Mindful Medicine - by Jan Chozen Bays (Paperback)

About the Book

"Simple mindfulness practices to help health care professionals of all kinds reconnect with themselves and their patients, find joy, and build resilience. Healers need healing, too-now, more than ever. Jan Chozen Bays, MD, draws on her background as both a physician and a Zen teacher to offer accessible mindfulness practices specifically designed to support health professionals of all kinds. Mindful Medicine shares short exercises, practices, and meditations that can bring the proven benefits of mindful awareness into the busy and often chaotic lives of health professionals. Divided into four sections-connecting with yourself, connecting with your patients, rescue remedies for times of stress, and meditations-the book offers evidence-based support for many different kinds of challenges. Most of the practices are very short and fit naturally into the day, for example: wash your mind as you wash your hands; lovingkindness on the way to and from work; and noticing eye color. The book also includes an appendix that highlights the medical research supporting the power of mindfulness. Growing numbers of caring professionals are leaving their professions and experiencing rising rates of depression and anxiety. Mindful Medicine can help people in health care reconnect to themselves and their sense of purpose-even in challenging times"--

Book Synopsis

Simple mindfulness practices to help health care professionals of all kinds reconnect with themselves and their patients, find joy, and build resilience.

Healers need healing too. Mindful Medicine shares simple mindfulness practices and brief meditations that fit easily into the demanding schedule of a healthcare worker's day, creating an experience of less stress and more presence, connection, ease, and flow. Addressing topics such as connecting with yourself and your patients, the role of the Inner Critic in medicine, and rescue remedies for times of stress, this book offers evidence-based support for the many challenges of healthcare work. These short practices are an invitation to replenish the passion of healthcare work and douse the flickering flames of burnout.

Review Quotes

"I have four frontline healthcare professionals in my household. I intend to get each their own copy."--Dhananjay Joshi, Quest

"Healing the burnout epidemic in health care will require systemic change, along with pragmatic, research-backed tools for self-care that can meet healthcare workers where they are now. To that end, physician and meditation teacher Jan Chozen Bays offers a wise, timely, and compassionate book's worth of simple exercises that healthcare professionals (and all frontline workers) can use to mitigate stress and to restore their sense of presence, purpose, and flow in their chosen career."--Mindful Magazine

"This important book will be a powerful resource for healthcare workers for years to come. It addresses the truth of suffering that people in healthcare experience and offers a path out of that suffering through deep practices that resource those who have hit the wall of medicine in our era."--Roshi Joan Halifax, author of Standing at the Edge: Finding Freedom Where Fear and Courage Meet

"A guide to being mindful during the busyness and chaos of clinical practice, this book is a must-read for clinicians wanting to experience greater joy, connection, and fulfillment in their work. A seasoned and wise pediatrician who has worked with some of the most challenging situations imaginable, Dr. Bays weaves her Zen teachings seamlessly into simple exercises that clinicians can incorporate into the workday--to connect us with our growing edge and inspire us to discover the unrealized potential that we all have. She shows how, in every moment, we can expand our capacity and courage to be curious, responsive and present to the needs of our patients, our colleagues, and, perhaps most importantly, ourselves."--Ronald Epstein, MD, family and palliative care physician, writer, researcher, and teacher of Mindful Practice in Medicine at the University of Rochester Medical Center

About the Author

Jan Chozen Bays, MD, is a Zen master in the White Plum lineage of the late master Taizan Maezumi Roshi. She serves as a priest and teacher at the Jizo Mountain-Great Vow Zen Monastery in Clatskanie, Oregon. She is also a pediatrician who specializes in the evaluation of children for abuse and neglect. She is the author of several books, including Mindfulness on the Go and Mindful Eating.