Drawing on the author’s lifelong practice in the non-competitive and defensive Japanese art of Aikido, this book examines education as self-cultivation, from a Japanese philosophy (e.g. Buddhist) perspective. Contemplative practices, such as secular mindfulness meditation, are being increasingly integrated into pedagogical settings to enhance social and emotional learning and well-being and to address stress-induced overwhelm due to increased pressures on the education system and its constituents. The chapters in this book explore the various ways, through the lens of this non-violent relational art of Aikido, that pedagogy is always something being practiced (on the level of psychological, somatic and emotional registers) and thus holding potential for transformation into being more relational, ecological-minded, and reflecting more ‘embodied attunement.’ Positioning education as a practice, one of self-discovery, the author argues that one can approach personal development as engaging in a spiritual process of integrating mind and body towards full presence of being and existence.

In our current systems of education, there is a trend toward compartmentalizing knowledge, standardizing assessments of learning, and focusing primarily on quantifiable and positivist forms of inquiry. Contemplative inquiry, on the other hand, takes us on a transformative pathway toward wisdom, morality, integrity, equanimity, and joy (Zajonc, 2009). These holistic learning practices are needed as a counterbalance to the over-emphasis on positivism that we see today. In addition to learning quantifiable information, we also need to learn to be calmer, wiser, kinder, and happier. This book aims to find and share various pathways leading to these ends. This book will describe educational endeavors in various settings that use contemplative pedagogies to enable students to achieve deep learning, peace, tranquility, equanimity, and wisdom to gain new understanding about self and life, and to grow holistically. Embodiment is a central concept in this book. We hope to highlight strategies for exploring internal wisdoms through engaging ourselves beyond simply the rational mind. Contemplative pedagogies such as meditation, yoga, tai chi, dance, arts, poetry, reflective writing and movements, can help students embody what they learn by integrating their body, heart, mind, and spirit.

Contemplative practices, such as secular mindfulness meditation, are being increasingly integrated into pedagogical settings to enhance social and emotional well-being and to address stress-induced overwhelm due to increased pressures on the education system and its constituents. While these practices bring benefits, including increased self-awareness, emotional self-regulation, and empathy for teachers and learners alike, this dissertation makes the claim that pedagogical practices on the whole reflect an epistemological worldview that privileges a highly cognitive approach to teaching and learning, one that fails to fully account for the deeper psychological, emotional, and somatic registers of human participants, and that sees them as separate from the other-than-human ecology of life around them. In a time of global crisis, such contemplative approaches to education, as beneficial as they may be, run the risk of reinforcing the psychosomatic notion of the individualized human self-itself rooted in interiorized experience--the Cartesian notion of mind-body dichotomy, and a host of other factors that underscore an already hypercompetitive and anthropocentric world. This dissertation extensively draws on the author's lifelong practice in the non-competitive and defensive Japanese art of Aikido. Known as the 'art of peace,' Aikido is an inherently relational practice that teaches practitioners to view and engage an 'opponent' from a virtue-ethic standpoint and ontological view of non-dualism, non-violence, and calm, controlled physical resolution. Aikido is rooted in a spiritual and practical ethos of harmonized relations, or more radically, of unifying 'love.' To be effective, one has to embody this ethic not only from the intention of an 'inner posture,' but through fluid timing, relaxed movement, and non-aggression in their 'outer posture' and intercorporeality. Learning Aikido requires one to focus not only on cognitively acquired skill, but also on mind-body-spirit integration. The four essays in this thesis explore the various ways, through the lens of this non-violent relational art of Aikido, that pedagogy is always something being practiced (on the level of psychological, somatic and emotional registers) and thus holding potential for transformation into being more relational, ecological-minded, and reflecting more 'embodied attunement.' Thus pedagogy, as Aikido, holds potency as the skillful practice of empathic connectivity or 'love.' From the 'art of motorcycling' to 'teacher as healer,' these essays present teaching-learning practice from the Japanese philosophy worldview as 'way' or path-one that is taken up for daily life and based on self-cultivation of virtue-ethics as an aspirational achievement of mind-body integration and wholeness, rather than preoccupation with establishing claims about absolute truth.

