Abstract
Simon Howard's warning that being mindful to be mindful may prove a hazardous distraction, and in particular when in charge of a vehicle, is both timely and wise. 1
But the sins, omissions and claims of its prophets are not limited to this. Just as several decades back, there was a surge in the ranks of thanatologists (their number including untrained lay gurus who would spot a profitable entree a mile off), in recent years the ranks of mindfulness coaches and of hordes literally buying in has grown exponentially to the promises of ‘switch off, bow out, and become the agent of your own care'.
There are ways in which the total expenditure on mindfulness programs, and in the USA even of mindfulness institutions, evokes Shaw's Mr Doolittle and his diatribe against middle class morality. How so? In our disease care practice of medicine, the majority of serious and costly risks and diseases are causally associated with poverty and the lifestyle of the poor. This is not only the case in developing countries but in parts of the USA. In many countries access to healthcare is unavailable. Yet even where, as here, an adequate safety net is in place:
How many Medicare/Medicaid patients are likely to be offered the blessings of mindfulness, and what proportion of mindfulness practitioners would be likely to accept the payments that these programs offer? Even more importantly, would the mother of several children, between her tiring part-time jobs, be able to find time to devote her attention to the inner self-directed therapy of mindfulness claims.
Mindfulness is one more illustration of what separates the rich from the poor in our society.