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What a Recent University Study Tells Us About Mindfulness Now

July 21, 2026July 21, 2026 by mi_admin

What a Recent University Study Tells Us About the Mindfulness Now Programme

At Mindfulness Now, we’re committed to continually learning, improving and building the evidence that supports our work.

That’s why we welcomed a recent independent study conducted by researchers at the University of Lincoln, exploring the experiences of participants who had taken part in the Mindfulness Now 8 week programme.

Although this was a small pilot study, the findings are very encouraging. They suggest that the programme supports meaningful personal development for those who complete it, while also providing valuable learning that will help inform a larger-scale evaluation in the future.

What did the study find?

The researchers found positive outcomes across almost every area they measured.

Participants reported that, after completing the programme, they felt:

Less anxious
Less stressed
Less depressed
More relaxed
Greater overall wellbeing
Better able to manage emotional challenges

The only area that didn’t show the same level of improvement was managing physical pain. The researchers suggest this is likely because many participants were not experiencing ongoing physical pain before joining the programme, making significant change less likely.

More than learning mindfulness – living it

One of the strongest messages from the study was that participants on the Mindfulness Now Programme weren’t simply learning mindfulness techniques. They described mindfulness becoming part of everyday life.

Participants spoke about:

Becoming more emotionally aware.
Feeling calmer and less reactive during difficult situations.
Developing greater resilience.
Thinking more clearly.
Feeling more present in everyday life.
Embedding mindfulness practices into their daily routines.

Many described mindfulness as becoming “a way of life” rather than something they only practised during meditation sessions. Others talked about increased confidence, gratitude and a greater ability to cope with the demands of daily life.

Community matters

A consistent theme throughout the study was the importance of community.

Participants described the Mindfulness Now learning environment as supportive, welcoming and encouraging. They valued both the expertise of the teachers and the opportunity to learn alongside other people.

Many highlighted the sense of belonging that develops through the Mindfulness Now programme and continues afterwards.

Positive findings across different groups

The researchers also explored whether people from different backgrounds experienced the Mindfulness Now programme differently.

Overall, the positive outcomes were seen across participants regardless of age, gender or neurodiversity. The researchers also found that participants from non-White British backgrounds reported particularly strong improvements in feeling less depressed and more relaxed.

As this was a small pilot study, these findings should be viewed as early evidence rather than firm conclusions. Future research involving larger and more diverse groups will help us understand these findings in greater depth.

It’s important not to overstate the findings. This was a small pilot study, so while the results are very positive, they are best described as encouraging early evidence that will help shape future research.

This study gives us encouraging, independent evidence about the impact of the Mindfulness Now 8 week programme.

Teachers can confidently say that:

An independent study conducted by researchers at the University of Lincoln found positive outcomes among graduates of the Mindfulness Now teacher training programme.
Participants reported improvements in wellbeing, including feeling less stressed, less anxious, less depressed and more relaxed after completing the programme.
Participants described improvements in emotional awareness, resilience and their ability to apply mindfulness in everyday life.
The study found strong evidence of personal development and the importance of community within the programme.
The findings are encouraging and provide a strong foundation for future, larger-scale evaluation.

Looking ahead

Every research study offers an opportunity to learn.

Alongside these encouraging findings, the researchers identified valuable insights that will help inform the next stage of evaluation as Mindfulness Now continues to grow. By building on what we’ve learned so far, future research will enable us to strengthen the evidence base further and continue developing a programme that supports participants well.

We’re incredibly grateful to everyone who contributed to the study and shared their experiences. Their feedback is helping shape the future of Mindfulness Now and strengthening the evidence for the work we do together.

Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR)

Kabat-Zinn, J. (1982). An outpatient program in behavioral medicine for chronic pain patients based on mindfulness meditation.
This landmark paper introduced Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) and laid the foundations for modern mindfulness research.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/7042457/

Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy (MBCT)

Kuyken, W., et al. (2015). Efficacy of Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy in Prevention of Depressive Relapse.

Published in The Lancet, this influential study found MBCT to be as effective as maintenance antidepressant medication for preventing relapse in people with recurrent depression.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/25907157/

A Comprehensive Meta-analysis

Khoury, B., et al. (2013). Mindfulness-Based Therapy: A Comprehensive Meta-Analysis.

This review analysed more than 200 studies and concluded that mindfulness-based interventions are associated with moderate improvements in anxiety, depression and stress.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0272735813000734

Mindfulness and the Brain

Hölzel, B. K., et al. (2011). Mindfulness Practice Leads to Increases in Regional Brain Gray Matter Density.

