This week, you will submit the annotation of a qualitative research article on a topic of your interest (Burnout in Teachers). Narrative, ethnographic, grounded theory, case study, and phenomenology a

MIND, BRAIN, AND EDUCATION Inquiry-Based Stress Reduction Meditation Technique for Teacher Burnout:

A Qualitative Study Lia Schnaider-Levi 1, Inbal Mitnik 1, Keren Zafrani 2, Zehavit Goldman 3, and Shahar Lev-Ari 1,4 ABSTRACT—An inquiry-based intervention has been found to have a positive eﬀect on burnout and mental well-being parameters among teachers. The aim of the current study was to qualitatively evaluate the eﬀect of the inquiry-based stress reduction (IBSR) meditation technique on the participants. Semi-structured interviews were con- ducted before and after the IBSR intervention and were analyzed using the interpretative phenomenological analy- sis method. Before the intervention, the teachers described emotional overload caused by two main reasons: (1) multi- ple stressful interactions with students, parents, colleagues, and the educational system, and (2) the ideological load of their profession—trying to fulﬁll high expectations of performance and the manifesting educational values. Fol- lowing the intervention, the teachers described a sense of centeredness and a greater ability to accept reality. They reported improvements in setting boundaries, thought ﬂexibility, and self-awareness. These improvements assisted them in coping with the complex and dynamic nature of their profession. These positive eﬀects suggest that IBSR is an eﬀective technique in reducing teachers’ burnout and promoting mental well-being.

1Department of Health Promotion, School of Public Health, Sackler Faculty of Medicine, Tel Aviv University 2Begin High School3Blich High School4Center of Complementary and Integrative Medicine, Tel Aviv Medical Center Address correspondence to Shahar Lev-Ari, Department of Health Promotion, School of Public Health, Sackler Faculty of Medicine, Tel Aviv University, Tel Aviv 6997801, Israel; e-mail: [email protected]. Burnoutis deﬁned as a response to a chronic emotional strain due to dealing extensively with other human beings, particularly when having to deal with recurring problems as well as reduced coping resources (Maslach, 2003; Maslach, Jackson, & Leiter, 1996). Its components areemotional exhaustion, deﬁned as a lack of mental resources due to an emotional overload;depersonalization, deﬁned as an alien- ated and negative attitude toward the surroundings; and decreased personal accomplishment, deﬁned as reduced abil- ity to accomplish desirable results due to lack of external or internal resources (Awa, Plaumann, & Walter, 2010; Emery & Vandenberg, 2010; Friedman, 1993; Maslach, 2003; Maslach et al., 1996). Burnout has been researched intensively in the ﬁeld of education, and various studies have described its prevalence among teachers (Brackenreed, 2011; De Heus & Diekstra, 1999; Friedman, 2000; Honkonen et al., 2006; Luk, Chan, Cheong, & Ko, 2009; Schaufeli & Buunk, 2002), as well as its signiﬁcant personal and social implications, such as low level of performance, reduced commitment to teaching, high turnover (Friedman, 1993; Gold & Roth, 1993; Melamed, Shirom, Toker, Berliner, & Shapira, 2006; Sorek, Tal, & Paz, 2004), and physical morbidity (Ahola, Väänänen, Koskinen, Kouvonen, & Shirom, 2010; Bauer et al., 2006; Honkonen et al., 2006; Melamed et al., 2006; Shirom, Toker, Melamed, Berliner, & Shapira, 2013).

