meditation

How Meditation Impacts Daily Life

How Meditation Impacts Daily Life

Stressors fill the world around us. When looking for a way to combat this, meditation is an often-overlooked solution even though its benefits have been studied in the Western World since at least the 1970s. Meditation is extremely beneficial for a person’s daily health. The surprising thing, however, is just how beneficial regular meditation really is. Meditation can be practiced a variety of ways, but however you choose to do it, meditation reduces stress, improves mental clarity, improves mood, aids in sleep, and increases a person’s ability to problem solve. When practiced regularly, it also helps to build focus, eliminate negative thoughts, and change perspectives.

Stress Reduction

Probably the best-known reason for trying meditation is a reduction of stress. While many people know that stress is not good for them, few know the real damage it can cause. High levels of stress can inhibit beneficial sleep patterns. It can lead to anxiety and depression. It can lead to increased blood pressure, as well as mental and physical fatigue. Regular meditation decreases the effects of stress. It also has the effect of lessening the symptoms of stress-related conditions. Improvements to symptoms like irritable bowel syndrome and post-traumatic stress disorder can occur through regular meditation.

Help Decrease Anxiety

When reducing stress in life, there is a concurrent reduction in anxiety. This reduction can have numerous psychological benefits. For those that suffer from anxiety-related ailments like phobias and panic attacks, mediation offers substantial benefits. When combined with a physical movement such as yoga, the reduction in anxiety is considerable.

Can Lead to Better Self -Awareness

One of the central principals of all meditation is to listen to one’s self. The theory is that when this is done, people grow into the best version of themselves. A predisposition to harmful or negative thoughts improves with mediation. Meditation can help redirect these thoughts to a more beneficial state. Gaining awareness of chronic negative thoughts leads to better control of these thoughts. Accomplishing this on a regular basis leads to daily positive effects. This change in perception and attitude can positively impact relationships with others as well.

Become More Focused

Weightlifting builds muscle and continual mediation strengthens the mind. Performing meditation regularly increases the strength and focus of the mind. This change can lead to a mind that can focus more entirely on tasks at hand. It can improve mental functions like memory and attention span. Some theories suggest that meditation can even reverse mental patterns like worrying and wandering thoughts.

Combat Memory Loss

As people age, several systems in the body begin to deteriorate slowly. The many functions of the mind is no exception to this decline. A great deal of age-related decline comes from a lack of preventative care. Practicing meditation regularly can combat this decline by focusing the mind. This continual focusing through meditation can stem the tide of memory loss due to age.

The benefits of meditation go far beyond the mental. The mind and body are thoroughly connected. Improving mental function will lead to other physical improvements.

Insomnia

A common problem for many people is insomnia. Insomnia is often a side-effect of a mind filled with runaway thoughts. A calmer mind leads to less of this type of thinking. The added benefit of meditation is that it leads to a more relaxed body. Combining both factors can lead to deeper and better sleep.

Meditation can also help to control pain.

Pain is often a function of the mind’s perception of the physical body. A more controlled mind can control the thought of physical pain. Many palliative care practitioners are beginning to see the benefits of incorporating meditation into their treatment plans. This can be especially beneficial for those with chronic pain. Those that meditate learn to control all the thoughts of their mind. Mediation can mitigate and lessen regular pain over time.

The regular practice of mediation has benefits that can affect every part of the mind and body.The correlation between a more focused mind and physical, mental, and emotional benefits are hard to deny. Meditation leads to a calmer daily life and a more finely tuned mind and body. The best part of all of this is that even for beginners, regular meditation leads to almost immediate results.

 

Written by Charles Davenport for Senior Planning. Senior Planning is an eldercare planning agency, dedicated to helping seniors apply for benefits and find the care they need.

beyond-mindfulness-awareness-detachment

How Meditation Affects Your Brain

More people than ever are turning to meditation for a wide variety of reasons. The habitual process of training your mind’s ability to retain attention and awareness as well as achieving a more clear, calm and stable emotional states has been a practice used for centuries. Today’s scientific research, however, is showing exactly what it does to us, more specifically, how it changes your most important organ.

Here’s a look at 6 ways Meditation affects your brain.

Reduces Brain Aging
Promising research conducted by the Department of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences at the UCLA School of Medicine suggest regular meditation increases the anti-inflammatory glucocorticoid receptor which can help lessen age stress in the brain. Looking at meditators vs non-mediators also suggested that meditation can improve voluntary regulation of mental activity, shifting focus and attention, as well as a reduction in rumination. In addition, when examining the brains of meditators versus non-meditators, those who meditated had brains that appeared several years younger than those who didn’t.

Eases Addiction Receptibility
1 in 7 people ages twelve and older reportedly have a substance abuse problem. Commonly prescribed in addiction recovery programs, meditation alters the way the brain functions by changing thought patterns. Studies show that just eight weeks of meditation decreases amygdala response to upsetting stimuli even people aren’t currently meditating which is a key competent in drug addiction. Meditation also strengthens a person’s awareness of cravings and allows them to address them more effectively.

Rewires for Outward Thinking
The brain’s default mode seems to be a mind-wandering state which is correlated with unhappiness along with self-referential processing. A 2011 investigation looking at the brain activity of meditators found that main nodes in the medial prefrontal and posterior cingulate cortices (the me-center) were less active than non-meditators. Furthermore, stronger coupling between the posterior cingulate, dorsal anterior cingulate, and dorsolateral prefrontal cortices were found which is the region of your brain that deals with self-monitoring and cognitive control – giving meditators a stronger ability to understand and navigate situations outside themselves.

