Research that now proves Optimism can be created through 20 minutes of Mindfulness per day!

Taken From Here

“Be happy in the moment, that's enough. 
Each moment is all we need, not more.” 

Mother Teresa



A very short post today, but I just found some incredible research on how even just 20 minutes of Mindfulness per day can make you significantly more optimistic. It also offers some great instructions on how a great Mindfulness exercise. 

I'll let the article itself do all the talking today...!

Article can be found here!

Taken From Here

Rapport

Taken From Here

Have you ever felt 'out of sync' with the individual you're talking to? Have you ever ended a conversation with someone thinking "We're just not on the same wavelength!" Don't worry, it happens to all of us. However, we can change this by building rapport with literally anyone. This is one of the cornerstones of NLP. 

Rapport is one of the most important features or characteristics of unconscious human interaction.

It can be described as a state of mutual trust and responsiveness between individuals or groups of people. Building rapport is so fundamental in life, that it can be the difference between brokering a big business deal or getting nothing at all. By establishing good rapport at the outset we can gain commitment from the other party, conscious or unconscious, to trust the process even when they do not fully understand how the process works and what the ultimate outcome will be. 

Taken From Here

The most important thing to remember here is that people like people who are like themselves. 
Think about people you truly get on with, who you have rapport with and you really like. Then think about their mannerisms, tonality, behaviours - similar to yours, no?

In NLP, here's a few indicators of rapport building :

• Matching someone's posture (Are they sitting, standing, kneeling, slouching?)

• Matching their tonality

• Matching their breathing (this is a good one for if you want to be more subtle and not spook out the person you're communicating with!)

• Using some of the key words they have been using

Try some of these out, and see if you feel more in rapport with individuals you may have previously found difficult to get on with.

The Essential Presuppositions of Neuro-Linguistic Programming

If you're interested in NLP and the study of excellence, you're in the right place.  However, it's  important if you want to gain  more excellence in your life, socially and at work, that you adopt the following presuppositions of NLP.  Remember, these were built over years of analysing and studying those who excelled best in their field.  Try consciously adopting some of these today, and notice the subtle changes :

1) Choice is better than no choice.

Having options can provide more opportunities for achieving results.
We are always communicating.2) The meaning of your communication is the response you get.

Even when we remain silent, we are communicating. Non-verbal communication makes up for 55% of our message (Mehrabian and Ferris : "Interference of Attitudes from Non-Verbal Communication in Two Channels," The Journal of Counselling Psychology, Vol. 31, 1967, pp.248 - 52)


3) Respect for Other People's Map of the WorldWe are all unique and experience the world in different ways. Everyone is individual and has their own special way of being.


4) Flexibility is the key to success.

The person with the most flexibility will control the system

5) There is no failure, only feedback.

What seemed like failure can be thought of as success that just stopped too soon. Use feedback as an opportunity to improve your performance. Just look at Michael Jordan, the greatest NBA player of all time.

6) Behind every behaviour there is a positive intention.

When we understand that other people have some positive intention in what they say and do (however annoying it may seem to us), it can be easier to stop getting angrier and start to move forward.

7) Mind and body form a linked system.

Your mental attitude affects your emotions, your body and your health and, in turn,your behaviours

8) There are no resistant clients, only inflexible communicators.

Resistance is a sign of lack of rapport.

9) Anything can be accomplished if the task is broken down into small enough steps.

Achievement becomes easier if activities are manageable

10) People have all the ability they need.

There are no unresourceful people, only unresourceful states of mind.


Have a great weekend folks!


Adam

The low-down on Neuro-Linguistic Programming

Taken From Here

"Whether or not you think you can 

  or you can't...you're probably right" 

  Henry Ford

I've been really really excited about writing this post, as NLP is an approach to psychotherapy, personal development, and communication which absolutely fascinates me, and after reading this it may fascinate you more!

So, what is "Neuro-Linguistic Programming"?

