No time like the present: Mindfulness,temporality and the therapeutics of kairos |
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Authors: | Kitty Wheater |
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Abstract: | While mindfulness is often portrayed as attention to the present moment, this article investigates its variable temporality in social practice. Using the example of mindfulness-based cognitive therapy (MBCT), designed to prevent relapse in recurring depression, mindfulness emerges as an ‘instantly effective’ intervention; as a discipline to be practised for one's future health; and as a perennial property of human attention, to be experienced in any present moment. Demonstrating that these entail different obligations and possibilities for mindfulness practitioners, I analyze the therapeutic timeliness of temporalization itself – arguing that there is a right time to live by certain notions of time. |
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