Mindfulness made its first real appearance in America in 1979 when Jon Kabat-Zinn started his Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction Program (MBSR) at the University of Massachusetts Medical School. He was first introduced to the ideas while he was studying at MIT to earn his Ph.D. in molecular biology. He untangled the practice from its religious roots and put it into a solidly scientific context. He believed we shouldn’t practice meditation because it brings us closer to God or makes us “more...