NLP, or Neuro-Linguistic Programming, is the art and science of excellence, derived from studying how top people in different fields obtain their outstanding results. These communication skills can be learned by anyone to improve their effectiveness both personally and professionally. It is directly applicable to a diverse spectrum of fields such as communications, business, sales, education and therapy

Beginnings of NeuroLinguistic Programming
NLP began in the early 70's as a thesis project in California. Richard Bandler and his professor, John Grinder, wanted to develop models of human behavior to understand why certain people seemed to be excellent at what they did, while others found the same tasks challenging or nearly impossible to do.

Inspired by pioneers in fields of therapy, personal growth and development, Bandler and Grinder began to develop systematic procedures and theories that formed the basis of NLP. They studied three top therapists: Virginia Satir, the extraordinary family therapist, the innovative psychotherapist Fritz Perls, and Milton Erickson, the world-famous hypnotherapist.

Their goal was to develop models of how it was that these people got the results they did. They sought to identify and model the patterns that produced these results. These three gifted therapists were quite different personalities, yet Grinder and Bandler discovered some underlying patterns that were quite similar. These patterns became the underlying structure of NLP, with names like: meta-model, submodalities, reframing, language patterns, well formedness conditions and eye accessing clues.

The phrase "Neuro-Linguistic Programming" describes the process of how personality creates and expresses itself. Put simply, we are all made up of a neurology that conveys information about our environment to our central neurvous systems and brains. Since we are also meaning creating creatures, we translate theseperceptions in our brains into meanings, beliefs and expectations. As we continue to grow from a rather "critter brain" baby into a more complex adult human, we tend to filter,distort and magnify the input we get from our environment such that it matches the elaborate program we evolve to explain our life experience.

NLP in other Therapies

Taken From Here

Today, NLP has grown in a myriad of directions - hypnosis and behavioral personal change work, structures of beliefs, modeling personal success and systems of excelence and expertise, business coaching and sales training.  In fact, in my last job in advertising at Starcom MediaVest Group, the company ran a 4-day NLP course which offered managers and directors useful tools to improve their communication, confidence, and management skills. Some have taken it in spiritual directions, assisting in alignment of personal behaviours and beliefs with a "higher purpose" and connection to the Divine. 

It is rapidly growing in the field of personal health (the area I want to go into!) with its strong foundation in how the mind influences behaviours and feelings in the body.   Public speaking, stage fright, parenting skills, allergies, phobias, trauma...the list of areas where training in Neuro-Linguistic Programming and individual therapeutic work with NLP practitioners is endless.

In the next few posts I'll be walking through some tools common in NLP to improve performance at work and in your own personal health and wellbeing.  

If you're interested in using NLP in a practical sense, this is a great place to start 

Until next time...

What is the Placebo Effect and why is it so Powerful?

Taken from here

"Your chances of success in any undertaking can always be measured by your belief in yourself." Robert Collier 

I keep getting behaviourally retargeted with ads for the latest Placebo album at the moment - its got me thinking about the Placebo Effect.  The placebo effect has been known about for generations by doctors, and underlies the incredible power of our minds to heal the body.

I first came across the placebo effect some years ago when my doctor offered me prescription drugs to sort out some severe chest pains I was experiencing at the time. In 5 days the pains in my chest were gone, brilliant! The next time I saw the doctor and explained my relief, he responded with, "The restorative powers of sugar are incredible aren't they..." What...I'd been given sugar pills? At first I felt a bit cheated. I was a university student who had just spent £10 on sugar pills when I could have spent it on booze instead. What a rip off! 

However, my mindset changed when I started thinking how this sugar pill could possibly have made me better. This is where my research began.  It all comes down to how powerful our minds are at influencing the body, and in particular, our belief systems. I just knew that those painkillers would sort out my chest pain, I didn't even need to think about it. How could painkillers fail? It just does what is says on the tin. This If we believe something, it directs our subconscious to do everything in its power to prove that belief right, and this in turn makes the necessary changes within our bodies. The concept of the self being an autonomous being is a deeply held belief in western civilisation, but we affect each other all the time. If our doctors wholeheartedly believe that the treatments they are giving us have every chance of working, we are more likely to believe it too. If a doctor's influence makes us feel more positive about our health, it will make us more optimistic, and our optimism has a direct effect on our health.

