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Meditative PowerNoah ShortFlorida State UniversityMeditative PowerMeditation, how is this ancient art with heavy association to religion beneficial for our modern lives? This is the question I begin with in the search to understand and apply the usefulness of meditation in our current society that is consumed with the constant struggle of attention demanding distractions. What can meditation do for members of such a busy society that can hardly find time to spare and how time consuming is meditation? What are the real benefits of meditation on the neurology of the human brain? And what kind of fields are implementing this ancient art along with modern technologies and what results are they finding? All of these questions will illuminate just how important meditation is and what its actual health benefits are. Beginning with the first traces of history of this practice researchers have found that meditation is a practice with ancient roots, such depth and history immediately shows that this art has been valued by various cultures, generations and religions for hundreds of years, with some translations being dated back to the 5th or 6th centuries BCE and even with such a lengthy history scientists are only just now beginning to uncover the truths behind meditation, with the invention of modern brain analysis technologies such as the computerized tomography or CT scans which use advanced imaging technology comprised of putting many different angled x-rays together to form a model that shows in detail organs and structures inside the body and also the magnetic imaging resonance or (MRI) tests which shine powerful x-ray beams through a patient’s body in order to show structures in the body with incredible detail, these technologies have revolutionized the study of the brain and have allowed scientists to observe the brain while induced in a meditative state leading to understandings that scientists have never been able to document. Although the research is still in its early states there is increasing amounts of data with interesting benefits from the meditative induced state. A key aspect of meditation that almost all experts on meditation agree on is that it develops a better sense of mindfulness often described by becoming observant of one’s own thoughts instead of being affected by regular emotions one feels at any given moment. Those who practice and master meditation can become less affected by those emotions and more observant of them creating a sense of calm even when stressful events come into our lives and being able to handle stress is a key determinant of success in this world.Performance Enhancing MeditationAlong with numerous other benefits of meditative practices one that is particularly interesting and is becoming increasingly popular is the use of meditation to increase performance in a variety of fields such as athletic and cognitive performances. According to Ivanovski and Mahli (2007) “ various techniques enhance an individual’s ability to concentrate and inhibit distracting stimuli…” this evidence supports the idea that meditative practices can in fact improve performance by improving concentration and inhibiting distractions and to further this idea Noel L Ford, Sarah N Wyckoff and Leslie H Sherlin(2016) go on to concur that with further testing using neurophysiological measuring systems such as an electroencephalograph or EEG scanning systems a new understanding of how our mind works will be unveiled. With these new studies and available technologies scientists have been able to measure brain waves and notice that there is a slight change and increase in brain wave amplitude in participants of their studies under the experimental group practicing mindful calming practices such as meditation in comparison with the control group of naive participants not practicing mediation. These studies have led to conclusions such as found on page 153 in an article where the authors Noel L Ford, Sarah N Wyckoff and Leslie H Sherlin (2016) state that the findings In their experiments and those like them “practicing mindfulness allows the individual to build attention control skills, both in directing attention and in avoiding distractors.”(153) this supports the idea that meditating increases mental mindfulness which is a crucial skill among athletes especially who rely on quick reactions to perform at their peak. The article goes on to talk about the relative scarce amount of literature found on the subject of the meditative states ability to demonstrate the combined efficacy of biofeedback and mindfulness even with the well-known positive effects of biofeedback for enhancing sport performance. With further studies I predict that many more correlations of meditative mindfulness will accumulate and project itself as a clear key to further athletic performance. Along with athletic performance another performance based field that meditation is being applied to is studies in motor memory consolidation which are processes that aid in memory stabilization or learning in the period that follows training. Scientists studying the effects of training on the brain find that the motor memory consolidation is fragile and is often times lost due to disruption or competition between thoughts or interference in the forms of distraction and as Shadmehr and Brashers-Krug (1997) say that motor memory undergoes its first consolidation period within ten hours of the exercise where the memory is reinforced and shielded from competing thoughts For these studies meditation is becoming a novel approach in order to understand the brain in a more full manner for it involves a valued set of cognitive processes to better understand relaxed states of mind that are controlled and alert, studying these different states and comparing them to other awake