Teachers need to maintain high levels of mental well-being in order to ﬁt social expectations, professional expectations, and their own expectations (Awa et al., 2010; Pillay, Goddard, & Wilss, 2005). The optimal state of mental health, which is best described as “mental well-being,” related to health, optimism, contentment, hope, and hap- piness, is when an individual fulﬁlls his/her capabilities and functions well under standard pressures of life so that he/she can be productive and eﬀective and can contribute to society (Seligman & Csikszentmihalyi, 2000; World Health Volume 11—Number 2 © 2017 The Authors Journal Compilation © 2017 International 75 Mind, Brain, and Education Society and Wiley Periodicals Inc. IBSR Meditation for Burnout Among Teachers Organization, 2004). Promoting psychological well-being focuses on the individual’s positive and optimal functioning (Bolier et al., 2013; Keyes, 2007). Theorists have deﬁned the nature of positive psychological functioning in a variety of ways; however, there is consensus around six common factors that need to be addressed in order to avoid mental weariness, frustration, anxiety, nervousness, depression, emotional exhaustion, and psychosomatic problems (Keyes, 2007; Ryﬀ, 1989, 1995; Sin & Lyubomirsky, 2009; Tylee & Wallace, 2009; World Health Organization, 2004). These areself-acceptance,positive and reciprocal relationships with others,autonomy in thought and action(the ability to resist social pressure and to regulate behavior and thoughts according to personal standards),environmental mastery and competence(the ability to manage complex external surroundings, to choose or create contexts suitable to per- sonal needs and values),purpose in life,andpersonal growth and development.

The umbrella term ofwell-being promotionincludes sev- eral types of intervention, including approaches such as the psycho-behavioral methods used in the corporate business world (e.g., cognitive behavioral therapy, coaching), posi- tive psychology intervention (PPI) methods (e.g., practical gratitude, art therapy, music therapy), and mindfulness tech- niques (e.g., meditation, breathing practice; NCCAM, 2010; Sin & Lyubomirsky, 2009; Tylee & Wallace, 2009).

Mindfulness-based interventions are designed to enhance the mind’s capacity to be aware of the present moment and to accept one’s current experiences without judgment or elaboration (Bishop et al., 2004; Kabat-Zinn, 1994). With- out compelling the suppression or alteration of emotions, mindfulness enhancement enables the individual to have greater control of thoughts and emotions while dismiss- ing old habits and automatic reactions (Chambers, Gullone, & Allen, 2009). Research has demonstrated that diﬀerent forms of meditation can enhance well-being across diverse populations within (and beyond) the education sector. For example, student educators were taught simple meditation using sound as a focusing tool, and practiced it for 45 min per session, four times. Questionnaires ﬁlled by the par- ticipants who practiced this meditation have shown a sig- niﬁcant reduction in their stress symptoms in the posttest measurements when compared to the control group in the domains of emotional, gastronomic distress, and behavioral manifestations (Elder, Nidich, Moriarty, & Nidich, 2014; Emery & Vandenberg, 2010; Kemeny et al., 2012; Ospina et al., 2008; Winzelberg & Luskin, 1999). Practicing tran- scendental meditation was reportedly eﬀective on psycho- logical measures, such as stress and exhaustion, among spe- cial education teachers in the United States (Elder et al., 2014). Mindfulness practice of one and a half hours once a week during 10 weeks among teachers in Spain signiﬁcantly enhanced well-being measures and the eﬀective functioningof teachers in stressful situations; positive eﬀects persisted 4 months following the conclusion of the intervention pro- gram (Franco, Manas, Cangas, Moreno, & Gallego, 2010).

The ability to acknowledge and consider the emotions of others was shown to improve among intervention recipients during an intensive study of U.S. teachers receiving mind- fulness training combined with emotional adjustment. The participants also showed a decrease in blood pressure in con- junction with increases in mindfulness practice (Gold et al., 2009). A study conducted in Germany involving the prac- tice of breathing techniques showed participating teachers demonstrated an improvement in 9 out of 11 functional and emotional measures (Loew, Götz, Hornung, & Tritt, 2009).

An intervention involving the practice of mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR) and the practice of tai chi was stud- ied in a school in Boston after being recommended and resultsshowedittobeaneﬀectivetechniqueforincreasing peace of mind and improving the quality of sleep, focus, and well-being measures (Wall, 2005).