Yes this picture is a bit creepy

When testing the placebo effect, Tor D Wager conducted a study in 2004 with a placebo cream he told the subjects would take away pain. He then inflicted pain on them and watched them in an MRI scanner. Those who had been given the cream (the control group had nothing) showed "placebo effect patterns" in the prefrontal cortex. This part of the brain activates when anticipating pain relief and triggers a reduction of activity in pain-sensing areas of the brain. Wager suggests that this interplay within the prefrontal cortex may also trigger a release of pain-relieving opioids in the midbrain. Wow, we can relieve pain without any drugs! 

Incredibly, a recently published study declared that

Taken from here

97% of 783 GPs admitted that they had recommended a placebo to a patient. This indicates that most of you reading this will have been prescribed a placebo at some point in your life. The likelihood is, however, that it had exactly the same effect as the conventional medicine you thought you were getting. Our minds are THAT powerful.  Placebo's can come in the form of sugar or chalk pills to heal various ailments, and have even been used in surgery, known as Sham Surgery, where the surgeon makes an incision into the patient, then seals them up without doing anything. In many cases, the patient's symptoms magically disappear... 

Next time you visit your GP and you are prescribed drugs, be mindful of the doctor's beliefs.  Ask him how successful the drug is? What is the success rate?  Then judge your body's response on what the doctor has told you to expect. 

Our Emotional Brain

"When we direct our thoughts properly, we can control our emotions." W. Clement Stone - Businessman, Philanthropist & Author of Success System That Never Fails 



Hi all!

Today I'm going to delve deeper into our emotional brain and how it drives our behaviours and bodily feelings.  

Psychologists define emotions as a combination of cognitions, feelings and actions [source: Kalat]. Put simply, 'emotions' incorporate feelings, but also how we process and respond to those feelings.

This is possible because every time we have a thought, the brain produces a chemical, which travels down into the body.  Emotions are the effect of these chemical messages travelling through the body.  

If you are currently experiencing stress, anxiety or fear, you body is likely to contain high levels of adrenalin, cortisol, and Norepinephrine.  This is known as the 'Fight-or-Flight' response, and is great for if you need the body to "fight" or "flee" from perceived attack, harm or threat to our survival.  In this scenario, 'Fight-or-Flight' is useful.  However, chronic stress causes adrenalin, cortisol, and norepinephrine to run through your body constantly, which causes the de-regulation of cells, and our primitive bodies just aren't designed for this long-term.  Sit back for a second...Is your heart rate faster than usual? Are you breathing at a quicker rate than normal? Do you feel tense.  If so, this is effectively your brain telling your body that you are stressed or anxious, and your body is literally reflecting your mind!  

Don't worry, there's a flip side, and its important we adopt this for our health and wellbeing.  When experiencing happiness, joy, love, fulfilment, the list goes on...the brain releases chemicals into our body that have the complete opposite effect.  Dopamine  (known as the love chemical) is released, enabling the body to experience pleasure.  In other words, when you do something good, you're rewarded with dopamine and gain a pleasurable, happy feeling. This teaches your brain to want to do it again and again. Serotonin is also released, and is associated with memory and learning.  These positive emotions are critical in allowing the body to repair itself.  Next time you're feeling comfortable, or happy, take note of your pulse - does it feel more normal? does your body feel lighter? has your breathing rate normalised?

Well I hope you found this interesting,

Until next time, 

Adam

Treat yourself to a free Mind Detox - only 9 places left

Hi again!

Apologies for the delay, its been far too long!  

