Change in Sense of Nondual Awareness and Spiritual Awakening in Response to a Multidimensional Well-Being Program

Sound Healing Reduces Generalized Anxiety During the Pandemic: A Feasibility Study

OBJECTIVES

This study examined the feasibility and effectiveness of a virtually-delivered, biofield-based sound healing treatment to reduce anxiety for individuals meeting criteria for Generalized Anxiety Disorder.

DESIGN

This one-group, mixed-method feasibility study was conducted virtually via Zoom during the SARS-CoV-2 Pandemic. Fifteen participants with moderate to high levels of anxiety as determined by the Generalized Anxiety Disorder-7 (≥10), were enrolled.

INTERVENTION

Five certified Biofield Tuning Practitioners performed the interventions. Participants were given three weekly, hour-long sound healing treatments virtually, over a month's period.

OUTCOME MEASURES

Attrition rates and reports on feasibility of intervention delivery and outcomes assessment were obtained by participants. Data on anxiety, positive and negative affect, spiritual experience, perceived stress, and quality of life were obtained via validated surveys and analyzed via repeated-measures analysis of variance with intention-to-treat. Linguistic inquiry and word count was utilized to assess changes in affective processing as reflected in participants' spoken words over the course of the intervention. Qualitative interviews were conducted to further determine tolerability and experiences with receiving BT that may not have been captured by survey and language data.

RESULTS

Attrition rates were 13.3%, with two participants dropping out of the study after one session. The remaining participants reported acceptability of the data collection process and intervention delivery. Intention to treat analyses revealed statistically significant reductions in anxiety (State-Trait Anxiety Inventory), negative affect (Positive and Negative Affect Scale), and perceived stress (Perceived Stress Scale) (p <.001 in all cases). Linguistic and word count analysis revealed a significant linear decrease (p =.01) of participants' use of negative affect words over the course of the intervention. Qualitative data results are reported in another paper.

CONCLUSIONS

Results indicate that BT delivered virtually is feasible and amenable to study, and that the impact of BT may be substantial in reducing anxiety and improving mental health. This is the first study of its kind to report clinically significant reductions in anxiety levels in response to a virtually-delivered, biofield-based sound therapy. Data will be used to power a randomized controlled trial to more deeply examine the effects of BT on whole-person healing for those suffering from anxiety.

Effectiveness of four deconstructive meditative practices on well-being and self-deconstruction: study protocol for an exploratory randomized controlled trial

INTRODUCTION

The efficacy of interventions based on mindfulness and compassion has been demonstrated in both clinical and general population, and in different social contexts. These interventions include so-called attentional and constructive meditation practices, respectively. However, there is a third group, known as deconstructive meditation practices, which has not been scientifically studied. Deconstructive practices aim to undo maladaptive cognitive patterns and generate knowledge about internal models of oneself, others and the world. Although there are theoretical and philosophical studies on the origin of addiction to the self or on the mechanisms of action associated with the deconstruction of the self, there are no randomized controlled trials evaluating these techniques in either a healthy population or clinical samples. This study aims to evaluate the effect of three deconstructive techniques by comparing them to mindfulness in the general population.

METHODS AND ANALYSIS

A randomized controlled clinical trial will be conducted with about 240 participants allocated to four groups: (a) mindful breathing, (b) prostrations, according to Tibetan Buddhist tradition; (c) the Koan Mu, according to Zen Buddhist tradition; and (d) the mirror exercise, according to Toltec tradition. The primary outcome will be the qualities of the non-dual experience and spiritual awakening, measured by the Nondual Embodiment Thematic Inventory, assessed at pre- and post-treatment and at 3- and 6-month follow-ups. Other outcomes will be mindfulness, happiness, compassion, affectivity and altered state of consciousness. Quantitative data will be compared using mixed-effects linear regression models, and qualitative data will be analysed through thematic analysis and using the constant comparative method from grounded theory.

ETHICS AND DISSEMINATION

Approval was obtained from the Research Ethics Committee of Aragon, Spain. The results will be submitted to peer-reviewed specialized journals, and brief reports will be sent to participants on request.

TRIAL REGISTRATION

ClinicalTrials.gov NCT05317754. Registered on August 2,2022.

Examining the Relation Between Practicing Meditation and Having Peak Experiences and Lucid Dreams. A Cross-Sectional Study

The aim of this study was to compare meditators and non-meditators in terms of their tendency to have peak experiences and their dream lucidity, while examining the associations between these outcomes and some related variables such as non-dual awareness, mindfulness facets and absorption. In this cross-sectional study, 237 participants from general Spanish population completed an online survey that included ad hoc questions related to the study aim, along with the Five Facet Mindfulness Questionnaire (FFMQ), the Non-dual Embodiment Thematic Inventory (NETI), the Tellegen Absorption Scale (TAS) and the Lucidity and Consciousness in Dreams Scale (LUCID). Of the total, 110 participants were identified as meditators and 127 as non-meditators. More than half of the sample (58.2%) reported having experienced at least one peak experience in their life; these showed no differences in the number, intensity, or self-inducing ability of these experiences between both groups but were significantly more common among meditators (71.8% vs. 46.8%; p < 0.001), who also presented higher scores in most of the questionnaires, except for some LUCID subscales. Regression models demonstrated that being a meditator was a significant predictor of having had a peak experience, but not of LUCID scores. These results, which need to be interpreted considering the study limitations, support the potential of meditation to facilitate having peak experiences, while its impact on lucid dreams remains unclear.