A direct link has been established between mindfulness- based techniques and enhanced brain activity in the frontal cortex areas that are responsible for focusing attention and positive prosocial emotional states, such as empathy, com- munication, and socialization (Davidson & McEwen, 2012; Goleman & Gurin, 1993). Davidson and McEwen (2012) described emotional capabilities, self-inspection, and mind- fulness as dynamic, acquired, and adaptive processes, which can be enhanced in the same manner as other skills in the ﬁelds of music, mathematics, and sports. Their study showed structural and functional changes in the brain as a result of cognitive therapy and training certain forms of meditation.

Practicing mindfulness or meditation enables the indi- vidual to be less reactive to negative experiences and more focused on positive aspects as the consequence of enhancing the activities of speciﬁc brain areas (Davidson, 1992; Lutz, Slagter, Dunne, & Davidson, 2008).

Taken as a whole, such studies demonstrate that, across multiple contexts and countries, well-being promotion tech- niques based on mindfulness can be used beneﬁcially among teachers. However, broader and longer term research is still needed in order to establish the eﬀectiveness of these techniques in burnout-related exhaustion prevention and treatment.

Inquiry-Based Stress Reduction Inquiry-based stress reduction (IBSR) is a meditation technique developed by Byron Katie in 1986. Its aim is to identify the thoughts that cause stress and suﬀering in a systematic and comprehensive way, and to meditatively “investigate” them by a series of questions and turnarounds.

This technique does not require any intellectual, religious, or spiritual preparation, but rather a will to deepen and 76 Volume 11—Number 2 Lia Schnaider-Levi et al. reach self-awareness (Katie & Mitchell, 2003). It has been practiced by many individuals worldwide (Landau et al., 2014; Lev-Ari, Zilcha-Mano, Rivo, & Geva, 2013). Its eﬀec- tiveness was demonstrated on various psychological scales among cancer patients and cancer survivors. IBSR was also tested in a nonclinical population and it was shown to be eﬀective in improving scales of depression and anxiety (Leufke, Zilcha-Mano, Feld, & Lev-Ari, 2013). A constant evaluation of current eﬀorts and an examination of new eﬀorts are required in order to maintain and develop mental well-being of teachers in the education system. System- atic and individual means must be combined in order to eﬀectively treat exhaustion problems among teachers, with emphasis on mental health promotion (Flook, Goldberg, Pinger, Bonus, & Davidson, 2013). IBSR is classiﬁed as a meditation technique based on mindfulness and is there- fore applied as a mental well-being promotion technique.

However, to the best of our knowledge, its eﬀectiveness has not been tested among teachers in particular (Leufke et al., 2013). We hypothesized that IBSR has the potential of reducing exhaustion levels and increasing well-being levels among teachers. This would be consistent with the beneﬁts seen from other types of mindfulness programs. METHODS Recruitment and Participants The current study is the qualitative part of a controlled trial designed to statistically and qualitatively assess the eﬀects of IBSR on burnout and well-being levels among teachers. The studywascarriedoutatahighschoolinalargecityinIsrael.

All the teachers on its staﬀ were eligible to participate in the study if they agreed to sign an informed consent form and had no previous experience with the IBSR technique. The study was carried out with the support of the school prin- cipal and was approved by the Israeli Ministry of Education (MOE).

An advertisement for recruiting teachers to participate in thestudywaspublishedontheteachers’billboard(atschool and online). In addition, the invitation was announced dur- ing a teachers’ meeting. Teachers who were willing to par- ticipate met the main researcher at the school and were informed about study objectives and procedures. The ﬁrst 27 teachers to sign the consent form were included in the 12-week IBSR intervention group in order to ensure a full group. The rest of the teachers (n=27) were included in the control group. To reduce dropout rates from the control group, those who continued through until the end were told they would receive an IBSR kit (a book and a CD) at the end of the study. The assignment procedure was fully detailed in the advertisement.The intervention arm (n=27) included two groups who met on diﬀerent days of the week. All the participants (n=54) completed four psychological questionnaires before and after the intervention. Before the intervention, all partic- ipants of one of the intervention groups (n=11) were con- tacted by telephone and were informed about the qualitative part of the research. All of those teachers agreed to partici- pate. This led to a smaller sample appropriate for the analysis method chosen for this research (interpretive phenomeno- logical analysis; Smith & Osborn, 2003) as a relatively small sample size of between 6 and 12 is suﬃcient to arrive at conclusions (Baker & Edwards, 2014). Two teachers did not participate in the ﬁrst interview due to a busy schedule and one teacher joined the intervention group one day before the beginning of the workshop, leaving insuﬃcient time to complete the interview. A third teacher did not complete the second interview due to a busy schedule. The total number of subjects who completed all components of the qualitative study were eight.

