Name: Terran Palmer-Angell ’05
Majors: Psychology and Religious Studies
Hometown: Plattsburgh, NY
Activities: Men’s tennis, University Fellowship, Omicron Delta Kappa (ODK) leadership honorary, psychology and religious studies honoraries, Community Assistant, Who’s Who Among American Colleges and Universities, National Dean’s List.

With a double major in psychology and religious studies, Terran Palmer-Angell has embarked on a unique research project that exemplifies St. Lawrence’s commitment to interdisciplinary studies.

“I spent last fall on the India program,” he explains. “Part of the program is independent research, and I chose to focus on Tibetan Buddhist meditation techniques and whether the steps taken and methods used are progressive or interchangeable,” he explains. He interviewed the Dalai Lama’s personal translator, talked with the abbot of the Dalai Lama’s home monastery, and spoke to several other high lamas, monks and nuns about Tibetan Buddhist meditation practice.

This study complements his interest in sports psychology. “I want to see how Tibetan practices can be integrated into sport” says the men’s tennis team member. “The dedication to sports in the United States is the only Western parallel to the seriousness and dedication found in Buddhist philosophy. Sport practice is about teaching life skills, how to train the mind for optimal performance. People in the West don’t have as much of a sense of how to control their physiology, so I want to develop a meditation model based on Tibetan Buddhism that could be applied to tennis to increase performance.”

Palmer-Angell received a University Fellowship to conduct further research last summer. He hopes to come up with a meditation model he can personally test out in training and then potentially test on other St. Lawrence athletes.