Open Your Mind To Meditation

Are you ready to explore the possibilities? 👁✨

Beginning to meditate can feel daunting, especially if you are already not feeling great. It can feel like “just another chore” and when motivation levels are low then it’s understandable it’s something you might not want to engage with🙅‍♂️. But, a plethora of research has demonstrated that meditation can significantly help you✅. Albeit possibly challenging to start, it can be worthwhile and help improve any unhelpful emotions and feelings you're experiencing at present✅. Then it can also help to build resilience aiding you in managing difficult situations in the future✅.

I am also aware that sometimes people may negatively perceive meditation. Believing it to be some form of “hippie behaviour”. But, this really isn’t the case. Meditation has been scientifically proven by many studies to help in numerous ways both psychologically and physically (some of these are detailed below).

👉 What is Meditation? 🤔

There are lots of different understandings of the history of meditation and what meditation is. Exploring these is far beyond the scope of this piece. Meditation means different things to different people, it can be a very personal experience.

Meditation has been defined as a set of techniques that help you to be in the present moment with a judgment-free attitude, clear your mind, reduce unhelpful emotions, and heightened awareness. It is a skill that you need to practice to improve upon consistently. Meditation is a mental practice used to improve the psychological capacity of self-regulation concerning emotion, awareness, and attention (Brandmeyer et al. 2019 cited in Kim et al. 2022).

The great news is there are lots of different styles of meditation. You can have some fun and take some time to explore these, maybe find a favourite! It is common to prefer different styles of meditation for different reasons/situations, times of day, etc,. Some of these include...

👁 Focused Attention Meditation - This form of meditation involves engaging and maintaining your attention exclusively on a target stimulus present in the moment while purposefully disengaging from distractors (e.g., mind wandering, body sensations, etc,.). 👂Guided Meditation - This is where you are visually or audibly guided through the meditation practice. 🧘🏻‍♀️ Yoga - Yoga is a physical form of meditation. 💨 Breathing Practices - The focus of this form of meditation is on different breathwork.

👉 The Benefits of Meditation.

When you are considering making a change and starting something new. It can feel reassuring to know there is scientific evidence to support that change. It can be motivating to know that there is evidence that the change will have a positive effect on you. I understand it can be difficult to convince yourself to make a change, especially when you are already not feeling great, or feeling like you never have enough time. For these reasons, I have included some research concerning the positive effects of meditation. There is an abundance of research available, I have only chosen a few, there are plenty more!...

✅ Meditation can promote emotional stability, calmness, joy, and compassion (Shapiro and Walsh. 2003). ✅ Research has reported meditation to significantly reduce anxiety symptoms, particularly for people experiencing high levels of anxiety (Orme-Johnson and Barnes. 2013) ✅ Meditation can have positive effects on post-traumatic stress disorder and depression symptoms (Hilton et al. 2016) ✅ Meditation significantly increases left-sided anterior activation in the brain, this is associated with an increase in positive affect and a reduction in anxiety and negative affect. It also is associated with an increased adaptive response to stressful negative life events. This means meditation can change the brain in a positive way, reducing anxiety and speeding up emotional recovery following a stressful event! (Davidson et al. 2003). ✅ A review of more than 200 studies on mindfulness found it to be effective for reducing anxiety, depression, and stress (American Psychological Association. 2019). ✅ Meditation can improve immune function with research demonstrating meditation causes increases in antibody titer to the influenza vaccine (Davidson et al. 2003).

👉 Joining A Meditation Programme.

Many people find building a meditation practice a stress-inducing experience. The practice then needs to be incorporated into your life and it can be difficult to determine the most suitable schedule for you. If that isn’t enough, you then need to commit to engaging with your meditation practice and stay motivated. It’s also not uncommon to be left wondering if you're doing it “correctly”.

Developing a meditation practice is exciting. It should be celebrated🎉. Joining a meditation programme is an excellent way to build your relationship with meditation. It can help to reduce/remove common stressors as you're provided with step-by-step guidance. This means you can focus on the positive change you’re making rather than worrying about common concerns.

Therefore, Happio is super excited to announce… We will soon be launching an Introduction to Meditation programme. This programme aims to reduce the aforementioned stress you can feel surrounding meditating. Over a few weeks, you will be given the education, practical tools, and resources you need to hopefully successfully develop the lifelong skill of meditation.

Furthermore, if you are already familiar with meditating and practicing yourself, our meditation programme can help you to build upon your current practice, and gain a deeper level of understanding.

👉 Research Exploring Meditation Programmes?

👆 A controlled longitudinal study (Holzel et al, 2011) used anatomical MRI scans to investigate changes in participants' brains before and eight weeks after participating in a mindfulness-based stress reduction programme. The results of this study reported that the eight weeks scans demonstrated an increase in the cortical thickness of participants' hippocampus. The hippocampus is the region of the brain associated with regulating emotions and memory. A decrease in the amygdala’s volume was also observed. The amygdala is responsible for emotions which include fear, anxiety, and stress. In addition to these structural changes, the participants also reported their stress levels feeling reduced.

👆 A randomised controlled study (Mrazek et al. 2013) investigated whether a two-week mindfulness programme could decrease mind wandering and improve cognitive performance. The results of this study report that mindfulness meditation is an efficient and effective technique to improve cognitive functioning. Working memory and reading comprehension scores were improved, while the occurrence of distracting thoughts was reduced.

👉 Cultivating a Meditation Practice

Have a think about your lifestyle and how meditation can be successfully incorporated.

🔶 What is your current meditation practice? Be kind to yourself. If you have no previous experience with meditation it could be unrealistic to expect yourself to be able to meditate for thirty minutes from the very beginning. That is ok. Meditation is something that you can practice every day and improve upon. 🔶 Are there any specific areas in your life that you feel practicing meditation would benefit in particular? An example of this would be you feel stressed once you return home from work. Then try and consider how you could use meditation to help with this. The first element is to identify the feeling you would like to manage, in this case, it would be stress and you wish to reduce the feeling. 🔶 You then need to think about your schedule. For example, you are aware you’re stressed once you return home. But, determining a schedule needs to suit you comfortably. With this in mind, you may for example acknowledge that you usually shower first, so you decide to meditate once you’ve showered to not disrupt your routine. 🔶 Try different styles of meditation and journal your thoughts and feelings afterward. This can help you recognise which forms of meditation or time of day are most suited to your needs. 🔶 You can think about allocating a particular space dedicated to your meditation practice.

I would recommend you work your way through the abundance of meditation resources available in the self-care section to get your journey started.

✍️ Happio also has a Meditation Programme launching soon!🎉

🤗 Remember you are not alone! 🤗