The answer is Yes you can – The Mindfulness Association offer two unique opportunities to study Mindfulness & Compassion at Post Graduate Level.
You might be thinking of a new career, or to deepen your own practice and understanding of Mindfulness and Compassion. Studying a degree in Mindfulness is a perfect opportunity to make transformations in your own life and benefit others.
The MSc Studies in Mindfulness provides an in depth study of Mindfulness, Compassion and Insight as you establish your own practice and then apply this to research in your area of expertise. This programme can be studied online or via weekend retreats at Samye Ling Retreat Centre in Scotland.
The unique focus of this course is an embodied and compassionate approach to Mindfulness practice that is the basis for deepening insight, which enriches one’s life and work.
The MSc Mindfulness and Compassion provides an in depth study into the background and psychology of Mindfulness and Compassion and, as well as developing your own practice, you will train to teach our 8 week courses in Mindfulness and Compassion. This programme is studied at the London Campus of the University of West Scotland with retreats held at Samye Ling Retreat Centre in Scotland.
Both programmes run part time over 3 years and can be exited with a Post Graduate Certificate after one year, a Post Graduate Diploma after two years and a full MSc after three years.
Whilst learning to research and teach mindfulness and compassion you will develop your understanding of the relationship between psychology, mindfulness and compassion and also develop and deepen your own practice, which can prove to be transformational and life changing.
Throughout the course you will develop evidence-based knowledge of psychological wellbeing, biological psychology and consciousness and the relationship of these concepts to mindfulness and compassion. You will frequently reflect on the links between these concepts and your own teaching and practice.
Throughout both Masters Degrees you will learn how to practice Mindfulness and if you already are a meditation practitioner, it will help you deepen your practice.
This method of practicing Mindfulness is a thread running through all our courses:
(i) recognising the unsettled mind and practising being recollected and attending to the present moment;
(ii) practising mindful sitting, mindful movement, using mindfulness supports (body sensations, sound, breath) and working with distraction;
(iii) working with and observer and undercurrent model of mindfulness practice and examining how changes can come about;
(iv) practising mindfulness in daily life situations;
Critical Analysis of the Concept of Mindfulness: drawing upon research, relating this analysis to personal practice and experience and to a selected professional context.
You may be looking to deepen your practice or further your skills and knowledge for your career. You might even be looking for a career change that suits your lifestyle. Previous cohorts have included people who wish to share the benefits of Mindfulness with the people they are working with, or in areas in which they have special interest such as the caring professions, the police, business, drug and alcohol rehabilitation or similar. Others have applied their research to their own mindfulness journey and life and written autoethnographies.
It could be that you want to develop a stable Mindfulness and Compassion Meditation practice with a natural progression into teacher training. Or you might want to deepen your knowledge of mindfulness and compassion on a personal level and find out more about it’s evidence base and areas of application and critiques.
Graduates from the Mindfulness Degrees have developed a stable mindfulness practice with a natural progression into Compassion and Insight training. Others have taken the opportunity to research the application of mindfulness to a chosen professional context, such as health, education or business. Many have gone on to teach mindfulness.
Whatever your own personal reason for wanting to embark on a Mindfulness Degree Course you have come to the right place.