What Are Health Benefits Of Meditation

Ever wonder what are the health benefits of meditation? Many people do wonder if there are health benefits associated with meditation and we are here to tell you that there definitely are many benefits you can get by meditating.

We’ll cover some of the most common ones below.

 

What Are Health Benefits Of Meditation – Reduce Stress

Meditation can help reduce stress. It can also help improve some stress-related conditions. This includes post-traumatic stress disorder, irritable bowel syndrome, as well as fibromyalgia.

We get stressed out when we fear that the challenges and situations we are facing in our daily lives will become too much for us to handle. When we get into a stressful situation our stress hormone cortisol gets released by our brain.

Research has proven that when people practice meditation and are thrown into stressful situations, their cortisol production decreased. These levels remained low well after the subjects were done meditating.

Reducing your stress levels will help you to sleep better as well as lowering your blood pressure.

 

What Are Health Benefits Of Meditation – Improving Your Memory

Practicing meditation can also help you increase your memory and mental clarity.

Researchers found that practicing a certain type of meditation can increase blood flow in the brain which in turn improves memory.

Dharma Singh Khalsa, MD was one of the researchers for this project as well as the medical director of the Alzheimer’s Research and Prevention Foundation in Tucson, Ariz.

They ran a study using 15 participants between the ages of 52 to 77. All the participants had some sort of memory problems at the start of the research.

They practiced a form of meditation called Kirtan Kriya which is a Kundalini yoga tradition. For eight weeks straight they practiced this form of meditation.

This meditation technique only takes about 12 minutes a day, it’s extremely easy to learn, it’s free, and has no side effects.

Here’s how it works:  You repeat four sounds — SA, TA, NA, MA. While you’re saying these sounds, you touch your thumb to your index finger and middle, fourth, and fifth fingers.

You perform this exercise for two minutes, in a whisper for two minutes, in silence for four minutes, a whisper for two more minutes, and out loud for two minutes.

All participants showed slight memory improvement after the eight weeks were up.

 

Increased Attention

Meditation can also help you to increase your attention span.

Many researchers have confirmed that meditation gives a vital boost to people’s attention spans.

There was a study published in some notes in Frontiers In Human Neuroscience that stated that meditation “improves executive attention,” without involving a long term commitment to it. Just a brief meditation can have long-lasting improvements on your attention span.

Picture it like lifting weights. Just like lifting weights can strengthen and tone muscles, a short meditation session will strengthen the mind by building up discipline and resiliency.

 

Enhanced Will Power

Practicing meditation a few minutes per day can increase your willpower dramatically. It does this by building up the grey matter in your brain that’s in control of your emotions and decision making.

By paying attention to what’s going on in the moment with your body, mind and your surroundings can make it easier for you to control your urges.

 

Sleep Better

Meditation is a great way to help you get a good night’s sleep. By meditating right before bedtime you’ll be quieting your mind and body while enhancing your inner peace.

This will help you reduce insomnia and any other sleep problems by giving you overall calmness.

 

Lower Blood Pressure

Dr. Herbert Benson, director emeritus of the Harvard-affiliated Benson-Henry Institute for Mind-Body Medicine did a study using meditation to help people with high blood pressure.

In one study there were elderly people that had isolated systolic hypertension. These people used the meditation training and were more able to control their blood pressure to the point where some actually stop using their blood pressure medicine.

The research also showed that when people’s blood pressure dropped during their meditation, inflammation and blood vessel constriction went down.

 

What Are Health Benefits Of Meditation – Less Pain

There is more and more evidence that using meditation can help with reducing pain.

In 2015, Fadel Zeidan, PH.D, did a study involving meditation and pain management.

Brain images showed that the people who did meditation had less active responses in the part of the brain that manages pain messages.

The research also showed that some of the participants were able to not only reduce their pain medication but also eliminate them.

 

Greater Compassion

Using meditation for compassion is called compassion meditation.

It is a technique used to get rid of self-centeredness and isolation. By using meditation you’ll be to understand that you are not alone in your suffering.

Using meditation will help you become aware of other people’s problems around you and you’ll understand that by helping them you’ll enter a greater state of mind and body.

 

Less Anxiety

Anxiety is a cognitive state that is connected to the inability to regulate your emotions.

Meditation can reprogram neural pathways in your brain. This will improve your ability to regulate your emotions.

This will then help reduce anxiety and related mental health issues like social anxiety, fears, and obsessive-compulsive behaviors.

 

Less Depression

One of the main reasons that meditation helps with depression is that brings relief no matter the cause.

Researchers at John Hopkins University reviewed over 18,000 meditation studies.

These studies concluded that the three best uses for meditation were depression, anxiety, and pain relief.

 

In Conclusion

Meditation is a great way to feel better about yourself, not just physically but also mentally.

Try and do a session every day if possible. You’ll be amazed at how much better you’ll feel.