Rachel Jones never expected to be a champion of mindfulness. In fact, when she was first introduced to the practice 23 years ago, she dismissed it outright. "I thought it was a huge joke," she admitted with a laugh. At the time, she was juggling graduate school, single parenthood and postpartum depression. The idea that breathing and being present could solve her problems seemed unrealistic.
Everything shifted about a decade ago when overwhelming stress landed her in the emergency room. That experience led Jones to rediscover mindfulness — from student to practitioner, and now as a leader integrating mindfulness training into Missouri’s Department of Mental Health.
A journey back to mindfulness
Jones' formal mindfulness training began in 2021 when she took the eight-week Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) program through Brown University.
“The first class I took had people from around the world,” Jones said. “I was actually quite surprised that some of the things that I naively thought were just U.S. culture turned out to be this worldwide human experience.”