Meditation
MBSR (Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction): What It Is & How to Try It
AI-assisted draft, checked against linked sources · Not clinically reviewed · Editorial standards
MBSR, or mindfulness-based stress reduction, is an eight-week group course created by Jon Kabat-Zinn at the University of Massachusetts Medical School in 1979. Weekly classes teach body scans, sitting and walking meditation, and gentle mindful movement, with daily practice at home. You can try a guided sitting meditation in the MBSR style below.
Guided audio
Listen and rest
Lie down or sit with support, set the volume low, and press Play. You can pause or stop at any time, and it's fine to fall asleep.
Read by an AI-generated voice (OpenAI text-to-speech), not a recording of a person. The script is original to Breath Harbor.
Read the 10-minute transcript
This practice is read by an AI-generated voice. It is a sitting meditation of about ten minutes. You can stop at any time, open your eyes, or shift your position whenever you need to.
Sit in a way that feels upright and supported, feet on the floor, back straight but not stiff, hands resting in your lap. Let your eyes close, or lower your gaze to the floor in front of you. Let your shoulders drop.
There's nothing to achieve here. This is simply time to be present with whatever is here, and to notice when the mind wanders.
Notice your body on the seat, and your feet on the floor.
Now bring your attention to the breath, wherever you feel it most clearly: at the nostrils, in the chest, or in the belly. You don't need to change it. Just feel each breath coming in and going out.
When the mind wanders, as it will, notice where it went. Then gently bring it back to the breath. Each return is the practice.
Now let your attention widen to the whole body, sitting and breathing. Notice any sensations, and let them be as they are. If you need to move, move slowly and with attention.
Now open your attention to sounds, near and far. Let them come and go, without naming them or following them.
If you like, notice thoughts as they appear. See if you can watch them come and go, like clouds crossing the sky, without being carried away. If you are carried away, come back to the breath for a moment.
Now let go of any particular focus, and rest in awareness of whatever is here, moment by moment.
As the practice comes to an end, come back to the breath for a few moments. Notice the whole body sitting here, and the room around you.
When you're ready, gently open your eyes and move in any way that feels good. The practice is now complete.
Read the 20-minute transcript
This practice is read by an AI-generated voice. It is a sitting meditation of about twenty minutes. You can stop at any time, open your eyes, or shift your position whenever you need to.
Find a way of sitting that feels upright and supported. On a chair, let your feet rest flat on the floor and your back be straight but not stiff. On a cushion, let your knees be lower than your hips if you can. Let your hands rest on your thighs or in your lap.
Let your eyes close, or lower your gaze to a spot on the floor a little way in front of you. Let your shoulders drop. Let your jaw soften.
This practice is not about making anything happen. There's no special state to reach. It's simply a time to be present with whatever is here, and to notice, again and again, when the mind has wandered off.
Begin by noticing the points of contact. Your feet on the floor. Your body on the seat. Your hands where they rest. Let the body be held by what is beneath it.
Now bring your attention to the breath. You don't need to change it. Simply notice where you feel it most clearly. Perhaps at the nostrils, the cool air coming in and the warmer air going out. Perhaps in the chest, or in the belly, rising and falling.
Choose one place, and rest your attention there. Feel the full length of each in-breath, and the full length of each out-breath.
Sooner or later, the mind will wander, into planning, remembering, or daydreaming. That's not a mistake. It's what minds do. When you notice that you're no longer with the breath, take a moment to see where the mind went. Then, gently, bring it back.
Each time you come back is the practice. There's no need to judge yourself, however many times it happens.
Now let your attention widen from the breath to include the whole body, sitting here. A sense of the body as a whole, breathing.
You might notice sensations of warmth or coolness, pressure or tingling, places of ease and places of tension. Let them be as they are. If a sensation is strong, you can explore it with curiosity, or let your attention rest on the breath again.
If you feel discomfort and want to move, you can. Move slowly and with attention, noticing the wish to move, the movement itself, and how the body feels afterward.