The participants of this study, all high school teachers in the same school, held diﬀerent positions. The smaller sample is shown in Table 1.

Intervention Method The ﬁrst stage of the IBSR technique is to systematically identify the thoughts that cause stress and suﬀering, and to record the speciﬁc thoughts about various stressful sit- uations by using theJudge Your Neighborworksheet (see the appendix). The next stage is an inquiry of the stressful thoughts by a series of questions and turnarounds. Partici- pants choose the main thoughts they had written down on the worksheet and investigate them by four guided ques- tions: (1) Is it true? (2) Can I absolutely know that it is true? (3) How do I react when I believe that thought? (4) Who would I be without the thought? This self-investigation enables the individuals to examine their emotional and phys- ical responses during stressful situations. This stage is med- itative, and the participants are guided to be in a state of witnessing awareness, in which they observe the thoughts that come into mind without trying to control or direct them (Katie & Mitchell, 2003). In the turnarounds, the participants experience a revised interpretation of reality. For example, if the original thought was “My pupils don’t like me,” possi- ble turnarounds can be “I don’t like my pupils” (turnaround to the other), “I don’t like myself” (turnaround to myself ), or “My pupils do like me” (turnaround to the opposite). The par- ticipants are guided to ﬁnd three genuine examples in which the turnaround is as true as the original thought. By doing so, they can understand that they do not have to automati- cally believe the stressful thoughts, but can choose diﬀerent interpretations of reality (Katie & Mitchell, 2003).

Volume 11—Number 2 77 IBSR Meditation for Burnout Among Teachers Ta b l e 1 Sample Group Pseudonym Age Educational ﬁeld Years of experienceInterviews completed (Before and after the intervention) Rosette 48 Math, special education homeroom teacher 7 Before+After Hen 45 English 12 Before+After Yehudit 56 English 15 Before+After Tamar 40 Arabic 10 After Yaela 42 Physics 8 Before+After Keren 45 Literature, homeroom teacher 18 Before+After Ricky 42 Drama 11 Before+After Paula 38 History, homeroom teacher 13 Before+After Shira 44 English, homeroom teacher 9 Before+After Neriya 35 Bible teacher 6 Before Shaked 39 Educational counselor 10 Before The IBSR intervention lasted 12 weeks and included weekly group meetings (3.5 hr/meeting) and weekly indi- vidual sessions with a facilitator by telephone (1 hr/session).

All the sessions were standardized according to a train- ing manual, and each session was assessed afterwards for maintaining consistency during the program. The workshop was adapted speciﬁcally to homeroom teachers. The group forum training was designed to address teaching-related issues, such as self-esteem as a teacher, the student–teacher relationship, work under noise and pressure, professional development, and others. More personal issues were addressed in the individual sessions on the telephone with the facilitators. Participants were included in the ﬁnal study analysis if they had been present in at least 75% of the group meetings and completed 50% of the home practice. All of the participants complied with these basic terms.