Taken From Here

The past week I've been on the fantastic award-winning Mind Detox Practitioner Masterclass, led by Sandy C. Newbigging.  Throughout the course, I was taught a series of powerful techniques, which quickly finds the unconscious subtle resistance in a person's life, and helps them move to a place of acceptance.  The course elegantly delved in to how our mind drives our emotions, behaviours, and habits, and how this is reflected in our bodies.  What impressed me most about the Mind Detox Method is the speed at which it can aid people in moving on and completely heal their past.  Having worked with some brilliant people over the last week, it was incredible to see the positive shift everyone, myself included, in a matter of minutes.  Most interesting was the change in how people were feeling, having released issues which had been holding them back for literally years and years. Truly inspiring.  

I'm now in the process of working through 20 case studies - this involves roughly an hour to an hour and a half discussion where we assess what you want to let go of, what you want to gain, and then we use the method to resolve the issues.  This is completely free (as I'm in training!), and I only have 9 slots left, so if you're interested is resolving anything, please private message me on Facebook, I'll be more than happy to help. Also worth noting, these sessions can be done over Skype if you live far away.  

The below video is Sandy explaining how our emotions affect our behaviours.

See you soon,

Adam

Did You Know that our Brain is in Fact Plastic

Taken From Here

“I saw people rewire their brains with their thoughts, to cure previously incurable obsessions and traumas.” Dr. Norman Doidge

In my last post I discussed the power of positive-thinking (or affirmations) and how this has a decisive impact on our physiology. A couple of you wanted to understand how this works.  Well, let me tell you.

It all comes down to Neuroplasticity, which is the brain's ability to reorganize & re-mould itself by forming new neural connections throughout life. Since its discovery, this has had stress reduction, well-being, & health groups, very interested.

Taken from Here

What does this mean for us - The Basics

The adult brain contains over 100 billion neurons, give or take a few. To put this into context, that matches the estimated number of galaxies in our whole universe. Given we only use a few thousand of these repeatedly every day, there are literally billions of unused neurons we which can utilise.  This gives us the incredible ability to create completely new personalities, observe different outcomes, and completely change our condition of living...as long as we make the conscious decision to do it. It blew my mind too..

The reason we feel the same emotions & experience the same outcomes day-in day-out, is because we're firing the same neural pathways over & over again, over & over again, over & over again. This is where we can get stuck in this loop of self-limiting thoughts or habits, which recharges the stress response we experience on a daily basis and effectively moulds our personal perception of reality. 

Dr Caroline Leaf, estimates that "87% to 95% of the illnesses that plague us today are a direct result of our thought life. What we think about affects us physically and emotionally. It’s an epidemic of toxic emotions…"  

Consistent affirmations (said in a congruent way) is just one way of breaking that loop, by using new neurons in our brain to observe a different outcome, & to positively affect your physiology & mindset. Dr. Joe Dispenza, Neuroscientist, speaker on What The Bleep Do We Know, and a bit of a hero, claims "The one thing I noticed about people who had changes in health had changed their thinking...Our thoughts have a direct connection to our direct level of health."

To conclude

I'm not saying that using our infinitely powerful brains will cure all our physical difficulties, but by learning the discourse of stress symptoms and illness we can discover what is being suppressed or ignored in our emotions, and how this is influencing our health & well-being. From this viewpoint we can observe a clear two-way communication going on between our body and mind that affects our physical, mental & emotional state. 

Affirmations (some good ones are listed in my last post) & meditation are both ways that help us deepen this understanding.  So be more kind to yourself and try using some affirmations, you may find it works wonders!  I've attached a great little bonus tutorial for you on Neuroplasticity, which really gives you the low-down on this truly fascinating phenomenon :

Next time I'll be looking deeper into how emotions effect us and how we can affect them.  

Over & Out,

Adam

Method 3. Short-Cuts to Rapidly Reduce Stress in your Working or Studying Environment, and Create Peace of Mind Now!

Hi all and a warm welcome back!

We are now at the end of the road on how to Rapidly Reduce Stress in your Working or Studying Environment, and Create Peace of Mind Now!

