Goode 1 Noah Goode ENG 1102-24 Professor Ingram 5 November 2012 Meditation: A Beneficial Practice Meditation has been

practiced by man for thousands of years. It is fundamental to many religions, including Hinduism and Buddhism. It has also been practiced in various forms of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. In recent times, it has escaped the narrow scope of religious practice and has become common in the west. Along with this new exposure has come plenty of opposition to the practice itself. Many people think that it is strictly a new-age fad or that it is only for monks living a monastic life in the mountains. Whatever your perspective on meditation is, it is important to acknowledge the benefits it offers the average person, from any walk of life. Although many people believe that meditation is just another pseudo-scientific fad, meditation has been proven to have psychological, physical, and spiritual benefits to all who practice. Unfortunately, due to western ethnocentrism, meditation has widely been discredited as a beneficial activity. Much like meditation, there was once a time when psychology was viewed as absurd by the general population. Over the years, however, psychology has found its place among respected sciences. As it is constantly expanding, psychology is always looking for more approaches to the mind and its effects. Recently, psychologists have turned to using meditation as a part of psychotherapy. It has not only been claimed that meditation is crucial to unlocking techniques of insight therapy, but also is used as a form of relaxation in behavior therapy (Smith 136). The fact that meditation is used in two scientifically recognized forms of psychological

Goode 2 therapy would lead me to believe that there is more to the practice of meditation that one ignorant of it would suppose. Although I agree that more clinical trials are needed to show benefits in a therapy setting, such practices are becoming much more common during therapy sessions. Psychologists have long attempted to understand how we think. Even in the present day of modern medicine, we know relatively little about just how the brain works. Although the exact mechanics behind our ability to think still remain shrouded in darkness to a certain degree, psychologists have been able to pinpoint exercises that increase cognitive abilities. In a clinical study, data collected supported the theory that in addition to stress reduction, meditation improves things like attention span, our general mind state, and our cognitive abilities as a whole (Zeidan). It is important to note that Zeidans research was not based on Yogis or spiritual gurus, but rather a sample of people with little to no knowledge or experience of meditation. This would definitively suggest that meditation can be and is of benefit to even the most inexperienced practitioners. Psychologys close brother, neuroscience, has also taken an interest in meditation. Since the advent of the EEG, neuroscientists have been able to literally look at what is happening in the human brain during certain activities. At first glance, meditation seems like a person is just sitting with their eyes closed, and any benefits they feel are a result of essentially dozing off. In a study by Kasamatsu and Hirai, EEGs recorded different activities of theta and alpha brain waves in their subjects, one set who was meditating, and the other who was simply dozing (Fenwick 106). Their data clearly shows that something other than a semi-nap was happening to their subjects. Their brains showed activity that normal brains, sleeping or awake, did not produce. This suggests that in spite of stigmas and predispositions towards meditation, it cannot be

Goode 3 disputed that the act of meditating alters patterns of brainwaves in practitioners of meditation. A relatively new area of neuroscience is that of neuroplasticity. This is your brains ability to change based on the experiences that it has. Citing studies from Harvard Medical School, B. Alan Wallace asserts that the brainresponds structurally not only to the demands of the external environment but also to internally generated states, including aspects of consciousness (Wallace 27). This would mean that mediation not only can affect a persons brainwaves and cognitive abilities, but that it can actually rewire the way your brain functions as an organ. Meditations effects on neuroplasticity give concrete evidence to support that meditation can have extremely beneficial effects to an everyday persons body and mind. This study bridges the gap between therapeutic exercise and bettering the mind and brain. While the psychological evidence of meditations benefits are staggering, perhaps more noteworthy are the effects it has on the human body. It is generally agreed that meditation is a good stress reliever, and many practitioners use meditation for just that purpose. However, in a clinical study of adolescents with stable blood pressure, meditation was shown to lower their heart rate, cardiac output, and their blood pressure as a whole (Barnes). Once again, it is important to note that this study was done on adolescents. While older adults blood pressure may be highly variable, the young people used in this study did not have any stability problems with their blood pressure. Meditation didnt just relax them, it literally slowed their heart rate and how much blood their hearts were pumping. Obviously, it did not do this so drastically as to endanger the subjects, but I believe that it is worth noting that by only using their mind and breathing patterns, these adolescents were able to affect their entire cardiovascular system. If meditation was simply a new-age fad for Buddhist monks, then this would not be possible. Fadel Zeidans research also gave data that supported Barness. When compared to a

