Stress Reduction: Mindful Mandalas

Mental Health is an ever-increasing topic of discussion in several sectors of today’s society. One career, law enforcement, seems to correlate job-related responsibilities with rising numbers in post-traumatic stress disorder, depression, and anxiety. A group of nursing students from Olivet Nazarene University sought to incorporate their understanding of stressors associated with the helping profession of law enforcement while researching cost-effective, evidence-based, self-care methods that have a proven ability to reduce signs of depression and anxiety. One such method is the practice of mindfulness. Mindfulness must be understood fundamentally before it may be useful in practice in reducing the effects of stressors. With the help of faculty mentor Dr. Deanna VanKuren who has an earned Doctor of Nursing Practice in research related to self-care methods, the students learned of a wide variety of self-care methods of which the focus on mindfulness was chosen. To narrow the many expressive mindfulness practices, a cost-effective option was focused upon. Mandalas was the focus mindfulness topic, although the research presented contains options for many different routes of mindfulness. The goal of the research aims to introduce cost-effective, stress relief and coping skills for the helping profession, specifically law enforcement. The focus of the research was surrounding the use of mindful mandalas. Both psychological and physiological effects were researched with results indicating positive impacts of mindfulness on law enforcement officers. Overall, community impact of nursing research on mindful mandalas on the target group of law enforcement indicates positive advancements