Picture Taken from Here

"I'll do the best I can." What is this exactly...POSITIVE THINKING! 

Picture Taken From Here

Sound's so simple doesn't it...but its incredibly effective at releasing stress and boosting self-esteem and self-confidence.  They're also incredibly able when you are ill, as they boost your belief that you will get better, sooner.

They are commonly referred to as an affirmation, which is defined as 'the assertion that something exists or is true." This method is extremely competent at breaking that negative state of being we call stress, and shifts us into a much more positive, relaxed state of being.

After becoming 'stuck' at University with looming deadlines and exams, I often found myself in this negative cycle of stress and couldn't figure out how to stop it! I purchased a brilliant book called It's The Thought That Counts by Dr. David Hamilton (currently only 6 left in stock, so get yours while you can!), which completely changed my relationship with stress. It taught me about affirmations, and how the subconscious mind believes what you tell it, as long as you are really congruent with your language.  To this day, I use affirmations on a daily basis.  

As I mentioned in my second Blog Post, its all about repetition, repetition, repetition - this is how the brain learns! If you're finding it hard, think back to a time when you had to memorise it, and you managed to do it. This will give you huge confidence moving forwards.

I've listed below my top 10 affirmations for you to try out in your head. See how they affect your body language, your mood, and your belief systems :

I can handle whatever comes my way

Today has endless possibilities

I release stress now

I release all restrictions

Challenges bring opportunities

I choose a positive frame of mind

Every day in every way I'm getting better and better

I'm feeling calmer and calmer

My intentions create my reality

I can make healthy choices

The great thing about affirmations is that they can literally be used on anything, from stress, to anxiety, to relationships, and so on. To add to this, simply writing these on a peace of paper is just as, if not more effective, than saying them in your head. Try both, see what works better.

So that's it for my Short-Cuts to Rapidly Reduce Stress in your Working or Studying Environment, and Create Peace of Mind Now! I really hope you've found them useful, both now and in the future.

If anyone has any requests on things they would like me to write on, just drop me a Facebook message. I can usually be found at : https://www.facebook.com/adam.lomax.73?ref=tn_tnmn

Thanks and farewell until next time,

Adam

Method 2. Short-Cuts to Rapidly Reduce Stress in your Working or Studying Environment, and Create Peace of Mind Now!

http://science.howstuffworks.com/life/laughter.htm

Stress relief from laughter? Yes, no joke. It was an age old question for me - why do people who laugh more appear happier, more relaxed, more in control, and in better health? 

What was the secret? What was the formula? 

http://mydailycafe.com/site/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/Laughter.jpg

When you start to laugh, it doesn't just lighten your load mentally, it actually induces some very powerful physical changes in your body. Wow, all that just from a short burst of laughter. It also promotes a healthier, more positive attitude, and at the end of the day, why would you want to resist happiness in your life?

Take yourself back to a time when you've had a good old chuckle - how did you feel? Lighter, lifted, happier, even relieved?
Laughter can :

Short-term effects :

• Stimulates many organs. Laughter enhances your intake of oxygen-rich air, stimulates your heart, lungs and muscles, and increases the endorphins that are released by your brain.
• Activates and relieves your stress response. A rollicking laugh fires up and then cools down your stress response and increases your heart rate and blood pressure. The result? A good, relaxed feeling.
• Soothes tension. Laughter can also stimulate circulation and aid muscle relaxation, both of which help reduce some of the physical symptoms of stress.

Long-term effects :

• Improves your immune system. Negative thoughts manifest into chemical reactions that can impact your body by bringing more stress into your system and decreasing your immunity. In contrast, positive thoughts actually release neuropeptides that help fight stress and potentially more-serious illnesses.
• Relieves pain. Laughter may ease pain by causing the body to produce its own natural painkillers. Laughter may also break the pain-spasm cycle common to some muscle disorders.
• Increases personal satisfaction. Laughter can also make it easier to cope with difficult situations. It also helps you connect with other people.