Now let the body move to the background, and open your attention to sounds. Sounds near and sounds far. Sounds that are loud and sounds that are quiet. The spaces between sounds.
There's no need to go looking for sounds, or to name them. Just let them come to you, arising and passing away.
Now, if you're willing, turn your attention to thinking itself. Instead of following thoughts, see if you can notice them as events in the mind. A thought appears, stays for a while, and passes, like clouds moving across the sky.
You might notice the kind of thought: planning, worrying, remembering, judging. You can silently note it, "planning," "remembering," and let it go. If you get carried away by a thought, that's fine. Come back to the breath for a few moments, then return to watching.
If watching thoughts feels like too much right now, simply return to the breath, or to the feeling of your body on the seat. You can always come back to these anchors.
Now let go of any particular focus. Rest in awareness of whatever is most present, moment by moment. The breath. Sensations. Sounds. Thoughts. Feelings. Nothing to hold on to, nothing to push away. Just being here, aware.
Rest here a little longer.
As this practice comes to an end, come back to the breath for a few moments. Feeling the body breathing.
Notice the whole body sitting here. Notice the room around you, and the sounds in it.
You might take a moment to appreciate that you've given yourself this time.
When you're ready, gently open your eyes, look around, and move in any way that feels good. Carry a little of this awareness with you into the next part of your day.
The practice is now complete.
The practice is complete. Take your time before you get up.
How do you feel now?
How to do MBSR: the 8-week course
A standard MBSR course is taught live by a trained teacher, in person or online, to a small group. The details vary by teacher, but most courses share this shape:
- An orientation before the course starts, to explain what is involved and check that the timing is right for you.
- Eight weekly classes of about two to two and a half hours, mixing guided practice, short teaching on stress and attention, and group discussion.
- Formal practices introduced over the weeks: the body scan, sitting meditation, gentle mindful movement or yoga, and walking meditation.
- Informal practice in daily life, such as paying full attention to a routine activity, or noting pleasant and unpleasant moments and how the body reacts to them.
- Daily home practice, often 30 to 45 minutes, usually with recordings from the teacher.
- A day of practice, typically a silent, all-day session between the sixth and seventh weeks.
The home practice is a real commitment, and it is a large part of what research on MBSR has tested. A course is not a single relaxation technique; it is training in noticing stress reactions and responding to them with more choice.
Try MBSR-style practices now
You do not need to enroll to try the kinds of practice MBSR teaches. These are our own short versions, not the course itself:
| MBSR practice | Try it here |
|---|---|
| Sitting meditation | The guided audio above (10 or 20 minutes), or a silent sit with the meditation timer |
| Body scan | The body scan script, with a 5-minute guided audio version |
| Awareness of breathing | Mindful breathing, which observes the breath without changing it |
| Walking meditation | Walking meditation, indoors or outside |
| Informal practice | Everyday mindfulness exercises |
MBSR body scans and sittings are usually longer than ours, often 30 to 45 minutes. If you want to build toward that, start with a length you can repeat daily and extend it gradually. The how to meditate guide covers the basics.
Ways to take an MBSR course
- Live courses: Many hospitals, universities and independent teachers offer MBSR in person or by video. Ask whether the teacher has completed recognized MBSR teacher training, such as the certification pathway run by Brown University's Mindfulness Center in collaboration with UMass, and how they handle questions about your health.
- A free self-guided course: Palouse Mindfulness offers a free online eight-week course based on MBSR, created by a certified instructor, with videos, audio and practice sheets. It has no live teacher.
- Books and apps: Kabat-Zinn's book Full Catastrophe Living describes the program. Apps can help with regular practice but are not the same as a course.
A live course gives you a teacher who can answer questions and adapt practices, which matters most if you are managing a health condition or a lot of distress.
When to use it
MBSR was designed for people living with stress, pain or illness, and it is now widely offered to the general public. It may suit you if you want a structured way to build a daily meditation habit and are able to set aside time for weekly classes and home practice.
