credit: FARBFROH
Meditation refers to various techniques that have been practiced for thousands of years in many different cultures. Most meditation techniques originated in Eastern religious or spiritual traditions. Though meditation is widely recognized as a spiritual practice, it can also lower stress levels, combat particular health problems and improve your overall physical health and mental strength.
Meditation Practices
In meditation, you focus your mind on a particular object, mantra, thought or experience. Through meditation, you can experience a state of awareness, bliss and enlightenment. Though meditation techniques such as yoga, tai chi and others, vary quite a bit, most have the following elements in common:
Quiet Location
Most meditators practice meditation in a quiet location with as little distractions as possible. After years of meditating, some people can actually meditate in crowded public locations. However, this is not the norm – particularly for beginners.
Focus of Attention
In nearly every type of meditation, the meditator must focus his/her attention on specific object, mantra (phrase), the breath, thought or experience.
Open Attitude
During meditation, the meditator must let their thoughts flow freely. If wandering thoughts occur, they shouldn’t be suppressed but rather let them flow through and bring your attention back to the focus.
Health Benefits of Meditation
When your mind focuses on a particular part of the body in meditation, the blood flows to that part and the cells receive more oxygen and nutrients. Studies have shown through regular meditation, many people can reap physical, emotional and mental benefits. Yoga and meditation techniques are implemented to help reduce stress, accelerate learning programs, manage chronic pain and life threatening diseases, reverse some mental illnesses, and maintain overall well being.
Stress Reduction
Meditation has shown to combat stress and many stress related disorders. Most people who begin meditation do so to relieve stress. Stress can result from pressures experienced in all aspects of life. Stress can stem from work, family, illness, or other factors. If stress continues, conditions such as anxiety, depression, hypertension and heart disease may develop. Meditation is even used in hospitals and clinics in cases of chronic or terminal illness to reduce complications associated with increased stress.
Research studies have shown that hormones and other biochemicals in the blood that are indicative of stress decrease during meditation. And with regular meditation sessions, these changes stabilize so that a person is actually becomes less stressed during daily activities.
Pain Management
Those who suffer from chronic pain can oftentimes find no physical cure for their ailments. And though meditation may not completely eliminate pain, it can certainly help some people cope with pain more effectively.
Pain causes anxiety and anxiety decreases the threshold for pain. As you can imagine, a vicious cycle develops where patients begin to feel more and more pain and anxiety. You can break this cycle by practicing meditation. If you can learn to manage your anxiety through relaxation techniques and meditation, you will increase your pain threshold and reduce your anxiety level, resulting in a decrease in chronic pain and improvement in overall quality of life.
For women who are expecting, childbirth classes teach breathing exercises to help minimize the pain and anxiety of labor. This is another case of meditation and relaxation techniques helping with pain management.
High Blood Pressure
Meditation increases blood flow, slows heart rate, improves circulation and helps lower blood pressure. Those with hypertension who can lower their blood pressure significantly will reduce their risk of stroke, heart attack and other circulatory ailments.
Anxiety and Depression
Through meditation, you can develop emotional stability and improve overall quality of life. For those who suffer from anxiety attacks, meditation helps to lower the levels of blood lactate, thus resulting in less frequent attacks. Meditation also helps to increase serotonin production. Low serotonin is commonly associated with depression, insomnia and other physical disoreders.
Premenstrual Syndrome (PMS)
Meditation can help ease premenstrual syndrome (PMS), tension headaches and other such health problems. Because stress and anxiety leads to muscle tension, body aches and other PMS complaints, you can use meditation to reduce the stress and anxiety (and thus the symptoms). Though the effect of meditation are not always immediate, practicing meditation once or twice daily can result in a substantial reduction in the problems associated with PMS over a period of time.
Cancer
Dr. Ainslie Meares, an Australian psychiatrist who uses meditation with cancer patients, has written on the success of meditation in her field. “Nearly all such patients can expect significant reduction of anxiety and depression, together with much less discomfort and pain. There is reason to expect a 10 percent chance of quite remarkable slowing of the rate of growth of the tumor, and a 50 percent chance of greatly improved quality of life.” Many doctors agree with Dr. Meares conclusions and find that reducing stress often reduces the growth of cancerous tumors and relieves pain associated with cancer.
Infertility
Couples dealing with infertility issues oftentimes become depressed and anxious. Several doctora suggest meditation to help them cope with the stress, anxiety and depression associated with infertility problems. Women are more likely to get pregnant when they are not stressed out and worried. Additionally, some studies have shown an increase in sperm count and fertility in men who have reduced their stress levels through meditation and relaxation techniques.
Slower Aging
People who practice meditation experience a lowering of their body temperature. Lower body temperature leads to longevity. Also less stress improves the texture and tone of skin and reduces the appearance of fine lines and wrinkles.
Concentration
Many professional athletes use meditation methods to help strengthen their mind and concentration. With a stronger mind, they are better able to guide their to execute physical projects. Thus, leading to improved preformance on the playing field. Pro athletes are not the only ones that can benefit mentally and physically from improved concentration. Nearly everyone can use a stronger mind to better their physical and athletic capabilities.
Other Ailments
Research has shown that meditation can also be helpful in combating other ailments and health problems including fibromyalgia, psoriasis, irritable bowel syndrome and others. Because so many illnesses are related to the effects of stress and anxiety, meditation can help fight all sorts of health problems.
Meditation Made Easy
With such overwhelming evidence about benefits of meditation, everyone should be meditating. Many people think that meditation is difficult or that they need to pay a lot of money for yoga or meditation classes. That simple isn’t the case. There are many different types of meditation that are easy to learn. As long as you have a quiet place to relax and can find just a few minutes a day, you can start meditate.
Books, CDs, classes and websites offer information about the various styles of meditation available. Though many people benefit from group meditation classes, you can actually learn to meditate on your own by looking up information on the Internet or checking out books from your local library about meditation techniques. It doesn’t need to cost you a dime.
Find a meditation method that feels natural and comfortable to you. Soon you will find yourself reaping the mental and physical health benefits of meditation.
