Wackfulness

By Mo Edjlali, Founder of Mindful Leader; Author, Open MBSR

Apolitical is a principle. Amoral is a failure.

The mindfulness field teaches people not to look away. Then a war comes. And the field looks away.

On February 28th, a missile hit a girls' school in southern Iran. 170 people were killed. Many of them were children. That was day one of the war.

That was five weeks ago.

Since then, we've had missiles hitting civilian targets in half a dozen countries. The Strait of Hormuz shut down. G…

By Mo Edjlali, Founder of Mindful Leader; Author, Open MBSR

I'm Iranian American. Born in Iran, came to the US when I was less than two years old. I've lived my whole life the child of these two countries, and this weekend they went to war with each other. A friend asked me how I was feeling in all this. I shared it’s like living with two divorced parents who fought my entire life and are now trying to kill each other. 

I have family in Tehran. My uncle, my aunt, my cousin, and his three-year-…

By Mo Edjlali, Founder of Mindful Leader; Author, Open MBSR

Epstein, Deepak, and Authority Illusions

You've seen it happen. A revered teacher's private correspondence surfaces. Social media erupts. The disturbance isn't mere disagreement. It's disorientation. This doesn't match the person I thought I knew. 

I’ve been feeling a great deal of that lately. We all have. 

It's hard to deny that Jeffrey Epstein is on everyone’s minds. I searched the files on Jmail, checked for people I knew, searc…

By Mo Edjlali, Founder of Mindful Leader; Author, Open MBSR

"What do you think is my son's favorite color?"

I wasn't sure why I asked. We were somewhere on Route 66, heading toward the Shenandoah Valley, my Tesla driving itself through the grey winter afternoon. My kids and I had been playing trivia with ChatGPT for the past twenty minutes, animal facts, math problems, the kind of thing that keeps elementary schoolers engaged on a long drive without handing them a tablet.

"Red," the AI respon…

By Mo Edjlali, Founder of Mindful Leader; Author, Open MBSR

When you have spent 15 years in the mindfulness field, people start imagining you glide through life, calm, steady, perfectly regulated at all times. Maybe you meditate on mountaintops before breakfast. Maybe you never get annoyed in traffic. I wish.

2025 reminded me, loud and clear, I'm still a work in progress.

This was one of the most demanding years of my life. A book launch, an app launch, and the daily circus of trying to be a …

By Mo Edjlali, Founder and CEO, Mindful Leader; Author, Open MBSR: Reimagining the Future of Mindfulness

The False Divide

Maybe you've heard the arguments:

"Workplace mindfulness is a betrayal, McMindfulness!"

"Contemplative practices don't belong here, stealth Buddhism!"

The spiritual practitioners cry corporate sellout. The pragmatists warn against religious infiltration. Both sides patrol the borders, checking credentials, questioning motives.

These divides exist for real reasons. Con…

By Mo Edjlali, Founder and CEO, Mindful Leader; Author, Open MBSR: Reimagining the Future of Mindfulness

There is a chill in the air.
Not the kind that wakes you gently, but the kind that creeps in through cracks, quiet, subtle, undeniable.

We are in what I call a Mindfulness Winter. Not for everyone, to be precise.

The celebrity gurus and mega-spirituality influencers are still selling enlightenment by the download. The spiritual capitalism machine continues to hum. Instagram enlightenment …

By Mo Edjlali, Founder and CEO, Mindful Leader; Author, Open MBSR: Reimagining the Future of Mindfulness

A New Trend Emerges

Something new is stirring in mindfulness: the language of open source. What began as a whisper is now entering real conversations. Ideas like community-centric and open-source alongside MBSR are no longer unthinkable, still not mainstream, but no longer off-limits. In August, Wiley published my book Open MBSR, a framework built on transparency, collaboration, and share…

An excerpt from "Open MBSR: Reimagining the Future of Mindfulness" by Mo Edjlali

Unpacking the Buddhist DNA: A Blueprint for Transparency

Chapter 3 ripped off the Band-Aid. For the first time in print, the Buddhist skeleton of MBSR has been exposed.

This excavation revealed more than a sprinkling of Eastern spice. It unearthed a full-blown Buddhist blueprint that forms MBSR's very DNA. From the Three Jewels to the Four Noble Truths, from the Four Foundations of Mindfulness to the principle of…