Data Collection The data were collected from semi-structured interviews which were conducted during the 2 weeks before and after the intervention, and each interview lasted for 1 hr. The goal of a semi-structured interview is to create an open dialogue between the interviewer and the interviewee, and to pro- vide the opportunity for people to tell their story openly and freely with minimal interference (Smith & Osborn, 2003). At the ﬁrst interview, the participants were asked the follow- ing questions: “Can you describe your everyday experiences at school? What is your main motivation in teaching? What is important for you? What are your main diﬃculties? How do you cope with them?” In order to estimate their expec- tations from the workshop, they were also asked: “What beneﬁts do you wish to achieve from the intervention?” At the second interview, they were asked to describe their gen- eral impressions: “Please tell me about your experience in the workshop.” Elaboration or clariﬁcation was requested asneeded. The interviews were conducted and recorded by one of the researchers. The recordings were then transcribed by an objective third party who issued the textual interviews used in the research while ensuring that personal informa- tion remained conﬁdential.

Data Analysis The interviews were analyzed using the interpretative phe- nomenological analysis method (Smith & Osborn, 2003).

This method aims to investigate people’s experiences from a subjective point of view, while emphasizing the way they make sense of their personal and social world. It includes several phases. In the ﬁrst phase of this study’s analysis, two of the researchers (the interviewer and the medical psychol- ogist) interpreted the transcripts. Each transcript was care- fully read several times, signiﬁcant topics were marked, and attention was focused on language and the use of key words or metaphors. In the next phase, the main topics of each interview were identiﬁed and conceptualized intothemes,as expressed by speciﬁc phrases that aimed to reﬂect the mean- ing of the text. Analytical or theoretical connections between the themes composed thesuperordinate themes. RESULTS The results of the analysis show the interview data provide a rich description of teachers’ reﬂections about the eﬀects of the 12-week IBSR intervention on the individual teacher with an emphasis on the development of subsequent abili- ties to cope with the unique challenges of their profession.

The results are separated into three parts: (1) themes that were revealed before the intervention; (2) themes that were revealed after the intervention; (3) the limitation of the work- shop,asdescribedbysomeoftheparticipants.Parts1and 2 consider the description of the psychological state and 78 Volume 11—Number 2 Lia Schnaider-Levi et al. the outcome behaviors of the participants in the classroom, in the school environment and at home, and provide some interpretation based on other published literature.

Main Themes: Abstract Before the intervention, the teachers described multiple social interactions as being part of their daily routine.

Despite the positive and supportive relations with their colleagues, they also described an emotional overload and diﬃculty in dealing with the complicated reality. Moreover, they expressed a sense of frustration due to their unful- ﬁlled expectations and the gap between their professional ideology and the daily reality. After practicing the IBSR, teachers described two main experiences—a more centered and focused self and a greater ability to accept reality. The workshop’s structured and systematic format was suitable in this context, and it was described by them as being highly beneﬁcial. Details of teachers’ responses—before, during, and after the intervention— are presented in three separate panels over the next few pages.

Pre-Intervention Interview Results Analysis of the interview data collected prior to delivery of the intervention revealed two superordinate themes, as described in Figure 1. They represent the complex and stressful dynamic of the profession as detailed by the teachers. The participants’ names and data remained conﬁdential.

Multiple Relationships The teachers described various interactions and dynamics as part of their daily work routine with colleagues, pupils, and the pupils’ parents. These relationships were described as personal and having an emotional involvement, rather than professional.

Relations with colleagues and school management: support and understanding.

Paula “There are a couple of teachers, who are much more than friends.…it’s relaxing, it helps.…You are not alone.” Rosette “We have a great staﬀ, supportive.…Advice from a colleague is worth a lot…the cooperation is great.” Yehudit “She(theprincipal)isverynice.…I can always tell her how I feel.” Ya e l a “The principal and the staﬀ are great and supportive…it feels like a family.” Interactions with pupils and parentswere usually described as highly demanding and intensive, with considerable emotional involvement that made it challenging to set clear boundaries.

