The Practices

• Author: Peter Jamadar/Elron Elahie/Richard Jamadar
• Pages: 28-30

28

THE PRACTICES

Mindfulness, as Intentional Awarenessing, in the Four Quadrants

The practice involved two components, broken into two discrete practices. Richard

Jamadar, also one of the researchers in this project, was instrumental in refining the

details of these practices, drawing on his long practical and intellectual involvement with

Buddhism. The first component was intentionality. Built into both practices was a step to

cultivate the setting of intent, of an aim or orientation to direct the mind and will during

the actual awarnessing aspect of the practices. The second component was awarnessing.

Both practices involved specific instructions on how to pay attention in a particular way,

on purpose, in the present moment, non-judgementally, but each with a different focus

of attention. In one practice, the focus was internal, inside the individual, and in the other

it was external, on outside phenomena. These different foci were deliberately designed

in order to accustom and habituate the participants’ minds to awarnessing Wilber’s

‘inside’ and ‘outside’ dimensions, and so prepare for the four-quadrant Intentional

Awarenessing that we actually wanted to test in the courtrooms. There were also general

preparatory instructions, referred to as ‘pre-practice’. Thus, the practices can be thought

of as Intentional Awarenessing conditioning events/experiences/exercises that we wanted