It's even being recommended by The Breast Cancer Wellness Magazine as an approach to stimulate lymphatic health! I'm not saying go over the top here, but just a couple of chuckles a day, may well keep the doctor away.

A great clip here from the amazing Karl Pilkington attending a Laughter Yoga club in India, where laughter really is the best medicine.  

Remember, "A day without laughter, is a day wasted." Charlie Chaplin

Thanks for stopping by!

Adam

Method 1. Short-Cuts to Rapidly Reduce Stress in your Working or Studying Environment, and Create Peace of Mind Now!

‎"There is more to life than increasing its speed."

Mohatma Gandhi







Hi again,

A warm welcome back to those of you who are following my series of Blog Posts on how to create more calm, mindfulness, and wellbeing in your lives through using your mind!
Over the next 6 days I will be posting 3 highly effective ways to hastily stop stress in its tracks, so that we can move from this...

to this...

These tools have helped thousands of people globally, and the science behind it is extremely thought-provoking..

Today the focus will be on 3C Vision. I was taught this at a talk by Sandy C. Newbigging which discussed the effects that chronic stress can have on the body. This simple, easy to adopt technique, is great, as it can be done at the desk (or anywhere really), is completely unnoticeable to those around you, and reduces stress symptoms in just a few minutes. It merely requires using your eyes to activate your parasympathetic nervous system.

Step 1 - Pick a spot on the wall to look at, preferably at a 45° above your eye-line Ensure this is a stagnant spot, which doesn't contain any movement.

Step 2 - As you stare at this spot, effortlessly allow your mind to go loose and focus all your attention on the spot. Take a few long, deep breaths.

Step 3 - Notice that within a few moments, your vision begins to spread out. Your vision will become more peripheral than central.

Step 4 - Now, pay more attention to the peripheral part of your vision than the central part. Take in the colours, the shapes, the shadows, and anything else. Retain long, deep breaths. Be mindful that you stick to using your peripheral vision by avoiding looking directly at anything.

Step 5 - Continue with this for as long as you want. You will find your mind is more still.

Step 6 - Repetition, Repetition, Repetition. With practice, this technique will become easier and the more effective. 

So..how do you feel now?


This process is similar to what psychologist Stephanie Silberman, PhD, has labelled as "thought stopping," which allows the body to drain excess cortisol and adrenalin out of the system and induce a calmer response. Personally, I found this great to do before important meetings, seminars, and particularly when distraction is leading you astray!

As always, many thanks for reading and I hope this finds you well! The 2nd of the 3 highly effective ways to hastily stop stress in its tracks will be posted in the next couple of days.


Adam

10 Simple Tips to Become A Master of Meditation Overnight

Following my first post, some of the great feedback I received was along the lines of, "I can't meditate because I can't stop thoughts buzzing through my head."  Sound like you? 

I completely understand where you're coming from, as initially I struggled with this practice too, but once you make the decision to actively engage with it, and practice regularly with gentle discipline, you will find it both rewarding and enjoyable.  

I like to compare it to body training at the gym...the more you work a muscle, the more it strengthens.  The same goes for neurons in the brain, as we are taught in Hebbian Theory, "Neurons that fire together wire together."  So, in effect, the more you practice meditation, the stronger the neuron connections become, the better you'll get and the easier it becomes.  

Here are my top 10 tips to ensure you develop consistent practice, and stay on track to creating a healthy body and a healthy mind!  

