THE ZEN MEDITATOR AND THEIR RELATIONSHIPS

A STUDY ABOUT THE RELATIONSHIPS THE MEDITATOR HOLDS WITH THEIR SELF AND SIGNIFICANT OTHERS. A QUALITATIVE RESEARCH

Resumo

During the last twenty years, there has been an increasing interest from the scientific community to study the effects that meditative practices could have in human well-being. However, the academic community has not reached a consensus regarding what are the exact myriad of practices that should be considered meditative, and which should not be considered as such. As a means of provisionally solving this problem, it has been suggested that those practices that fall under an ancestral tradition, in specific Zen meditation, have enough references to be considered meditative. There’s plenty of information available regarding the benefits meditative practices could be having, however, there has not been enough research that focuses on the impact that meditation has on people’s relationship with themselves or significant others. The present study focused on these questions in order to guide future research into the effectiveness of meditative practice on self and relationship development. To do so, a qualitative approach was chosen, particularly guided by the use of Grounded Theory. This was applied by using an in-depth interview methodology to ten participants which have practiced Zen meditation by a period of eight or more years of systematic-weekly-practice. The resulting investigation allowed us to know that meditators report changes in their relationships: 1. In relation to other people, they perceived the emergence of a new positive intentionality directed to those people and that the quality of their relationships with friends and family had improved, however, a consensus was not reached regarding the influence of the practice in the relationships with their couples. 2. In relation to their self, they noticed an increase in the silencing effect of their inner monologues, a positive attitude, a tendency to engage in meaningful activities and feelings of connectedness with themselves. This study is a preliminary attempt to explore how Zen meditative practice influences the relational domain.