One of the best-known neuroscience studies exploring structural brain changes associated with regular mindfulness practice.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/21071182/

NICE Guidance (UK)

National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE)

Depression in adults: treatment and management

NICE recommends Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy (MBCT) for people who have experienced recurrent depression.

https://www.nice.org.uk/guidance/ng222

Oxford Mindfulness Foundation

The Oxford Mindfulness Foundation provides accessible summaries of current mindfulness research and developments.

https://www.oxfordmindfulness.org/

Centre for Mindfulness Research and Practice

Bangor University is internationally recognised for its work in mindfulness research and teacher training.

https://www.bangor.ac.uk/mindfulness

University of Oxford – Oxford Mindfulness Centre

The Oxford Mindfulness Centre conducts research into mindfulness for mental and physical health and provides training informed by the latest evidence.

https://www.psych.ox.ac.uk/research/oxford-mindfulness

American Psychological Association (APA)

The APA regularly publishes evidence-based articles exploring mindfulness and psychological wellbeing.

https://www.apa.org/topics/mindfulness

Cochrane Library

Cochrane produces high-quality systematic reviews evaluating healthcare interventions, including mindfulness-based approaches.

https://www.cochranelibrary.com/

Why I Love Blue Monday

February 5, 2024January 21, 2019 by mi_admin

Yes, today is the, so called, ‘Blue Monday’, the third Monday of January, which in 2019 is the 21^st of the month and I’m told by certain ‘experts’ that I’m likely to be miserable, worried and possibly depressed, for a number of reasons.

I will have failed my New Year resolutions by now. I’m maxed out on my credit cards after the big Christmas spend. The nights are long, the days are short. I’m not getting enough daylight. I’m feeling cold and I most likely have a cold that doesn’t seem to go away. My diet has failed and I put weight on over the past month. My holidays seem to be as long away as they could be. My clients are too ill to make the journey to come and see me. What else could possibly go wrong?

Hang on a mo!! – I’m sitting in the Bryant Room at the beautiful Midland’s Arts Centre in Birmingham, overlooking the lakes and the park. It’s very early and the sun is rising and the sky has a blueish tinge. The ducks and geese are tuning up their voices. This is the start of my ‘Blue Monday’. I’m setting up training manuals, pads and pens, looking at my list of participants and feeling a deep sense of gratitude – eagerly anticipating greeting my fellow trainers, Rachel and Aston and all of our new trainees.

Mindfulness is a way of life that I’m very privileged to enjoy, to teach, and to train others how to teach. Our training has come a very long way from a humble beginning, 6 years ago to now being internationally recognised, attracting students from 11 countries, externally accredited and probably the most successful training course in the UK, training in 7 different locations. Teachers who have graduated from the Mindfulness Now programme work in many diverse environments including within the NHS, who have funded many students places. Others work in the charity sector, in schools and in commercial organisations. Many are therapists who wish to increase their range of skills.

Not gloating or being complacent, or taking anything for granted. Just a sense of amazement really and an immense amount of gratitude. Mind you – I do have a cold!

Happy Blue Monday

Nick Cooke

Why EQ can be more important than IQ and how the practice of mindfulness can help to develop Emotional Resilience

February 5, 2024January 12, 2016 by mi_admin

Emotional intelligence (EI) can be thought of as the ability to identify, assess, and control the emotions of oneself, of others, and of groups. Having a high level of emotional intelligence can be far more useful in helping us to have a happy, healthy and stable life, than any amount of traditional, cognitive – problem solving intelligence (IQ).

In 1983, Howard Gardner’s ‘Frames of Mind: The Theory of Multiple Intelligences’, introduced the idea of multiple intelligences which included both interpersonal intelligence (the capacity to understand the intentions, motivations and desires of other people) and intrapersonal intelligence (the capacity to understand oneself, to appreciate one’s feelings, fears and motivations). In Gardner’s view, traditional types of intelligence, such as IQ, fail to fully explain cognitive ability.

Although the concept of EI was introduced in the 1920s, it was popularised by Daniel Goleman’s 1995, best-selling self-help book ‘Emotional Intelligence’. Here, Goleman focuses on EI as a wide array of competencies and skills (mixed model) that contribute significantly to our ability to ‘succeed’ in life, to be self-motivated, emotionally resilient and to relate successfully to others.

