To provide ideal conditions for contemplatives, scientists, and philosophers to fathom consciousness and re-envision global flourishing.

In order to catalyze a revolution in the mind sciences and nurture a renaissance in the world’s great contemplative traditions, the Center for Contemplative Research provides:

• a conducive environment that fosters silence, stillness, solitude, and community,
• sustained training in rigorous methods of contemplative practice,
• the ideal conditions for expert meditators to make replicable discoveries about the nature and potentials of consciousness, and
• opportunities for collaborative research with scientists and philosophers.

In the spirit of radical empiricism, while challenging unquestioned assumptions, we seek to discover the deepest sources of mental health, well-being, and environmental flourishing, grounded in ancient principles of nonviolence and compassion. And to share that knowledge with our world.

THE CENTER FOR CONTEMPLATIVE RESEARCH

Fathom the mind. Heal the world.

We envision a contemplative renaissance:

Empowered by determined individuals, practicing in community.

Diving into the depths of reality, guided along charted courses by those who have explored those same vast waters in the past.

Replicating the contemplative discoveries made by generations of practitioners dwelling in silence, solitude, communion, and humility.

We believe such a renaissance is possible because we are committed to giving all that we are to rigorous study, careful understanding, sustainable practice, and genuine breakthroughs.

We envision a revolution in the mind sciences:

Overturning unfounded assumptions, breaking through artificial walls.

Honing the telescope of attention with which we can observe the inner space of the mind directly.

Discovering the nature of consciousness by looking right into it.

Researching the mind using contemplative methods.

Creating a laboratory where professional, full-time meditators collaborate on equal terms with professional, open-minded scientists.

Working together to design and implement experiments that integrate both first-person and third-person perspectives.

We step through the invisible walls of societal norms and prejudice by dissolving the hard dichotomies in our ways of thinking.

We embrace cultural and ethnic diversity and thus we heal and move forward together.

We develop a new paradigm for the dialogue between science and religion and nurture deep communion among religious traditions.

We honor long-standing traditions by daring to rise to their most exalted challenges.

And we seek to overturn cultural bias and ethnocentric assumptions in education, ethics, and science by recognizing and emulating the monumental contemplative achievements of premodern, nonwestern peoples.