Various studies on meditation

Vox has an article titled "Are we morally obligated to meditate?", a general article about the author's meditation journey and the various studies on meditation they came across.

Meditation and mindfulness training may lower blood pressure

There is anecdotal evidence that meditation and mindfulness training may reduce blood pressure, according to Medical News Today.  The study can be found at https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0223095.

An excerpt from Beyond the Self

Beyond the Self is a book by Matthieu Ricard (a molecular biologist that became a Buddhist monk in Nepal) and Wolf Singer (a neuroscientist) that is a conversation between the two about meditation and the brain.  The Atlantic has an excerpt - it's a bit of heavy reading, but interesting nonetheless.

Transcendental Meditation for treating Post-traumatic stress disorder

A study funded by the Department of Defense, US Army Medical Research and done at the Department of Veterans Affairs San Diego Healthcare System found that Transcendental Meditation works as an alternative for those who do not want to receive or do not respond to exposure-based treatments for Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).

Buddhist meditation used in Thai cave soccer team ordeal

According to Vox, the soccer team's coach taught them to meditate to help them keep calm and preserve their energy during their two-week ordeal.

Why Meditate? Change your Brain's Default Mode

I came across this on YouTube the other evening and thought that this might be of interest for others.

Meditation can change the brains of ordinary people and improve their health

A study published in Biological Psychiatry shows that meditation can change the brains of ordinary people and improve their health.  There's an indication in the article that other studies have not had "scientific thoroughness", but I don't know if that claim is true or not.

Meditation Affects Cancer Survivors

Researchers find that meditation maintains the length of telomeres in cancer survivors whereas they shorten in non-meditators.

Mapping the Mindful Brain

Episode 259 of the Buddhist Geeks podcast interviews Dr. Judson Brewer about his work of studying the effects of meditation on the brain.  The podcast also discusses meditators using Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging to get immediate feedback on their practice.  There's also discussion on using this to test the various products out there to see how effective they are.

Where There's A Will

Episode 135 of Dr. Kiki's Science Hour discusses the science of will power, including how it relates to the brain and some discussion on how meditation affects the brain.

A Reflection on Life and Lucid Dreaming

In many cases, a dream tries to reflect reality. However, for whatever reason, there are usually elements in the dream that are out of place. The conscious mind can notice these out of place elements, but generally only if there is enough awareness to catch the tuggings of the conscious mind. Usually we are so buried in the dream that we don't notice those oddities, accepting them as they are, until after we wake up - if we even remember the dream at all.

If you have enough awareness to hear those tuggings of the conscious mind, your conscious mind can rise up to where you realize that you are in a dream. Thus begins a lucid dream, where you can just watch or start to take control of your dream. Sometimes the conscious mind can rise up too much to where you begin to wake up.

One analogy that has been used about life is that it is a dream. How our perception of life is actually a dream and that if we wake up, we can be enlightened, in the world but not of it, etc. And how does that waking up happen? Awareness. And how can awareness happen? Meditation.

In the waking world, I see that the ego, shadow self, or whatever you want to call it, acts just like that part of the brain that gives us dreams. Then there is the higher consciousness, or super consciousness, that tries to tell us that we are dreaming. How well we hear it depends on our level of awareness.

I recently had an experience that brought me much pain in the past. This time, however, I could see that it was the ego making noise, trying to protect me. Despite noticing this, it still produced stress, as I had no idea what to do about it. I could clear my mind, but not too much later it would come back. It's like not being knocked over by an ocean wave, but not too much later the next wave comes along.

How to describe what happened next is difficult. I guess I could say that I listened closer to what the ego was saying. It was saying something, though, that suggests that I made a conscious decision. It was then when I saw it for what it was, as I had not made that conscious decision at all and was (and still am) trying to figure things out enough to come to a decision.

Now I am at a point of realization that if I make a particular decision, the voice of that ego will come back. I'm not sure what I would do, but am trying to not let that influence my decision. But I do have it in the back of my mind, trying to figure out how to bring peace to that part of me, as no matter what decision I make, it is likely to come back sooner or later.

Meditation Reduces Pain

A study by Wake Forest University School of Medicine finds that meditation reduces pain by 40 percent and reduced pain more than pain-relieving drugs.

Of course trying to meditate while in pain can be challenging.

Meditation in a High-Security Prison

NPR tells the story of the William E. Donaldson Correctional Facility and their Vipassana meditation program. One of the results of this program: "...a 20 percent reduction in disciplinary action."

The Brain, Thermodynamics, and Entropy

Bill Harris posts about ah-ha moments, how one moment can affect people differently, thermodynamics, and entropy. It's the first part of a series that I am sure that will go more into open systems (which this post touches upon) and how it relates to the brain, meditation, and Holosync.

Wandering Minds Are Unhappy Minds

According to a study, people are thinking of being somewhere else or doing something else other than what they are doing half of the time and that this mind-wandering makes them unhappy.

Apparently an iPhone application would randomly ask people at different times what they were doing and if they were thinking about their activity or something else that was pleasant, neutral, or negative. The application is available at http://www.trackyourhappiness.org. People were found to be happiest when having sex, exercising, or having a conversation. They were least happy while using a computer, resting, or working.

It's interesting to note that those activities where people were happiest were those that require or bring about presence (or being in the present). Sex and exercise get you out of your mind and into the body. A conversation requires you to listen to someone else. Thankfully, we have a practice that helps us cultivate presence in our life - meditation.

Contemplative Neuroscientists Belive Meditation Can Change Your Brain

Before reading the CNN Article - Can meditation change your brain? Contemplative neuroscientists believe it can, I had never heard of contemplative neuroscientists, which basically deals with the brain science of meditation. The article touches a bit on this as well as a bit of history in meditation research as well as what is going on today with studies, the funding for that research, as well as some criticisms about that research.

Meditation and Other Related Practices for Mental Illness

The National Alliance on Mental Illness Hearts & Minds initiative is using meditation, yoga, and other "mindful" practices for mental illnesses such as depression, bipolar disorder, and schizophrenia. An article in Medical News Today discusses some information about the program.

Awareness, Consciousness, and Technology

Technology can make us unaware of what we are doing, yet at the same time can potentially lead us to be more conscious. Sounds True: Insights at the Edge looks at the interaction of things such as cell phones, social media, awareness, consciousness, and presence.

Meditation reduces the emotional impact of pain

An article from Physorg.com talks about a study that says that meditation reduces the emotional impact of pain. I didn't find this article fully clear, as while it talks about the emotional reaction to pain, there are parts where they seem to be talking more about the physical sensation of pain.

While the article mentions that meditation brings about a "present-focused" brain, how much of this dealing with pain better might be coming about from not resisting and not judging it?

Meditation Changes Your Genes

A study by researchers at Benson-Henry Institute for Mind/Body Medicine at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) and the Genomics Center at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC) looked at how meditation changes how genes behave in response to stress (as well as other relaxation techniques).

The study compared long term practitioners, people that completed 8 weeks of relaxation technique training, and general people who were not practitioners and found that up to 2,209 genes were significantly different. Some of these genes are involved with inflammation, programmed cell death and the handling of free radicals.

It's great to have more studies on the benefits of meditation.