If eight weeks is too much right now, short practices like the ones above are a reasonable way to start. If you are looking for help with an anxiety disorder or depression, an MBSR course can be discussed with your clinician as one option, alongside the treatments they recommend. Meditation for anxiety offers a gentler first step, and 5-4-3-2-1 grounding keeps attention outward if turning inward feels like too much.
Who should be careful
Mindfulness practice is usually considered low-risk, but it is not risk-free. NCCIH reports that a 2020 review found about 8% of participants had a negative effect from meditation, most often anxiety or depression. Stop or open your eyes if a practice leaves you more distressed, dizzy or disconnected from your surroundings.
If you are living with the effects of trauma, active psychosis, severe depression, or thoughts of harming yourself, talk with a clinician before starting an intensive course, and tell the teacher at orientation. Gentle movement should be adapted to your body; skip any posture that causes pain. MBSR is not a replacement for medical or mental health treatment; talk with your doctor before making any change to medication. If you are in crisis in the U.S., call or text 988.
What the research says
MBSR is one of the most studied mindfulness programs.
- Healthy adults: A 2015 meta-analysis of 29 studies with 2,668 participants found MBSR moderately effective overall, with large effects on stress and moderate effects on anxiety, depression and quality of life. Results were maintained at an average follow-up of 19 weeks, but the studies varied widely.
- Anxiety disorders: In a 2023 randomized trial, 276 adults with diagnosed anxiety disorders took either an eight-week MBSR course or the antidepressant escitalopram. After eight weeks, anxiety severity had fallen by similar amounts in both groups, and MBSR met the trial's test for being noninferior to the medication.
- Broader evidence: A 2014 review of 47 trials of meditation programs found moderate evidence of small improvements in anxiety, depression and pain.
These results come from live, teacher-led courses with substantial home practice. They do not show what reading this page or using a short recording will do. Our research page explains how we read studies like these.
References
- Khoury B, Sharma M, Rush SE, Fournier C. Mindfulness-based stress reduction for healthy individuals: A meta-analysis. Journal of Psychosomatic Research. 2015. PubMed
- Hoge EA, Bui E, Mete M, et al. Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction vs Escitalopram for the Treatment of Adults With Anxiety Disorders: A Randomized Clinical Trial. JAMA Psychiatry. 2023. PubMed
- Goyal M, Singh S, Sibinga EMS, et al. Meditation programs for psychological stress and well-being: a systematic review and meta-analysis. JAMA Internal Medicine. 2014. PubMed
- National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health. Meditation and Mindfulness: Effectiveness and Safety. Evidence and safety
- Brown University School of Professional Studies. MBSR Teacher Certification Pathway. Teacher training
Common questions
What does MBSR stand for?
MBSR stands for mindfulness-based stress reduction. It is the name of the eight-week course developed by Jon Kabat-Zinn at the University of Massachusetts Medical School in 1979, which has since been taught in many countries.
Can I do MBSR at home for free?
You can follow a free self-guided course based on MBSR from Palouse Mindfulness, or practice MBSR-style meditations on your own. A self-guided course has no live teacher, so you will need to keep yourself on track and seek support if practices bring up difficulties.
Is MBSR good for anxiety?
In a 2023 trial of adults with anxiety disorders, an eight-week MBSR course reduced anxiety about as much as a common antidepressant over eight weeks. That was a teacher-led course in a research setting. Talk with your clinician about whether it fits your situation; it is not a reason to stop current treatment.
How long are MBSR meditations?
Formal practices in the course often last 30 to 45 minutes, and the home practice recordings are similar. If that feels long, start with 10 minutes, like the sitting meditation on this page, and build up gradually.
What is the difference between MBSR and MBCT?
MBCT, mindfulness-based cognitive therapy, adapts the MBSR format for people who have had recurrent depression, adding elements of cognitive therapy. MBSR is aimed at stress in general. Both are eight-week group courses.
Update history
- : First published with a 10- and 20-minute guided sitting meditation (AI-generated voice).