Spontaneous Spiritual Awakenings: Phenomenology, Altered States, Individual Differences, and Well-Being

Spontaneous Spiritual Awakenings (SSAs) are subjective experiences characterised by a sudden sense of direct contact, union, or complete nondual merging (experience of oneness) with a perceived ultimate reality, the universe, "God," or the divine. These profound transformative experiences have scarcely been researched, despite extensive anecdotal evidence suggesting their potential to catalyse drastic, long-term, and often positive shifts in perception, world-view, and well-being. The aims of this study were to investigate the phenomenological variances of these experiences, including the potential differences between SSAs and Spontaneous Kundalini Awakenings (SKAs), a subset of awakening experiences that the authors postulate may produce a higher likelihood of both physical and negative effects; to explore how these experiences compare to other altered states of consciousness (ASCs), including those mediated by certain psychedelic substances; and understand their impact on well-being. Personality trait absorption and temporal lobe lability (TLL) were assessed as predictors of Spontaneous Spiritual and Kundalini Awakenings (SSA/SKAs). A mixed within and between-participants self-report survey design was adopted. A total of 152 participants reporting their most powerful SSA/SKAs completed questionnaires measuring nondual, kundalini, and mystical experience, as well as depth of ASC, and trait absorption and TLL. Spontaneous Kundalini Awakenings were found to be significantly more physical, but not significantly more negative than SSAs, and overall, both sets of experiences were perceived to be overwhelmingly more positive than negative, even in cases where the experience was initially challenging. The phenomenological distribution of SSA/SKAs was similar to other measured ASCs although greater in magnitude, and appeared most similar in distribution and in magnitude to drug-induced ASCs, particularly classic psychedelics DMT and psilocybin. Temporal lobe lability and trait absorption were found to predict the SSA/SKA experience. The limitations and implications of these findings are discussed.

Understanding the Nature of Oneness Experience in Meditators Using Collective Intelligence Methods

Research on meditation and mindfulness practice has flourished in recent years. While much of this research has focused on well-being outcomes associated with mindfulness practice, less research has focused on how perception of self may change as a result of mindfulness practice, or whether these changes in self-perception may be mechanisms of mindfulness in action. This is somewhat surprising given that mindfulness derives from traditions often described as guiding people to realize and experience the non-separation of self from the world or its "oneness" with the whole of reality. The current study used a collective intelligence methodology, Interactive Management (IM), to explore the nature of oneness experiences. Five IM sessions were conducted with five separate groups of experienced meditators. Participants generated, clarified, and selected oneness self-perceptions they believed most characterized their experience both during meditation and in their everyday experience in the world. Each group also developed structural models describing how highly ranked aspects of oneness self-perceptions are interrelated in a system. Consistent themes and categories of oneness experience appeared across the five IM sessions, with changes in the sense of space (unboundedness), time, identity, wholeness, and flow highlighted as most influential. Results are discussed in light of emerging theory and research on oneness self-perception and non-dual awareness.

Nondual Awareness and the Whole Person

Integrative Health aims to treat the whole person and to do so within the context of whole systems and practices. We raise questions as to what constitutes the whole person and what must be taken into account to support the creation of optimal well-being. We propose that in order to fully account for the whole person, the transcendent aspects of human awareness, the development of which is the goal of many meditative traditions, must be taken into account. “Nondual awareness” is a term increasingly used in the literature to describe a state of awareness that is characterized by the experience of nonseparation, compassion, and love. Well-being in this state does not depend on anything being experienced per se, but it is rather an innate attribute of living in nonduality. For these reasons, nondual awareness can be considered foundational to the realization of the whole person and achieving the state of optimal well-being.

Employing pain and mindfulness to understand consciousness: a symbiotic relationship

Consciousness, defined here as the quality of awareness of self and the corresponding sensory environment, is considered to be one of most enigmatic and contentious areas of scholarly dissection and investigation. The subjective experience of pain is constructed and modulated by a myriad of sensory, cognitive and affective dimensions. Thus, the study of pain can provide many inroads to a concept like consciousness that the traditional sense modalities do not. Mindfulness defined here as non-reactive awareness of the present moment, can uniquely control and/or modulate particular substrates of conscious experience. Thus, in combination with brain imaging methodologies, we propose that the interactions between pain and mindfulness could serve as a more comprehensive platform to disentangle the biological and psychological substrates of conscious experience. The present review provides a brief synopsis on how combining the study of pain and mindfulness can inform the study of consciousness, delineates the multiple, unique brain mechanisms supporting mindfulness-based pain relief, and describes how mindfulness uniquely improves the affective dimension of pain, an important consideration for the treatment of chronic pain.