This volume explores the reception, development and construction of Eastern practices in the Nordic countries. The focus is on spirituality, medicine and healing from a lived religion perspective. Besides a geographical focus on the Nordic countries and their characteristics, this collection examines the embodied practices aligned with different expressions of religiosity, alternative medicine, spirituality and healing practices. By addressing questions about how so-called Eastern practices are embodied, spread and materialized, the contributors shed light on a cultural change in Nordic societies regarding religious, spiritual and alternative health practices, that are sometimes at odds with the dominant medical discourse about life-threatening diseases and other types of conditions.

This book investigates the lived experience of CEOs in their quest for wholeness and presents a model of spiritual intelligence for contemporary leadership. The experience of ethical and spiritual crisis in the post-modern society especially in organizational leadership, calls for deeper quest and spiritual intelligence. Four essential themes emerged from the analysis of the in-depth interviews with top leaders of different organizations across the globe: (1) Sensing Crisis, (2) Embracing Crisis (3) Awakening Hidden Wholeness, (4) and Serving Greater Good. From the analysis of the themes, a model of spiritual intelligence and leadership wholeness is constructed. This Spiritual Intelligence Model portrays the intra-dynamics of leaders’ ongoing quest for wholeness penetrating through their existential, learning, spiritual, and moral dimensions of being and the five ethical dimensions of wholeness permeating through the personal, organizational, social, global, and environmental spheres of life. This book gives a fresh perspective on spiritual intelligence and leadership practice today.

In recent years the traditional approach to common ground as a body of information shared between participants of a communicative process has been challenged. Taking into account not only L1 but also intercultural interactions and attempting to bring together the traditional view with the egocentrism-based view of cognitive psychologists, it has been argued that construction of common ground is a dynamic, emergent process. It is the convergence of the mental representation of shared knowledge that we activate, assumed mutual knowledge that we seek, and rapport as well as knowledge that we co-construct in the communicative process. This dynamic understanding of common ground has been applied in many research projects addressing both L1 and intercultural interactions in recent years. As a result several new elements, aspects and interpretations of common ground have been identified. Some researchers came to view common ground as one component in a complex contextual information structure. Others, analyzing intercultural interactions, pointed out the dynamism of the interplay of core common ground and emergent common ground. The book brings together researchers from different angles of pragmatics and communication to examine (i) what adjustments to the notion of common ground based on L1 communication should be made in the light of research in intercultural communication; (ii) what the relationship is between context, situation and common ground, and (iii) how relevant knowledge and content get selected for inclusion into core and emergent common ground.

A comprehensive training program to navigate skillfully in this disruptive, uncertain time This comprehensive workbook provides a mind training based on new findings in neuroscience that will enhance your decision-making skills. Skillful, strategically aware decisions in professional and private life are key for sustainable well-being and flourishing in life. Part 1 provides a conceptual introduction into understanding the brain as a predicting organ, actively inferring, and constantly trying to optimize energy. Part 2 leads you through a systematic training program of 8 sessions to enhance strategic awareness and improve decision-making skills by increasing the precision of our perception and mental processing. The practices are designed to fit in a busy schedule with a focus on the challenges we all grapple with in daily life. While thorough and well-grounded in scientific research this workbook is also pleasant and inspiring to read. It is filled with practical examples and the author’s own life experience. Numerous hand-drawn illustrations inspire also visually. The MBSAT methodology has been tested by practitioners for over 10 years and is widely acclaimed. The government of Singapore, known for its outstanding commitment to education and investment in the human resources of its population, has included MBSAT in its official skill-building program and heavily subsidizes participation in MBSAT training. It is one of the testimonials to the efficacy of MBSAT.