A couple of years ago I worked with a client who, from a very early age was academically brilliant, a national chess champion at 10 years old, gained a scholarship to a top public school, gained a science 1st at Cambridge and went on to become a highly successful and respected academic. Her issues in consulting me were that she was unable to form close personal relationships, loneliness and social phobia which meant she was finding it very difficult to function other than in her university laboratory. She really seemed to have no life at all outside her work and was starting to become very negative.

I started a process of helping my client to explore in an open and honest way, her negative emotional states and to begin a self-healing process that I call ‘natural healing’. This involves examining what it is that you really want in life and formulating a plan to move towards it. At the same time finding ways to admit and to express to yourself the truths and the hurt of the present reality. Natural therapy also involves accepting and forgiving yourself and others. Its tools include gaining and changing perspective, laughter and relaxation both in the form of self-hypnosis and mindfulness meditation.

Successful therapy is always a collaboration between therapist and client and learning the skills of emotional resilience is no exception. I like to think of therapy as a process of teaching the client, rather than doing something to the client. Clients learn, over the course of a few sessions, how to let go of unwanted feelings, interrupt unwanted emotional patterns and learn ways of cultivating nourishing emotions such as curiosity, excitement, flexibility, confidence and determination, as well as gratitude and appreciation.

Scientific research has demonstrated that people engaged in mindfulness practice over a period of 6 to 8 weeks boosted their resilience ‘scores’ by more than 38%. The results were very clearly demonstrated and participants stated that they felt happier, with more energy and less stress than before the programme. They also reported that they started to identify challenges as opportunities rather than threats and had a higher level of optimism.

In his trainings Anthony Robbins describes ways of ‘mastering your emotions’ which I’ve found very beneficial in teaching emotional resilience. I ask my clients to focus on a number of key steps:

Identify just what the emotion is, and what it’s telling them that they need to act on.
Clarify just what message the emotion contains and whether they need to change their perception of it, or their behaviours in respect of it.
Recall a previous experience of this emotion which they managed to successfully overcome. Recall the success state and anchor it.
Experiment with imagining different ways of dealing with this emotion until they find one that works well – then take action!

There will be times when clients are locked into patterns of emotional trauma where it appears that there is no way out. In that situation nowhere feels safe and nothing feels any good. Life loses its sparkle and often people experiencing Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) have frequent upsetting flashbacks of traumatic memories which just seem to come ‘out of the blue’.

The most successful ways of helping clients with emotional trauma seem to come from the category of approaches that can best be described as mind/body interventions which employ a kinaesthetic , sensory input. These are described by Dr Ronald Ruden in his book ‘When The Past is Always Present’ as ‘psychosensory therapy’, and it includes his ground breaking approach ‘Havening ™’. These kinds of approaches can be described as truly holistic and I’ve found that EFT and EMDR can be particularly helpful. The most recent development in this field is Kevin Laye’s Psy Tap, which seems to be achieving remarkable results.

EI and Resilience Building is part of the syllabus of the UK College, accredited mindfulness teacher training course – run on a regular basis. www.mindfulnessnow.org.uk

Becoming a Mindfulness Teacher

June 5, 2025July 18, 2015 by mi_admin

Thinking of becoming a mindfulness teacher?

Why would we want to?

The rapid growth in mindfulness based interventions (MBIs) in recent years has created a healthy demand for teachers of mindfulness. John Kabat Zinn’s 1991 book ‘Full Catastrophe Living’ documented the birth of the Stress Reduction Clinic at The University of Massachusetts Medical Centre and the Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) programme which is one of many MBIs taught world-wide. The book made the principles and methods of clinical mindfulness accessible to a very wide public audience.

Kabat Zinn’s work was given a substantial boost when he, and his MBSR programme were featured on the Bill Moyers ‘Healing and the Mind’ USA television series in 1993, which was subsequently syndicated word-wide. From that point on, interest in the therapeutic use of mindfulness grew dramatically amongst healthcare professionals, creating a demand for teachers.

The interest has showed no sign of waning and the huge amounts of positive publicity which mindfulness has received in recent years, along with the wealth of scientific studies supporting its use, combined with an endorsement by NICE, has meant an increased demand for mindfulness teaching, and therefore, for qualified teachers.

How can we learn?

