Selling Mindfulness: Commodity Lineages and the Marketing of Mindful Products

Abstract

Buddhism has always had a relationship with local economies, which help to shape the forms in which Buddhism is practiced and represented. Naturally, the emergence of Buddhist-derived mindfulness meditation in the West is affected by capitalist, market-based values, and forces that impact other phenomena brought into the marketplace. The necessity to market mindfulness to non-Buddhist consumers leads to alterations in contextualization and presentation, while the fluctuating usefulness of Buddhist associations leads product vendors to lean sometimes toward, sometimes away from Buddhism as a resource for imagery and concepts. An analysis of the popular magazine Mindful, with particular attention to its advertising policies and featured advertisers, provides insight into the forces at work in the commodification and diversification of the mindfulness movement.