Jul
04
Meditation for the mind, body and spirit
Why do we meditate, practice mindfulness, or other mindbody therapies? Perhaps you’ve tried it for relaxation, or to ease the mind, or perhaps because you’ve heard it helps with stress and anxiety. Perhaps you are looking for some way to relieve pain when the drugs are just not working. Or you may be thinking of giving it a go because mindfulness is all the rage right now.
Image via Favim.com
Interest in the health benefits of meditation has seen a increase in research in many different fields over the past few decades. As an indication of this growth, research into the effects of mindfulness alone has grown exponentially in the past decade from just 52 articles in 2003 to 549 in 2013.
As these studies have shown meditation is about more than simple relaxation, blissing out or doing nothing, meditation IS beneficial for health and wellbeing. Here are some findings on the effects of meditation and mindfulness on the mind, body and spirit.
Mind
Anxiety, depression, stress and burnout.
You should sit in meditation for twenty minutes every day — unless you’re too busy. Then you should sit for an hour. – Zen proverb
Suffers of severe stress, anxiety or depression (often all at the same time) can find it difficult to regulate emotions, or could be struggling with finding a balancing perspective in certain situations. Decision making is often difficult, whilst trying to retain focus or concentration can seem impossible when stressed. Meditation can help and mindfulness training in particular has been shown to have a positive effect on regions of the brain that deal with executive function, impulse control, decision making, learning and memory, perspective taking, emotion regulation and connection to self and others.
Mindfulness training generally comes in the form of Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) an eight week program that teaches participants to use mindfulness techniques to help manage stress and anxiety, including incorporating daily mindful meditations. (There are also numerous modified versions of MBSR in clinical and therapeutic settings).
In this analysis of 209 studies in which 12,145 participants received mindfulness based therapies that included a mindfulness meditation component, researchers confirm that mindfulness is an effective treatment for anxiety, depression and stress.
Mindfulness for teachers is also gaining rapid momentum. Teaching, as a profession, has a very high attrition rate due to stress and burnout. Numerous studies have shown positive and promising outcomes from teachers learning mindfulness and the knock on effect this therapy has for student learning and teacher / student relations in the classroom.
In this comprehensive study researchers offered a modified MBSR program to 18 primary school teachers, 10 of whom received the program and 8 in the waitlist control (they would receive the intervention after the study was complete). Researchers tested for numerous factors including psychological distress, mindfulness and self-compassion, burnout and teacher classroom behaviour. Mindfulness equated to increased mindfulness and self-compassion in the classroom, improved teacher behaviour and reductions in psychological symptoms and burnout. Overall the teachers had an improved sense of wellbeing and classroom effectiveness. These results were so impactful that researchers suggest mindfulness programs have “potential for systematic implementation as a part of teachers’ professional development.”
Body
Healthy eating
In this study researchers wanted to see if mindfulness could be used to encourage healthy eating habits and weight control. They carried out four separate studies and found that overall mindfulness, or mindful food consumption, successfully reduced calorie intake and resulted in healthier food choices. In discussing the significance of these finding researchers suggest that “these results provide strong evidence that mindfulness encourages healthier eating, even in the absence of specific instruction in mindful eating. Mindfulness may thus be a pertinent factor in a theoretical understanding of eating behavior.” Mindfulness may provide dietitians and nutritionists with new ways to work with clients on obesity and excess weight issues.
Better sleep
I’ve previously talked about the benefits of meditation for sleep. In this sleep study, patients prescribed antidepressants who had ‘sleep complaints’ were given an eight week program of mindfulness based cognitive therapy (now used as a primary therapy for patients with depression). The participants also kept sleep diaries and meditation practice logs. Results showed improved “sleep efficiency”, and “less time awake at night” in the mindfulness group. Researcher suggest that those who are taking antidepressants and experiencing sleeplessness may benefit from meditation training and ongoing practice to help achieve longer and better quality sleep.
Spirit
Cultivating compassion
In the words of Thich Nhat Hahn in this interview, mindfulness meditation “will fundamentally change their perspective on life as it naturally opens hearts to greater compassion and develops the desire to end the suffering of others.”
Whether compassion was an intended effect of the mindfulness intervention in this study is unclear, but it was found that a mindfulness training program did help career’s, in a disability care home, respond in a more mindful, caring and less reactive way to challenging patients. Hopefully with continual practice these career’s will develop compassion and empathy towards the suffering of those in their care.
There is a growing body of research that is also looking at the benefits of mindfulness and meditation for compassion, kindness and altruistic behavior. Rather than evidencing the benefits through stress surveys, blood cortisol levels and other quantitative means, these researchers are wanting to share ‘peoples stories’ and experiences. Understanding peoples experiences and how these therapies and meditation practices work from this perspective, will add greatly to the scientific work already being undertaken.
As Brene Brown so beautifully reflects in her book, Daring Greatly, “maybe stories are research with a soul.”
Meditation is not a matter of trying to achieve ecstasy, spiritual bliss, or tranquility, nor is it attempting to be a better person. It is simply the creation of a space in which we are able to expose and undo our neurotic games, our self-deceptions, our hidden fears and hopes. – Chogyam Trungpa
Mindfulness is said to be innate in all of us, but as we grow older life’s distractions, life’s choices, and the simple busyness of day to day life, even for children, finds us shedding our mindful being, replacing it with one of planning for tomorrow, thinking about yesterday, and worrying about what others think about us. This is one reason there is interest in bringing the skills of mindfulness, through meditation and play, into the classroom to ensure children today have the ability to develop these innate skills to lead better lives into the future; a future that which will no doubt have more to distract them than they already have today.
But mediation shouldn’t be seen as a panacea for all of life’s ills that effect our mind, body and spirit. Instead it is a means of gaining insight into us, our lives, our emotions, and understanding how our minds and bodies interact. The many health benefits and positive health outcomes that I’ve talked about here and that are being studied all over the world, are a result of this insight; mindfulness brings acceptance and transformation.
Has mindfulness helped you in mind, body or spirit? Consider sharing your story.
