise is more similar to creative writing than forms of visual creativity
In meditation we call thoughts ‘mind objects’ and so dealing with these is different to dealing with real objects or images that are in front of you. So it would be interesting to compare this exercise with another showing them an image of a paperclip and being asked to design as many garments as possible based on it in a set period of time, this might have yielded different results. But equally for people other than my participants, (experienced fashion design lecturers) It could be more intimidating. On the creativity task, it is possible that this element of the task was more stressful than the others, anecdotally afterwards a couple of participants said it was difficult. Although another two said they enjoyed it.
The nature of research and measuring can of course alter the experience fundamentally. I have never been asked to do very tricky tasks like this before and after drawing or meditation. So in feeling the need to document, test and prove that meditation works, It is worth considering whether I am reducing the quality of the experience.
Fig, 6. Robson, C. & McCartan, K. (2016). Page 203 Real World Research
RATIONALE
My first encounter with mindfulness was via the NHS as part of a referral to the Royal Hospital of Integrated Medicine. I was offered a group session as part of a treatment. I have met many meditators and I am not alone in being someone who came to it feeling like I had no other options. That is to say, sometimes things need to get really bad, before you can imagine that there might be a way to turn things around. And that people only come to meditation if and when it suits them. As much as I can present the evidence, talk about my experience and teach classes, I know that if I were talking to myself pre-2013/14 I just… wouldn’t believe it could change anything. It takes years and multiple influences to change people’s minds. ‘People need pressure to change (even in directions they desire) but it is only effective under the conditions that allow them to react and interact. (Robson & McCartan K 2016) I can simply speak from my own experience of it being useful. As well as present evidence from others that it is. This YouTube video LINK (Improvement Pill, 2017) for example does a fairly good job of summarising convincing research on the effects of meditation in a convincing way, and could be a useful tool.
At first I found mindful meditation not necessarily helpful but at least relaxing, and as part of one session we were asked to write down things in our life that nourished us and things that depleted us. I had never looked at my life in this way before. I would venture that being from a working class background is a part of this not-looking. ‘Nourishment’ can be seen by many as an unaffordable luxury. This is to say that the way to apply mindfulness to your life is simply to be aware, If you are aware that an activity is depleting, maybe you can give it less of a focus in your life. This I feel is also where mindfulness can ‘lose’ people, a lot of people simply feel they don’t have choices in life, that they can’t change things. It is also important to say that access to mindfulness classes and meditations, although many exist online for free, is still a class issue. For me the widely-held perception that it is doable for free with an app can initially be unhelpful. As you can’t ask an app any questions that might be unique to your own situation. And in order to practise you need time. Time to sit still, can of course also be a luxury. I also think you need an open minded network of people around you. If you are surrounded by people who dismiss meditation as ‘mumbo jumbo’ or ‘hippie stuff’ you would be less likely to try it. Mindfulness and meditation can often be perceived as an unreachable goal for people who have very real issues.
‘With meditation the goal is to simply gain some distance from your own thoughts, thereby giving you the space to question them’.(Robertson 2022, P18) ‘Emotional wisdom, I believe is a tool that can be used in teaching for connecting with your body and breath, dealing with life’s undulations, and noticing the interconnectedness of life and materials on this planet. And this tool can also be used to address some of the harmful mental effects of stress and caused by intersectional experiences of discrimination’. (Hamshare 2024)
The reality of the situation that students face and in particular marginalised students can be seen in this 2024 House of Commons report.
Fig 7. Mental health factors, Screenshot of Commons Library Research Briefing, 2024, Pg 13
‘The Being Well, Doing Well survey for Student Minds and Alterline (PDF) carried out in November 2022 found 57% of students said they had a current mental health issue, 36% had poor mental wellbeing and 27% had a current diagnosed mental health issue. 30% said their mental wellbeing had got worse since starting university, while 32% said it had improved. 60% said their financial situation had a negative or very negative effect on their wellbeing’ (House of commons library, 2024)
https://researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk/documents/CBP-8593/CBP-8593.pdf
As I often tell my students when teaching on sustainability and the climate crisis, huge problems can feel overwhelming because they are, you should never expect yourself or others to tackle it alone. It must be taken on systemically, together. ‘Institutions may also have powers to correct or prevent problems that virtuous individuals cannot solve or avoid on their own.’ (Anderson, 2012, p164) But for this to work well people need a sense of agency, a sense of self confidence that their part is worthwhile, meaningful and they need to feel capable of enacting change as well as being capable of enacting changes. It is important to say that meditation is not a magic pill, a cure for anything, and it cannot fully address the effects of marginalisation not address the inequalities. ‘Structural injustices require structural remedies’ (Anderson, 2012, p169) And so I consider further staff training fundamental to enable any further meaningful interventions.
There is also a step change required in thinking in order to facilitate these types of interventions as counselling or therapy is more commonly recommended over mindfulness type interventions.
‘Psychologists usually try to help people use insight and understanding to manage their behaviour. However, neuroscience research shows that very few psychological problems are the result of defects in understanding; most originate in pressures from deeper regions in the brain that drive our perception and attention. When the alarm bell of the emotional brain keeps signalling that you are in danger, no amount of insight will silence it.’ (Van der Kolk 2014)
Making art, meditating practicing mindfulness can lead to just plain feeling better rather than analysing what went wrong, or thinking about why you don’t feel better.
The cost of living crisis for example cannot be mitigated using meditation alone. But, in my experience, with practice, meditation can help you to see more of the reality, gain some distance and perspective from unhelpful thought patterns, which in turn might put you in a state of being where you are able to work better, be more productive, perhaps even improving your prospects. ‘With an integration of antiracism and critical pedagogy, mindfulness educators can ensure that mindfulness is utilized as a practice of freedom (inspired by Brazilian educator Paulo Freire) rather than a technology of compliance.’ (Cannon, 2016) However, ‘As these concepts are essential to well-being and development at individual and societal levels, understanding them is critical to the future of human thinking, wellness, and society.’ (Henrickson et al 2021) These two ideas must guide my future research and teaching.
FIGURES LIST
Fig 1 & 2. Changes in Affect With and without participant numbers, Results Diagram. Smith, K. & Hamshare, E. (2024)
Fig 3. Excerpt from questionnaire results, Screenshot, Hamshare, E. (2024)
Fig 4 & 5. Relevant Excerpts from Lury & Wakeford Inventive methods: The Happening of the Social (2012)
Fig, 6. Robson, C. & McCartan, K. (2016). Page 203 Real World Research. 4th edn. Chichester: John Wiley & Sons.
Fig 7. Mental health factors, Screenshot of Commons Library Research Briefing, 2024, Student mental health in England: Statistics, policy, and guidance. House of Commons Library. From https://researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk/documents/CBP-8593/CBP-8593.pdf Accessed January 7, 2025
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