Meditation

Two hundred thousand faces form a crowd, all gathered in a peace meditation. In August 1999, the Sarvodaya organization began its peace initiative in Sri Lanka by calling 100,000 people to mobilize and meditate for peace.

Attention is paramount in the law - attention to details; to legal, ethical and moral principles; and to the hearts and minds of clients, colleagues, judges and juries. A meditation practice helps lawyers cultivate a greater ability to “pay attention.” Meditation can also help lawyers deal better with stress, develop self-awareness and understanding of others, improve concentration and creativity, and perform better as attorneys and mediators.

Recognizing the value of this practice, many law firms are initiating meditation training, including Boston firms Hale & Dorr and Nutter, McClennan & Fish, and the Minneapolis firm of Leonard, Street and Deinard. Students at seven law schools -- Denver, Hastings, Miami, Missouri-Columbia, North Carolina, Stanford, and Suffolk -- have taken mindfulness meditation instruction on campus, sometimes as part of law school courses. Groups of lawyers across the country are gathering together to practice meditation and to reflect on their law and/or mediation practices. For instance, Zen priest and lawyer Mary Mocine leads a monthly Dharma Group for lawyers in the San Francisco Bay Area.

The Law Program at the Center for Contemplative Mind explores ways of helping lawyers, judges, law professors and students reconnect with their deepest values and intentions, through meditation, yoga, and other contemplative and spiritual practices. The program has sponsored a series of insight meditation retreats for lawyers and law students, These retreats include instruction in contemplative practices and group discussions about combining these practices with a life in the law. The Law Program’s Coordinator is Douglas Chermak.

Contemplative law is gaining attention by mainstream academia not only as means for personal development stress reduction, but also to cultivate perspective and skill to be a more effective lawyer and mediator. Some of the institutions that are embracing contemplative practice include: