On a More Personal Note

About 9 years ago I accepted a part-time position as a counselor for students at a small college in my region (Carson Newman) It was a good distance from my home requiring me to drive one hour and 20 minutes one way. I decided that I would  maximize my time in the car so I picked up a book on CD off the bookshelf at a bookstore in Lexington, KY (Joseph-Beth). 

The book was entitled Getting Rid of Destructive Emotions by the Mind and Life Institute, which is a group of eminent scientists from all over the world. I thought to myself, shouldn’t every therapist know how to do this? And why don’t I? And the kicker for me was that the scientists were in dialogue with the Dalai Lama. Well, as a student of religion as well as psychology this peaked my interest. What could these folks possibly have to do with one another? And it certainly helped that my twin brother, Fr. Antony Hughes in Cambridge, Mass, had recently begun to practice meditation in the mindfulness style himself. He is 7 minutes older than me and often a little ahead of me in exploring things so I had to catch up and catch up fast (sibling rivalry don’t you know.)

The research being presented by this group astounded me. And the secular application of mindfulness helped me overcome my initial and needless reluctance. Of course, being Eastern Orthodox by tradition quickly made all of it seem fairly familiar as I explored it further. There are convergences between the two in spiritual practices. So, being interested in the subject and having more than a passing experience with both depression and anxiety I decided to begin to practice myself. (Besides remember, my brother was ahead of me!) I began to feel the benefits very quickly. 

After I had settled in at Carson Newman I began to see students. One of my first students was a slender, black-haired young man approaching the end of his sophomore year whom I shall call "T". He reported being depressed maybe since age 10 and at this time in his life with suicidal ideations. Full of anxiety and frustration he also developed the symptom of trichotillomania, that is to say, he pulled hair out of his head. He often had to color in his eyebrows and wear baseball caps to cover up the gaps. Another consequence of all these symptoms was that, despite his high level of natural intelligence he could not get his grade point average above a 2.7 to save his life. And he was not into partying; he studied. Of course, his problem with suicidal thoughts worried me so I began to say, ‘I think with all these symptoms we will need to refer you to the nurse practitioner for some med…” I was unable to even complete the sentence before he blurted out ‘I don’t want any medication.”   I then blurted out something myself, ‘Ok, do you want to do an experiment with me?”  I recovered my senses and then insisted on 3 conditions to this experiment:

• He would see me twice a week. 
• He would call me or get himself to safety should the suicidal thoughts intensify.
• After, four weeks, if he was not feeling any better, he would reconsider medications.

He agreed and we began. 

I knew very little at this point about mindfulness but I gave him the directions I knew. He was to practice a simple breath-focused exercise  30 minutes a day. As it turns out this was an excessive amount for him and for most starting out. He returned for the next session 4 days later saying he only did the exercise a couple of times for about 5 minutes at a time. He did work up to 30 minutes per day after awhile. But by that time I had read more and instructed him to reduce the time he spent with the breath-focused exercise and  on how to practice mindfulness informally wherever he was and whatever he was doing—when he was eating, walking, showering, driving, sitting in class. He was exited about both and ran with the instructions. He also was interested in ancient Christian forms of mindfulness practice and he took up some of these as well. The following sessions were replete with his stories about where and how he was practicing mindfulness and the affects it was having. After 4 weeks there was no need to talk about medications and at the end of this semester he had achieved a GPA of 3.25. But this was only the beginning. The next semester his GPA was 3.5. The next it was 3.75. The next it was 4.0. His final semester it was 3.75 but he was ok with this. Neither of us was expecting this. 

He also told me that despite the fact that his family was still suffering from many varied problems he was no longer depressed about it, concerned, sad, frustrated some times but not depressed and moreover “I hardly ever pull a hair out of my head.” All without a single milligram of medication! 

My first thoughts were “Holy crap! What have I found?!” And then I got myself on a flight to Harvard Medical School’s conference on mindfulness. There, joined by my two brothers, Fr. Antony Hughes and John Hughes of the Richmont Institute in Atlanta, GA, I began to learn with great seriousness about the science and practice of mindfulness. I have been sold ever since and the research has exploded. 

One final note. Before Christmas 2013, I had lunch with "T". in Knoxville, TN where I live and where he works. He continues his practices and readings in mindfulness, his life is full and satisfying and has its typical ups and downs but he free of inordinate depression and anxiety and he is still medication free.