states of mind can allow scientists to uncover the small differences In brain wave amplitude and allow for in depth understanding of how the brain works and even uncover the mysteries of consciousness. Immink, Maarten A. (2016) suggests that “experiencing meditation and its associated cognitive processes and states following training can lend benefits for motor memory consolidation.” This information provides that for trained sequences have an increased ability to consolidate memories than that of novel sequences. Research for meditation reaches wide and enters almost all fields, another which includes one of true academic rigor that is medical school, who else to test the effects of meditation a practice which calms the mind more than anything else than those attending medical school which can be considered one of the most academic rigorous and stressful environments for students that attend Medical school where the purpose of Saoij, Apar is to understand the benefits of meditation to people functioning in a high stress environment such as those attending medical school in a randomized, two-way crossover study.?The idea of this study is to see how meditation effects students in an extremely stressful environment where mental and physical fatigue are the norm which can have a detrimental effect on the capability of these doctors in training. The study was put in place and a control group of forty two students were given a yogic meditation session and the results according to Saoji Apar(2017) conclude that there is a positive correlation in the students tested that the meditation showed real health benefits not just mentally but physically as well and through the results of all of these studies and articles a common result tends to appear which is that these variations of meditative practices seem to have resounded effects for the groups who participated in the meditation groups with not only greater performance but less stress, anxiety and physiological ailments. Neurologic Benefits of MeditationIn researching meditation finding the positive effects of such practices on athletic, memory consolidation and medical student performance leads to the question of how does meditation effect the neurology of the human brain? In an article that looks how meditation affect the amount of grey matter in the brain in which the brain is closely examined and in particular the effects of meditation on grey matter in the brain is studied and the results found the grey matter region in the brains of those who practiced mediation was larger than those who did not practice it and grey matter has a key role in the brain according to authors Sergio Elías Hernández, José Suero , Alfonso Barros , José Luis González-Mora , Katya Rubia (2016) begin the article by stating the important role in which grey matter plays in our mental health; Grey matter can be associated with more focused attention, emotion control, and a better feeling of compassion. Furthermore the state of mental calmness associated with meditation have been found through electroencephalography have found that those more experienced in the art of meditation have denser grey matter regions of the brain and have a positive correlation to the feelings of joy. Along with these experiments include a study which measures the blockage of alpha waves from meditative states, alpha blocking correlates to healthier physiological and mental health this state that changes the way our brain waves function can be related to what Zen-Buddhists call finding the inner light and the study conducted by researchers Pei-Chen Lo, Ming-Liang Huang and Kang-Ming Chang reveal even blessings given to a control group who’s brain waves were measured using electroencephalograms showed increased blockage of alpha waves from purely Buddhist blessings that the subjects were unaware of receiving with these findings it seems as if the meditative power effects real energy and can even span through one’s body to another’s to promote a sense of well-being. This research conducted by Pei-Chen Lo, Ming-Liang Huang and Kang-Ming Chang (2013) even states that those who have implemented meditation into their regular routine can even have an improved physical appearance and look significantly younger, this shows that those with experienced meditative disciplines exhume a healthier and more active lifestyle in part due to the mental benefits of mediation. With various known benefits perhaps one of the greatest that meditation can bring us is the ability to relieve stress. Stress?can play a part in various diseases and are a start to the accumulation of even more in time according to a Harvard health publication written by Julie Corliss(2016) who’s study’s suggests mindful meditation can help ease physiological stressors. Further study of the EEG measurements from those who practiced meditation on a frequent basis also shows a change in the amplitude of beta waves in the brain, beta brainwaves dominate our normal waking state of consciousness when attention is directed towards cognitive tasks and the outside world and harnessing these practices can give beneficial results to mindfulness of its practice. The results of these studies are so real that even the United States military has incorporated it into a special training program designed to teach soldiers the benefits of meditation on the battle field, this training is called mind fitness training or M-fit and according to Hinduism today (2013) . M-Fit is proving to be a useful tool for a variety of soldiers deployed in various responsibilities from battlefield operators to intelligence officers in providing increased mental calmness and clarity in stressful. This training was developed by a former United States Army captain named Elizabeth Stanley who after being diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder found