Conducted by Michael Overstreet, a doctoral candidate at the University of Virginia and a Research Assistant at the Journal of Contemplative Studies (JCS).
JCS: Hello Sarah, thanks so much for making the time for our conversation today. The first question I’d love to ask you is how did you find yourself interested in contemplation and mindfulness?
SB: It’s one of those things that just sort of comes to people. You know, I think it came on pretty gradually, but I’ve had some health problems my whole life, and I grew up in a family that had some mental health challenges. And I simply found myself being drawn to ways of looking at the world differently. You can’t just take the world for granted. I think I’ve always felt that; I’ve always been curious and liked to look at things from a different way. I don’t really remember one specific experience or time, but for the last decade or so, I’ve been really interested in learning to see the world from different perspectives. And I keep saying differently because I grew up in a very Western context where being contemplative, reflective, or even introverted are considered a little bit weird or alternative. I think it’s something that everyone can or could reach at some point in their life, and I think I naturally went there because I needed it, as everyone needs it, even if they don’t realize it yet.
JCS: Would you say that once you started becoming interested and invested in contemplative practices, was it grounded in a specific tradition? Or was it a more open and/or secular path for you?
SB: I am very open to different perspectives because I find them to be so connected. Finding connections, I think, is more important to me than finding the ways that people and ideas are different. Differences, of course, can be valuable, but I think drawing connections is a really important piece of a mindful practice. I go through phases. I went through a Zen phase, but I don’t consider myself a Buddhist. I think I consider general mindfulness practice to be the most practical and accessible for a wide audience. I wouldn’t say that it’s my personal favorite, but I think I enjoy talking about mindfulness the most because it is so accessible to both secular and non-secular viewpoints. Although the West’s wholesale adoption of mindfulness isn’t necessarily always correct, I still think that it can be extremely valuable when done well, and a lot of people can understand it. So I think it’s a very accessible way to approach contemplation—for me, the fact it’s accessible is incredibly important. I don’t consider myself to be an advanced meditator or anything like that, but I see myself as a person who would love for everyone to be a little more mindful, even if it isn’t through a set meditation practice.
I see myself as a person who would love for everyone to be a little more mindful, even if it isn’t through a set meditation practice.
JCS: That’s a good segue to my next question. From what I’ve read of your work, it sounds like this desire to make practices of mindfulness more accessible is very closely tied to what you do. Could you share a bit about your work and how contemplation factors into it?
SB: Contemplation is a way of life you can’t really separate from anything else. It’s not like I have my work and then I have my meditation practice. I think mindfulness can, and dare I say, maybe even should, be something that we all take some time to practice. For me, mindfulness began to permeate everything I do, including my scholarly work. As an academic, I focus on rhetoric, and I realized that a lot of the media analyses and academic articles I was writing came from a place of me being more grounded in a contemplative perspective rather than a critical or social scientific lens, where usually some kind of dichotomy is involved. In Western thinking, this dichotomy could be seen as the one between the cerebral, cognitive, or analytical mind and a more embodied, holistic, and feeling mind.
As one example from my work, right now I’ve been thinking a lot about mindfulness in terms of how we use technology. At face value, “mindful scrolling,” or the mindful use of any technology, is a little bit of a contradiction, like putting a square peg in a round hole. I think, though, that it’s an important direction we could all take. And, although difficult, it’s about the process of getting somewhere; there’s no end goal here besides being more mindful about things like technology use and the rhetoric revolving around technology. While I know it is such a buzzword, I do think it’s necessary to have that reflective and thoughtful view toward things, especially when it comes to our everyday use of social media.
“Mindful scrolling,” or the mindful use of any technology, is a little bit of a contradiction, like putting a square peg in a round hole.
JCS: Being a professor, do you incorporate this sort of thinking into the classroom? Are practices of mindfulness infused into your pedagogy as well as your research?
SB: I try to, yes. Some of my research studies how to help students use technology more mindfully in the classroom. Many of us these days are a little addicted to the small casino in our pockets and I talk with students often about it. It’s one of those open secrets, you know? Everybody’s like, yeah, yeah, we need to be more mindful about our phone use, but people don’t really know how to do it. I myself don’t fully know how to do it. I do try, though, to incorporate these discussions into my classes here and there. For example, I am preparing to teach a class which involves a writing component. We’re going to talk about AI usage and how to do that ethically or unethically, and, without providing a hard boundary, per se, talk about how can we be thoughtful about our use of all the AI tools that are available to us these days? How can we be more thoughtful about how we do that in a way that aligns with our own values? How can we use AI in a balanced and ethical way that is also effective without allowing machines to be our overseers, but instead to use them more agentially and honestly? How can we be more of an agent in our own experience? I think mindfulness is an important part of getting that done—you can’t take action if you haven’t even noticed the problem.
JCS: Do you have any tips for navigating one’s relationship with scrolling and social media? How do you suggest becoming more mindful about one’s use of this technology? Are you a fan of say, you know, the Brick where you can lock your phone and come back to it at the end of the day? Or do you feel that’s a compartmentalization of the problem? Do you think we actually need technology to become more agential in this relationship?
Can you use a technology to help you use your technology less? That, to me, is already inherently a problem.
