As a psychologist and psychotherapist who has been involved in mindfulness education since the late ’60′s (when it was called meditation), and integrative medicine before it had a name, this explosion of interest in expanding awareness and increasing attention – improving the powers of the mind – thrills me. I’m all for anything that increases compassionate awareness and improves attention: for my clients, my patients, our children, and certainly myself.

The idea of “more, better” is as American as it gets, and I’m all for more and better when it comes to the mind. But I’ve got some reservations about the how of all this. The selling of mindfulness seems somehow antithetical to the very acceptance mindfulness cultivation strives for. And it may seem a strange thing for a psychologist whose focus is on problem solving to say, but life is not simply a problem to be solved.

Hegel supposed that all art is a reflection of the time in which it is created; the same is no doubt true of the psychological arts. Ours is a time when excellence is valued. Not necessarily the pursuit of excellence, however. We like our accomplishments big and easy and fast. And the improvement of mental functioning, while often shockingly quick when we begin proper training, is indeed a lifelong practice. In it for the long haul, not simply for today’s trend.

Training takes practice. So why bother?

When we correlate attention solely with achievement, we limit what the mind can do even as we improve our chances for success. Just as an efficient laser requires vast numbers of atoms in an excited state, our human laser-like focus, so crucial for excellence in completing many tasks, requires a ramping up of very specific kinds of attention. As we learn more about the brain’s neuroplasticity – and apply ever more sophisticated technology – exciting real life applications will