1. Meditate first thing in the morning or last thing at night (if possible!) - this is when you brain is most receptive to change, as it is in the alpha, dreamlike state
2. Aim to find a place at home or work suitable - somewhere quiet where you are unlikely to find distractions is perfect.  This will allow you to relax and focus much more easily
3. Make it a priority - this means putting it in the diary and committing to it in the same way you would to any other kind of meeting. Whether it is 10 minutes or considerably longer, nothing is more important than the health of your mind.  When people don't make this their priority, they often miss out and then become de-motivated
4. You don't need to 'still your mind' - above all, meditation gives your body the chance to relax and recover.  It is not useful, therefore, to resist having thoughts when meditating.  To resist thoughts is to resist relaxation, so just go with the flow!
5. To help yourself feel at ease - initially visualise a place you've been to in the past that evokes a relaxation response, perhaps a sunny beach
6. If you miss a day or two, don't be hard on yourself - this will surely undermine your efforts and motivation. Therefore, I suggest if you fall from grace one day, make the choice to get back into your routine the very next day without wallowing in failure and self-deprecation
7. Always spent a couple of minutes at the end of each meditation to reflect on its benefits - Notice how you feel, physically, mentally and emotionally. The more you establish the connection between training the mind and feeling better, clearer, or calmer, the easier it becomes to sit down and practice 
8. You only need to meditate 10-15 minutes per day - that's all it takes!
9. Have realistic expectations - Training or taming the mind is a skill to develop over a lifetime. There are some immediate benefits to be found, but some take longer than others. Just take it one day at a time
10. Have a scrap book and note any changes you feel - be it calmer, more confident, or healthier, these will be constant reminders of what you have achieved

Thanks, and remember...

Adam

p.s. Still struggling? There's a series of audios you can download from http://www.eocinstitute.org/. This is based on Dr. Heinrich Wilhelm Dove's discovery that when you introduce tones with certain frequencies into each ear, you could actually entrain the electrical patterns within the brain to resonate in very specific patterns, called brainwave states. These tones induce beta, and alpha wave states in your brain, which enables quicker meditative states.

Meditation : Where Traditional Practice meets cutting edge Mind-Body Medicine

Shirley MacLaine once said, "Remember what people used to say about meditation? Now everyone is doing it." I wonder why..

Although Meditation Practitioners have known the benefits of meditation for thousands of years, it is only now that scientific research is beginning to prove that meditation has a positive effect on us at a physiological level. In this post I'm going to be exploring the science behind this ancient tradition and how it can be of benefit to our minds and bodies in the fast-paced Western society we live in today. 

Studies have proven that meditation is strongly associated with improvements in a number of psychological areas, which include depression, anxiety, cognitive function, alertness, and stress, amongst others. There is new research which also suggests that meditation reduces response to pain, as well as blood pressure, and even strengthens our immune systems. Isn't that incredible - we are actually using our minds to direct our bodies! 

But what does meditation actually do to the body to cause these changes? It all starts with the brain, or perhaps more precisely the subjective mind. 



Several MRI scans, taken of people's brains whilst meditating, have shown that the subject's brain wave goes into an alpha state. According to The National Institutes of Health (NIH), this "reduces activity in the sympathetic nervous system and increases activity in the parasympathetic nervous system," or equivalently, meditation produces a reduction in arousal and increase in relaxation. This 'relaxation response' includes changes in metabolism, heart rate, respiration, blood pressure and brain chemistry.

My particular area of interest relates to meditation and health, having suffered previous health issues myself. People with chronic illnesses have found vast improvements over time through regular practice of meditation. This has been achieved by simply sitting in a quiet room (not necessarily in the classic Buddhist pose!) for just 15 minutes a day, shutting their mind off from the external environment, and positively affirming to themselves!

Early research suggests this may be possible due to this practice reducing cortisol levels within our body, which is extremely important, bearing in mind that chronic-stimulation of cortisol and adrenalin causes our cells to break down. Meditation may also reduce anxiety within the subject, linked to the negative prognosis they may have received from their doctor.

Meditation is a truly fascinating area of Mind-Body Medicine, and we are just at the tip of the iceberg! As a daily meditator, I can't recommend it enough. To you I say, next time you are stressed or have an unresolved issue causing you anxiety, don't dwell on it..meditate! It's free and good for your health!

Thanks and Happy Reading!
Adam

p.s. if you're interested in taking meditation further, The London Meditation Centre does free fortnightly talks in Notting Hill Gate -

http://www.londonmeditationcentre.com/upcoming-meditation-courses/