On June 14, 2019, Professor john powell gave a keynote address at the Mind & Life Institute’s Summer Research Institute in Garrison, NY, entitled, “Contemplative Practices and Interventions for Individual and Social Flourishing.” The week-long immersion was designed to foster collaborations and shared insights among contemplative practitioners and interdisciplinary scholars regarding mental habits, contemplation, and compassion in order to create change for ourselves and society. In his keynote address, Professor powell discussed how major religious and spiritual practices have long reflected common struggles facing a community. Progressives and others who are eager to move towards an inclusive society must not only tell stories about economic and political belonging, but of ontological (or spiritual) belonging as well. That is, to create a world in which all truly belong, professor powell argued that we must understand ontologically who is included in the “we” and how that definition of “we” can be expanded to include all.