Yehudit “Spoiled kids…unable to postpone gratiﬁcation…unable to deal with diﬃculties.…Sometimes parents tell you, teach him, that is your job.…I tell them let’s do it together, I can’t do it without you.” Ta m a r “I beg them to stop disrupting the class.…it is very diﬃcult.…I sometimes tell them to please be quiet, Iwanttospeak…that is so insulting.…I teach them properly, they are always ready for tests…but sometimes it is very diﬃcult to control them.” Ricki “I constantly cope with boundaries issues…pupils text me during weekends and holidays…it’s diﬃcultformetosetanyboundaries.…There is a conﬂict between the need to be available for them and the need to be with my family.” Keren “If a parent calls you in the evening, how can you not answer him!? I cannot do that, it concerns children, not computers and papers. I had pupils who tried to commit suicide. Others ran away from home… how can I ignore that!?” Rosette “I need to work harder on setting boundaries…they are not so clear…I need to be more assertive.” Fig . 1.Main themes before and after the IBSR intervention. After the intervention, the teachers detailed various tech- nical aspects about the workshop that enable them to expe- rience the emotional process, such as the group format and the weekly phones calls with the facilitators. They all emphasized the importance of the practical tools given to them during the workshop (e.g., the “three types of business,” the four questions). Given the teachers’ compli- cated and chaotic experiences and their lack of emotional resources, their need for a systematic and focused practice is understandable:

The intervention was very systematic from the beginning.…It is a systematic process, which repeats itself.…I like it a lot. (Shira) Very clear rules were set, and suddenly you realize it works if you are consistent. (Paula) Volume 11—Number 2 79 IBSR Meditation for Burnout Among Teachers Expectations vs. Reality Positive attitude toward the professionwas noted by most of the teachers. This included ideological reasons for choosing this profession and a positive perception regarding a teacher’s contribution and role.

Rosette “Teaching is a way of life.It’s a great privilege.…The pupils’ success is our success.…It’s like therapy, you touch people’s lives.” Hen “Iwantedtopassonmyknowledge.…It’s a childhood dream. I had a geography teacher, whom I appreciated a lot, the way she taught, her caring and interest.” Yehudit “Each teacher is an educator.…Not just preparing pupils to the ﬁnal exams.…You need empathy, love for children.… Understanding their uniqueness.…They will learn only if you create a personal contract with them.” Overload: Their daily routine as teachers was described as highly demanding and stressful.

Ya e l a “There is a lot of stress, many things to do…How can I function with all these tasks?!” Keren “Whenyouentertheclassyouhavetobefocused.…with 40 pupils.…You have to be extra-focused and concentrated, to ignore your personal problems.…You always have stuﬀ on your mind.…You don’t rest even at home.…No rest.” Paula “You need a lot of energy.…You work many hours and it is natural to be burned out.…The work is very diﬃcult.…A stranger won’t understand it.…All my friends have nine-to-ﬁve desk jobs. The only noise they hear is the air conditioner… whileIhaven’teatenanythingthewholeday.” Frustration: The busy schedule, full of tasks and commitments, limited their ability to deal with the meaningful educational issues. This gap between their ideology and personal expectations vs. their daily routine was experienced as a source of frustration and exhaustion.

Hen “I have many ideas…but it is diﬃcult to accomplish them.…Time is so limited.…I start my day, from one lesson to the other.…I hardly have time to go to the bathroom.…There is so little energy available for new ideas…you can accomplish only 10 percent of them.” Ricki “All the bureaucracy.…I don’t do what I am supposed to do.…Iamworkingsohard…Iamexhausted…they expect me to achieve goals.” Keren “I was very motivated…I did so many things. …(Now) I wake up every morning and I don’t want to go to work.…Iwishthe day will be over as quickly as possible.” Yehudit “I don’t want things to concern me…to aﬀect me.…I want to deal with my own business and not to get hurt…it will make things much easier for me.” After the Intervention After the workshop, two super ordinate themes emerged, which represented a more focused and structured perspective toward their profession and its unique aspects, as described by the teachers (Figure 1),accepting realityandcenteredness.

Accepting reality—increased awareness:—The teachers described an increased awareness of their reactions and perceptions of reality.

