Introduction

This chapter describes self-help school of thought, that of mindfulness, which in many ways has taken a reverse journey in more or less the same time period from the 1970s and up to the present day. The origin of mindfulness is found in the 2,500-year-old Buddhist doctrine and meditation practice. It is a type of consciousness, an alert presence in the moment. There is a considerable amount of research available indicating that mindfulness can have an effective impact on a range of areas such as personal development, coping with stress, psychological ailments and somatic problems. Mindfulness is an interesting element in the self-help culture because it illustrates very well how it is not an easy matter to define specific schools of thought as being derived from science or watered-down religion, or an expression of collectivism or individualism. Stress is never far off in mindfulness literature's introductory description of daily life.