Mindfulness has been taken up by higher academic institutions in the UK and in consequence, a number of universities, including Oxford and The University of Wales, in Bangor offer higher academic, post-graduate, Master’s Degree / post graduate programmes. This traditional, long-term qualification route, comprehensive and excellent though it is, is not only outside the reach of many who wish to teach others mindfulness, but may also not provide the practical skills for everyday teaching. Other (vocational) training providers, including the UK College of Mindfulness Meditation, offer brief, externally accredited courses which combine intensive practical training with the provision of underpinning knowledge, assessed via case study work and written assignments.

What Makes an Excellent Mindfulness Teacher?

In our mindfulness teacher training courses I’m often asked this question and here I endeavour to give my brief views on some of the qualities that make the difference between just being a mindfulness teacher, and being an outstanding one, as well as providing some pointers for ongoing success.

The reasons why we wish to become a mindfulness teacher may give us a useful pointer – the most valid perhaps being a passion for our own sustained mindfulness practice and a strong’ heartfelt desire to share it with others, when our natural enthusiasm may well shine through and transmit itself to our learners.

Perhaps we might start to examine our teaching practice, if we are already doing that, and elicit from our clients / learners how they feel about learning from us. That way we at least stand a chance of getting better by our old age! Mindfulness teaching should, of course be assessed and a standard, client-administered assessment such as Bristol University’s MYMOP gives us a chance to gain data which can help construct our own evidence base.

Be yourself – don’t try and be someone else

At times I’ve sat with a teacher who has appeared to be trying to get into a role; in other words, trying to be their role model. To me this never comes over in an authentic way. If you try and be someone else, people will see through you and may well not respect you. I’ve learned from some of the world’s most respected mindfulness teachers, but I’m not them. I’d like to think that I bring by own unique experience and perspective, and you will do this also.

Be warm and engaging

Developing rapport between you and your clients / learners is something which it pays giving close attention to. Those who are drawn to mindfulness and mindfulness teaching are likely to be the kind of people who have a natural warmth and empathy with others. There is evidence that people respond to those teachers and therapists who they like and who they believe are open to them, as opposed to coming across as cold and indifferent. The interesting thing is that even if the skills of the less engaging teacher are superior to the more engaging one, the more engaging teacher will be perceived as being superior and effective. So be nice!

Be humble – you don’t have all the answers

One of my personal heroes in field of personal development is the Canadian, Brian Tracy who has been right at the top of his field for many years. He has positively influenced many thousands of people, world-wide’ through his training courses, on-line videos and books. Despite all his wisdom he is one of the modest people who I have met. He is always happy to admit that he does not have all the answers and he suggests that rather than telling people that you are right, it may be more helpful to say to them ‘I may be wrong – I often am’!

I’ve borrowed this phrase along the way and it seems to work well for me, in fact so much so that my wife Carmel who has heard me say it so often, now sometimes uses it against me by saying ‘you may be wrong – you often are’! I can’t win can I!

Keep it simple – stupid (KISS)

I’m sure that I won’t be alone in sometimes sitting in a class where the teacher (and yes I am deliberately using simple language here) uses language which appears to be more designed to complicate and confuse, rather than make clear. Perhaps using words which may be unfamiliar to the audience, without any explanation – presumably to boost the speaker’s own ego. If you find you are doing this, then in the words of Bob Newhart, in his Comedy Club therapy sketch video, just ‘STOP IT’!. Remember the NLP presupposition, ‘the meaning of the communication is the response it gets’. If you are not getting the response that you want then only you can take responsibility and you may need to look at clarifying, or simplifying your language. – ‘simples!’

Encourage discussion and inclusivity

Well, we can’t make our learners talk and neither should we. If attendees wish to quietly participate then of course they may do that. In our groups we hand out an information form inviting participants to talk separately to any of the teachers if they wish, and also as a way of requesting feedback in a very unpressured way. However, it may be that some attendees would really like to talk within the group but feel a little too shy. Sometimes we will have one or two who tend to ‘dominate’ the conversation, if we let them!

It is a real shame for anyone in the group to feel excluded and I think that something which sets aside a really good mindfulness teacher, is the ability to include each attendee through openness and warmth, as well as gentle and subtle eye contact with everyone.

So there you have it – to become a mindfulness teacher and perhaps even a really effective one, needs motivation, positive attitude, warmth, and learnable skills. At The UK College, our student feedback and completed assignments tells us that that on almost all occasions we manage to achieve that. If you are interested and would like to see the feedback from all our former students – just let us know.

To learn more, or to arrange an informal chat, please contact me (Nick) or any of the Mindfulness Now team at the UK College on 0121 444 1110 or email info@mindfulnessnow.org.uk

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