This awareness helped them accept reality as is and avoid futile attempts to change or confront it, thereby reducing their level of frustration and stress. The teachers experienced a higher level of satisfaction with themselves as well as with their surroundings.

Ya e l a “The workshop helped me to stop arguing with reality.…Today I truly understand how to love what exists and there is a lot to love!…The bad is always there, you just need to focus less on it…, when I don’t argue and accept myself…it is like going outofjailinsomeways.” Neriya “When [pupils] talk—I don’t immediately freak out. You know what I mean? Until now every little twit drove me crazy. But now I say it’s okay, it’s okay for them to talk, so what if they are talking, keep teaching.” Shaked “The workshop helped me to focus my awareness on various situations…not to automatically complain but to understand when there is a genuine pain that I need to work on so it won’t hurt anymore…for example, when it is diﬃcult for my children, it hurts me physically…so I tell myself that I need to think about the situation diﬀerently.” Shira “It [ the intervention] conﬁrmed that I am on the right track and that is important.…In the complexity of teaching, you need to adjust yourself…it conﬁrmed that my instincts are correct.” Hen “One thought terribly bothered me. I sat down and devoted some time to it. I actually took the ‘Judge Your Neighbor’ sheet and applied The Work. Things I’m familiar with, I use the turnarounds on. Others which I’m not, like when I’m in a midday overload, I tell myself to pay attention to bad feelings and take them on an inquiry.” Accepting reality—ﬂexible thinkingThe participants described their improved ability to interpret and perceive various situations in a more ﬂexible manner, with no rigid assumptions or emotional involvement. This was achieved mainly by the technique of the turnaround, which enabled the participants to acknowledge the subjectivity of their thoughts and beliefs.

Shaked “Many times during stress…we have a thought that causes us to get stuck and it ( the turnarounds) was very easy.…Now I turn the situation to myself or to the other, and it releases something in your way of thinking…it is importantfor methat the house will be clean, so my son does not have to do the dishes.…It changed the way I act in my house, with my children and with my husband.” 80 Volume 11—Number 2 Lia Schnaider-Levi et al. Yehudit “I understand that children are sitting in front of me in the classroom, not adults…and so my expectations should be diﬀerent.…I don’t need to judge them according to my values; they are in a diﬀerent place than me, so I need to treat them diﬀerently.” Paula “Mainly doubting your thoughts, instead of blaming someone else. Asking the questions, and the turnarounds, creates doubts and takes you elsewhere. Neutralizes all kinds of variables: when you are in the middle of a storm, you are certain it is intentional and devious, and then when you turn it around, you realize—wait, I contribute to this situation as well!” Centeredness: The teachers described a more focused and centered self, which helped them to deal better with the various relationships and dynamics in their daily routine. This experience was diﬀerent from the former experience of splits and complexity, which was described by them before the intervention. During the workshop they were trained to set emotional boundaries in various daily interactions, in particular, the technique of “the three types of businesses,” which was described as highly practical and helpful.

Ricki “We checked whose ‘business’ were they, and it was clear that they were the pupil’s.…IwasfrustratedthatIcannothelpher, but another teacher helped me understand that I am dealing with her business.…IcouldnothelpherbecauseIwastoo emotionally involved…setting boundaries was what she needed the most.” Rosette “For me it was a problem that lasted for years…and then things surfaced here during the workshop. Being very clear, set boundaries, speak assertively. I left with a large toolbox. Sometimes I feel we are kind of slaves of our thoughts.…” Yehudit “It really changed the way I act in the classroom…my pupils’ behavior aﬀects me much less, which is a signiﬁcant beneﬁt for me.…I respond less to their behavior…emotionally.…Once if there was noise, if they didn’t listen…I used to get so upset and scream.…Now I don’t get nervous and aggressive.…Three months ago, I was crazy, bitter, nervous.…Iusedto react very intuitively…very aggressively.…Now I take my time.…IammorerelaxedandIthink.…I explore it my way.” Ya e l a “The thing that aﬀected me the most was the issue of the ‘business.’…Many times you discover you are not dealing with your own ‘business.’…You deal with those of others and you neglect your own.…This workshop can help teachers to avoid misunderstandings with pupils…to reduce conﬂicts…using the four simple questions we learned.…Investigating our thoughts as teachers can reduce stressful situations in teaching.…I am much more attentive, I try to understand what the other person wants.” Limitations of the Workshop Although the teachers were satisﬁed with the intervention, they described several limitations of the workshop. First, most of them were skeptical about their ability to practice the technique without regular group meetings. They expressed a need to integrate it into their routine. Second, some teachers were concerned about the exposure of personal issues in front of their colleagues, with whom they have an ongoing professional relationship. DISCUSSION Before the intervention, the interviews revealed a state of emotional overload and exhaustion among the participants.

