SHAMATHA PRACTICE AND THE PURSUIT OF OPTIMAL EXPERIENCE: INVESTIGATING THE USE OF CONTEMPLATIVE TRAINING WITHIN SPORT AND PERFORMANCE RELATED DISCIPLINES
Open Access
- Author:
- Palmer-Angell, Terran
- Graduate Program:
- Kinesiology
- Degree:
- Master of Science
- Document Type:
- Master Thesis
- Date of Defense:
- None
- Committee Members:
- Robert Scott Kretchmar, Thesis Advisor/Co-Advisor
Robert Scott Kretchmar, Thesis Advisor/Co-Advisor - Keywords:
- attention
flow
introspection
applied sport psychology
optimal experience
mental training
spirituality
sport psychology
Csikszentmihalyi
shamatha
meditation - Abstract:
- The effects and experiences of meditation have received copious attention within sport and performance psychology, as well as philosophy. Over the last decade in particular, similar levels of interest have also evolved within other sub-disciplines of psychology and philosophy. Such work has begun to change how many phenomena, including attention, happiness, and excellence, are understood. Perhaps the most recognized work in these areas focuses upon measuring the states and traits of relatively advanced meditation practitioners. But very little effort has been invested, as yet, in understanding the various methods that these practitioners are employing, and what purposes each of these methods serve in the contemplative context. (e.g., Lutz, Dunne, and Davidson, 2007). According to the practitioners themselves, each such method may require years or decades of study and experiential investment for genuine understanding (e.g., Begley, 2007). Given the lack of extant effort in this direction, within psychology, and the essential role that such effort must play in interpreting the ground-breaking data now being published on advanced meditation practitioners, I invested myself in full-time contemplative practice for over two years under the guidance of a qualified teacher. This period of mentorship began after five years of academic and personal investigation of contemplative practice, which itself included months of field research, as well as time spent in formal contemplative practice settings. Overall, this extended period of investigation focused primarily upon one particular category of contemplative methods - practices for training the attention, or shamatha practices - which are commonly considered among the most basic, and most essential (e.g., Buddhaghosa, 1999; Wallace, 1999). The current work presents introductory explanations of shamatha in both a theoretical and applied context. Requisites for the successful cultivation of the practice, and possible implications for the aforementioned fields - including apparent connections between this training and the flow phenomenon identified by Positive Psychology’s Mihalyi Csikszentmihalyi – are also discussed. These discussions are focused, in large part, upon the potential of shamatha as a method for natural research and application within the study of optimal experience. Specifically, shamatha may be a methodology enabling direct empirical investigation of the mental causes and conditions contributing to optimal experience, as well as the intentional habituation, or training, of these causes and conditions for applied purposes (Wallace, 2000).