Goode 4 control group listening to a calming book reading, Zeidans subjects experienced a drop in systolic blood pressure that the book reading group did not (Zeidan). This experiment shows that even though an activity like a book reading may be calming, meditation has the ability to actually slow your body down in a way that other calming activities cannot. It cannot be stressed enough that prior to the experiment, Zeidans subjects had not ever practiced meditation. Even the novice meditation practitioner can learn to lower his or her blood pressure and heartbeat. When most people think of meditation, religions such as Buddhism and Hinduism seem to pop up. However, I think it is important to recognize the effects that meditation has had on western religions. Unbeknownst to most, meditation has been practiced by Christians as early as the fourth century (Fox 36). This suggests to me that meditation is not just an eastern phenomenon, but rather a tool used by many faiths to improve conscious contact with their respective higher power(s). Regardless of ones religious affiliation, it is important to acknowledge that meditation has been used in many different faiths. For the religious, meditation is not seen as just a stress reducing, blood pressure lowering exercise. For them, it is much more. Followers of many religions use meditation as a means to get closer to God. The altered states of consciousness that meditation offers can give one the feeling that they are in communion with the divine (Fox 47). Contact with God has been a priority of any religious follower since the beginning of time so it cannot be overlooked that meditation offers such spiritual benefits. I think that if modern day followers of western religions acknowledged and practiced meditation in their faith, that its reputation of being strictly for Buddhists or Hindus would fade away. I believe that the western view of meditation as being a ridiculous eastern activity is a product of western ethnocentrism. Wallace states that by segregating religions into dogmatic and

Goode 5 exploratory (western and eastern, respectively), that we lose the ability to see the similarities in meditative practices (Wallace 2). This has greatly encouraged the shunning of meditative practices in the west. Despite the fact that meditation is practiced by both new-agers and Buddhist monks, evidence suggests that in can benefit everyone. Through scientific trials, meditations benefits on psychological, neurological, and cardiovascular health have been documented as fact. For the religious, meditation offers an experience of divine communion, unrivaled in its intensity. Psychologists now use meditation as a part of their scientific approach to the human mind. It is for all of these reasons that I strongly suggest that the general population starts to look at meditation as less of an eastern pseudoscience, and more as a practice that has proven benefits on ones mind, body, and spirit.

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Works Cited Barnes, VA. Impact of Transcendental Meditation on Cardiovascular Function at Rest and During Acute Stress in Adolescents With High Normal Blood Pressure. The Journal of Psychosomatic Research. Vol. 51. 4. 597-605. Fenwick, Peter. Meditation and the EEG. The Psychology of Meditation. Ed. Michael A. West. New York: Oxford University Press, 1987. 104-117. Print. Fox, Douglas A. Meditation & Reality: A Critical View. Atlanta, Georgia: John Knox Press, 1986. Print. Smith, Jonathan C. Meditation As Psychotherapy: A New Look At the Evidence. The Psychology of Meditation. Ed. Michael A. West. New York: Oxford University Press, 1987. 136-149. Print. Wallace, B. Alan. Mind In the Balance. New York, New York: Columbia University Press, 2009. Print. Zeidan, Fadel. The Effects of Brief Mindfulness Meditation Training on Mood, Cognitive, and Cardiovascular Variables. Diss. University of North Carolina at Charlotte, 2009.

Charlotte: UMI, 2009. Internet.