that mediation not only could help her but also her fellow military men and women soldiers although many times skeptical at first reported real benefits due to meditation. Mindfulness meditation has even been used to treat detrimental diseases such as adult aphasia which is a disorder caused by stroke that impairs many functions of the brain including language skills. Studies are shown that adults suffering from aphasia when treated with common occurrences of meditation increase in word productivity, phrase length, word generation, decreased impulsivity, and increased attention. These findings prove that the practice of mindfulness meditation can help even severe diseases which will in turn lead to the further research of benefits of meditation on mental health. In addition to all of these incredible health benefits another disease that many health professionals are turning to meditation to combat depression in the study State and Training Effects of Mindfulness Meditation on Brain Networks Reflect Neuronal Mechanisms of Its Antidepressant Effect mediation is studied in efforts to alleviate the detrimental effects of depression on the mental health of patients. To investigate the impact of meditation practices on “the neuronal level and its antidepressant effects, alteration in the activation pattern of the Default Mode Network (DMN) is of particular interest and the DMN is thus selected as the target brain network“ as stated by Chuan-Chih Yang et al(2016) his findings indicate that not only does meditation help ameliorate depression but it also aids in the reconstruction of better neural networks than were in place before the practices were conducted. As we have discussed up unto this point the articles so far have mostly been concerned about how meditation affects cognition and performance while these are the most practical study for the beautiful health reasons provided by this ancient art the most interesting effect on the mind meditation causes to me is that of transpersonal and transcendent experiences that some say come with mastery of the art. In the article transcendental experiences during meditation practice the author begins by describing different focus categories that cause different reactions with brain waves such as compassion meditation which leads to higher electroencephalography and activation of limbic brain circuits including insula and amygdala during its practice and in contrast mindfulness meditation which leads to an increase in bilateral frontal theta waves(pg.1), ConclusionIn conclusion these studies reveal a variety of different benefits for those who practice meditation and even offer a peer into the future of how neurology will be studied. Meditating is a practice that dates back centuries but its use has never before been needed so much with our busy lives taking a moment to meditate can alleviate stress encourage better brain performance and even boost the feeling of joy and with findings such as different meditation focuses leads to different brain region and brain wave reactions this unlocks the minds ability to influence its own biology, these breakthroughs I believe will lead us further into the study of what we are by allowing us to explore the consciousness with a combination of old ancient practices and new modern medical technologies.ReferencesFord, N. L., Wyckoff, S. N., & Sherlin, L. H. (2016). Neurofeedback and mindfulness in peak performance training among athletes.?Biofeedback,?44(3), 152-159. doi:10.5298/1081-5937-44.3.11Hernandez, S. E., Suero, J., Barros, A., Gonzlez-Mora, J. L., & Rubia, K. (2016). Increased grey matter associated with long-term sahaja yoga meditation: A voxel-based morphometry study.?PLoS ONE,?11(3), 1-16. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0150757Immink, M. A. (2016). Post-training meditation promotes motor memory consolidation.?Frontiers in Psychology,?7, 1-10. doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2016.01698Ivanovski, B., & Malhi, G. S. (2007). The psychological and neurophysiological concomitants of mindfulness forms of meditation.?Acta Neuropsychiatrica,?19(2), 76-91. doi:10.1111/j.1601-5215.2007.00175.xLaures-Gore, J., & Marshall, R. S. (2016).?Mindfulness meditation in aphasia: A case report?doi:10.3233/NRE-161323Lo, P., Huang, M., & Chang, K. (2003). EEG alpha blocking correlated with perception of inner light during zen meditation.?American Journal of Chinese Medicine,?31(4), 629-642.Mindfulness meditation may ease anxiety, mental stress harvard health blog harvard health publicationsSaoji, A., Mohanty, S., & Vinchurkar, S. (2017). Effect of a single session of a yogic meditation technique on cognitive performance in medical students: A randomized crossover trial.?Journal of Religion & Health,?56(1), 141-148. doi:10.1007/s10943-016-0195-xReferencesBrain Pedia. (2016).?Amygdalae-brain-computer-model.?: .Brent Lambert. (2014).?Harvard unveils MRI study proving meditation literally rebuilds the brains grey matter in 8 weeks.?: Harvard University.Brewer J A et al. (2011).?Mindfulness meditation and brain activity.?: University of Toronto.Dr. Zoran Josipovic. (2017).?Experience bliss brain scan.?: New York University.Mindfulness meditation may ease anxiety, mental stress harvard health blog harvard health publicationsProfessor N. N. Lyubimov. (2015a).?Improved memory.?: Moscow Brain Research Institute of the Russian Academy of Medical Sciences.Professor N. N. Lyubimov. (2015b).?Optimizing brain-wave chart.?: Moscow Brain Research Institute of the Russian Academy of Medical Sciences.Shadmehr, R., & Brashers-Krug, T. (1997). Functional stages in the formation of human long-term motor memory.?The Journal of Neuroscience,?17(1), 409-419. Retrieved from? soldiers meditation. (2013).?Hinduism Today,?35(2), 7. ................
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