SB: I am currently writing an essay on this because what you just said is a really interesting tension, isn’t it? Like, okay, so you’re paying to use this thing and it’s taking over your life. So you pay for another thing to help you not use the thing, but you still need to use the thing because it’s so important to our social circles and work and every other aspect of our lives. So, can you use a technology to help you use your technology less? That, to me, is already inherently a problem. In this article I’m working on, I look at three different mindfulness apps that are designed to get you less addicted to your phone. There’s one called One Sec where it has you take a little pause before you can get on to your Instagram or whatever other app; it has you take a deep and mindful breath. This is similar to one called Unplugged, which is similar to a couple others. These are interesting, right? They can increase one’s reflection about their use of social media, but in the essay, I actually argue that they’re not really increasing mindfulness, per se, it’s more along the lines of what Heidegger would call releasement, which is a little different.
But I do think mindfulness can assist with releasement, because it helps detach you from mindless uses of technology. This ties into a favorite concept of mine called “ambient” rhetoric, which is the idea that the world around us is constantly influencing us, usually below our conscious awareness. So detaching ourselves in that way is really important. And certainly it can help you if you have something like a Brick or another app to get you off your phone. The thing is, though, is that it needs to also come from you. It has to come from a sort of detachment or non-desire, the Buddhist idea of detachment, which starts with awareness and being grounded in the present.
There’s tools to help get you there, but I think it’s crucial to be able to be mindful when using technology, otherwise, you begin fighting not to use it. The Brick doesn’t really turn it off for you; I think it can create some distance to assist you in detaching, but the real contemplative part, the reflective part needs to come from inside, and help you gain control without needing a crutch. It makes you think of Odysseus tying himself to the mast when he hears the sirens singing—if you have to tie yourself to the mast, are you really in control? There’s nuance to that answer: maybe not, or maybe you need to tie yourself to the mast temporarily. I just don’t know if it’s the permanent solution.
JCS: I believe you have already touched on this a bit, but how do you dream that your research at this intersection of technology, social media, and contemplative practice will affect society on a larger scale, at the level of communities and culture? Is it a question, for you, of wellbeing? Of flourishing, emancipation? What’s driving this research of yours?
SB: When I look around, it seems much of the suffering that we go through these days is not as “necessary” as in pre-modern or modern times. Not that that suffering was necessary by any stretch, because humans have always, unfortunately, harmed and hurt each other. And yet, it’s like we’re creating more struggles for ourselves. It’s almost as though, if we were more aware, some of today’s needless suffering might go away. A lot of groups and individuals are starting to recognize that the research is showing that phones are becoming rather harmful for us, so that that culture is changing, but it feels like we are in one of those really dynamic times in human history where people are already looking back and going, “Oh, you know, maybe just because we could, doesn’t necessarily mean we should.” It feels like we’re going through a learning curve waiting for things to get worse, and it feels like sooner or later, we’ll get through it. But, for right now, I think that individuals need support for getting to a point where we can shift.
Again, mindfulness isn’t supposed to be like a hammer to a nail. It’s not supposed to be a catch-all solution; it’s a perspective that can allow you to find solutions. And that’s going to look different depending on who you are, your circumstances, your situation. I do hope we have a big cultural shift and I think I’m seeing it happen, but in the meantime, what are we supposed to do as individuals? In this sense, I would say that mindfulness is just one of the many tools we can use to, quite frankly, survive.
JCS: It sounds like at the root of your research is an interest in changing the relationship we have with ourselves in our alone time. I’ve never thought of our relationship with technology in those terms—it’s about how we relate and interact with ourselves in our solitude. And so, Sarah, do you have a curiosity that’s pulling you right now? Where’s the future of your research headed?
Mindfulness isn’t supposed to be like a hammer to a nail… it’s a perspective that can allow you to find solutions… Mindfulness is just one of the many tools we can use to, quite frankly, survive.
SB: I have many ideas pulling me in many directions these days, but something you just said sparked another topic I’d like to touch on, which is non-human agency: the idea that things in our world, including phones, but also all non-human objects, have some level of agency, too. It’s not just humans who can influence and persuade and make things happen. There are other elements in our environment that are also influential. I think this is an area I will continue to talk about in my work. This brings to mind a small project I’ve been contemplating—a technological devotional. Though the title is tentative, it’s an exploration of practicing mindfulness while scrolling and using social media in particular.
Another project I’m working on is an analysis of the mental health app Betwixt. It’s a game that immerses you in a choose-your-own-adventure story which asks you reflective questions along the way. It’s really cool—I relate it to ambient rhetoric, which I mentioned before, but it describes the idea that the environment is persuasive, that rhetoric is almost as pervasive as the air we breathe. You’ve maybe heard the metaphor from Marshall McLuhan about fish, and how, spending their entire life immersed in water, they can’t have any conception of what water is.
Ambient rhetoric is a similar concept. It’s everywhere, and we’re unable to even conceive of a perspective that’s outside of the current rhetorical environment we are in. Mindfulness, I think, is a way to step back and get a wider perspective. And so, an app that takes you into another immersive environment and asks you to reflect on how you’d like to build your own narrative might help individuals see unhealthy patterns in their lives.
JCS: What a treat this was, Sarah. Thanks, again, for your time.