This ﬁnding was described in previous studies as a charac- teristic of teaching and as a source of emotional stress for teachers (Sorek et al., 2004). A study by Friedman (2000) demonstrated that unaccomplished expectations and shat- tered dreams have a signiﬁcant role in the process of burnout among teachers. After the intervention, the positive eﬀects described above can be evaluated by the theoretical frame- work ofpsychological well-being(Keyes, 2007; Ryﬀ, 1989, 1995; Sin & Lyubomirsky, 2009; Tylee & Wallace, 2009; World Health Organization, 2004). This model includes six dimensions of wellness, manifested in the results of the study as follows. (1)Self-acceptance, demonstrated in the current study by the teachers having reported higher levels of self-awareness and a more peaceful inner selfafter the intervention, as well as by acknowledging their abilities as well as accepting their weaknesses. (2)positive and reciprocal relationships with others,expressedasthe capability of empathy, aﬀection, and intimacy. The teach- ers described better interactions with their surroundings after the intervention due to their enhanced ability to set boundaries with less emotional involvement and by hav- ing a more ﬂexible attitude. In addition, the positive and close relationships that were formed with the rest of the participants helped the teachers to feel more acknowledged and appreciated, which improved their daily interactions at work. (3)Autonomy in thoughts and action,demon- strated by the ability to resist social pressure and to regulate behavior and thoughts by personal standards. The improved ability to set boundaries and sustain centered, self-helped teachers maintain their personal standards and values with less pressure from external surroundings. (4)Environmental mastery and competence, which translated into the ability to manage complex external surroundings and to choose or create contexts suitable to personal needs and values.

The teachers’ increased ability to set boundaries with a more ﬂexible position improved their ability to perform in the classroom and handle interpersonal dynamics. (5) Purpose in life, which replaced ideology and meaning as signiﬁcant and inherent features of their profession by personal values and goals, and redeﬁned them as a current resource of meaning and fulﬁllment. (6)Personal growth and development, as deﬁned by feelings of realizing one’s Volume 11—Number 2 81 IBSR Meditation for Burnout Among Teachers potential and openness to new experiences. The meditative process of the intervention focused on personal aspects and helped the teachers to acknowledge their abilities and inner strength, thereby initiating a process of personal development.

Limitations of the Study We are aware of several limitations of this study. The partici- pants were all from a single high school in Israel. It evaluated only the short-term eﬀects of a short mindfulness interven- tion. The data were collected by conducting two personal interviews with the researcher, which may have had an addi- tional eﬀect on the participants’ responses. It included only one IBSR group from the two intervention groups. How- ever, the group was selected randomly which minimizes the risk of bias. In addition, as described in the Results section, the teachers themselves described several limitations of the workshop, such as the need for regular practice as an integral part of their work and their ambivalence about its implemen- tation in a professional setting with colleagues.

To conclude, the current qualitative study demonstrated the positive eﬀects of the IBSR intervention on unique aspects related to teaching. These results should be fur- ther evaluated in large-scale studies with longer follow-ups in order to widen the understanding of the technique’s potential eﬃcacy as a tool for improving well-being among teachers.

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