Reduces Depression, Anxiety and Pain
Like in addiction plans, meditation is regularly part of treatment plans for numerous mental and physical stressors. “Anxiety, depression, and stress/distress are different components of negative affect. When we combined each component of negative affect, we saw a small and consistent signal that any domain of negative affect is improved in mindfulness programs,” writes Madhav Goyal, MD, MPH of the Department of Medicine at The Johns Hopkins University. The active training of the mind has been shown to have powerful effects in managing the unpleasant symptoms associated with depression, anxiety and even pain.

Improves Attention Span
Paying attention can be something everyone struggles with at some point in their daily life. A clinical study looking at sixty participants sent thirty people on a three-month meditation retreat while the other thirty acted as the control group and waited for the other group to finish. At three points participants on the retreat had their visual attention tested as well as their ability to make fine visual distinctions. Participants on the retreat showed continued improvement in perception that led to a longer sustained attention span – which was retained a whopping 5 months after the meditation retreat had concluded.

Children Can Benefit Even More
The incredible neuroplasticity of a young developing brain could benefit even more with daily meditation. The brain is quicker to rewire itself making it easier to improve different thought processes. Studies suggest utilizing mindfulness programs may be an effective way of building resilience and could be used in the treatment of disorders in clinical populations. Further studies looking to bring mediation in Elementary school classrooms found that adding a regular mindfulness program as part of the curriculum improved attention and may improve overall classroom behavior and academic performance.

Meditation is something anyone can do to improve their emotional and mental health. With a great variety of styles that can be done almost anywhere and with so much known benefits – meditation daily just might be one of the best things you can do for your brain.

By Guest Blogger: Alex Schaffer

Ep-2-teens-Stress-Overwhelm

Are you sick of being too busy?

“I’m just too busy!”, Linda says in a state of overwhelm.

“That’s your problem”, I tell Linda.

That usually catches her Ego’s attention. 😉

To me, this statement means, “I don’t have control over my choices. I’m in a state of overwhelm.”

Or this story says, “I don’t deserve help”, “I don’t choose support” , “I don’t choose me”, or “I’m alone.”

It’s also a great excuse for procrastination, avoidance, or over-commitment instead of a clear, “No, I’m choosing me today!”

What does this sentence mean to you?

If you are happily “full” and you love what you are doing, turn the statement to “I’m wildly abundant”, so the Universe can hear your enthusiasm!!!! 😉

It seems like almost everyone I have worked with in my Shamanic Healing Arts coaching program is suffering from overwhelm or anxiety.

How this shows up externally for some people is overworking, isolation, not prioritizing themselves or their needs, or half-assing it.

Can you relate to this feeling of separation from the Self, and community – the very things that keep us in union, in love and in relationship to the Universe?

Believe me I get it!!!  This was a struggle for me.  When I had these types of thought patterns running in the background it was hard to create and envision the loving, joy-filled, abundant life that I imagined for myself.

I didn’t like this struggle and unease.

I didn’t like my subconscious programming running behind the scenes. This is a LOW frequency to be running!

Now that I know this story well enough, I can see when it pops up!

It says to me…

  • You are out of integrity with your self-care practices – use your tools STAT!
  • You are over-commited because you didn’t honor your “NO!” – be AUTHENTIC!
  • You are in a STORY about not deserving what’s coming through flow.
  • Your scarcity consciousness is creeping in – FLIP THE SWITCH!

I don’t want you to have to struggle as much as I have!

I’ve offered great results to my healing clients for a decade.

I have worked with hundreds of clients.

What if you could learn ways to close the gap on these unhealthy patterns that were taught to you as a child?

What if you could have a toolbox that could help you manage them better?

What if you could learn ways to quickly change the story?

What if you could be wildly abundant and thankful for it?

I help the “spiritualpreneur” woman heal her subconscious programming, access her highest vision, unleash her priestess power and create actionable results!

You can step forward for real change

Or not.

Hop on a quick 15 min free call with me, if you wish to help yourself.

nicole-doherty-life-coaching

6 Coaching Tips to Create Happiness

I can say from direct experience in my own life and from working with so many life coaching clients, that these are the biggest obstacles to our happiness:

1) Being Overworked
2) Stress/Anxiety
3) Perceived Pressures (abstract & mind created – not enough time, family expectations, societal pressure, etc.)

These experiences become obstacles to our happiness because they create:

1) Fear
2) Life Imbalances
2) Lack of Fulfillment
3) Health Issues – Physical/Fatigue/Insomnia
4) Dysfunctional Relationships

Here are 6 tips that I have found to be helpful in transmuting these obstacles and thus create real change in our lives:

1) Increased Self-Care/12:12 Rule

Ensure you are engaging at least a few times a week in some sort of practice that is just for you that helps you to release pressure, stress, and anxiety. For example: yoga, meditation, running, eating well, and sleeping more and better.  If you can’t figure out how to get to find the time for this enlist an accountability partner – a friend, coach, mentor or trainer.  Someone who does this well.

There is a rule called the 12:12 Rule.  12 Hours of Input = 12 Hours of Output.  If we have 24 hours in a day, allow yourself to be fed and nourished in 12 of them, thus your output is productive and impassioned.  For input, sleep is part of the 12 hours and the other 4 are for self-care/fun/passion. For output, you have 12 hours of energy expenditure to the human experience as service.  If you do your inner work than those 12 hours of output are servicing by doing something you really enjoy (to the effect that it almost seems like 12 more hours of input, catch my drift?) Learn what you are passionate about!

2) Prioritization

Speaking of passion. We have lost our sense of priorities and what is important to us.

What’s important to you these days?  I have clients write their eulogies. What do you want to be known for in your life? At the end of the day what is most important? Are you fulfilling your dreams? Are you wasting time in fear and all the perceived pressures of life and expectations? Are you living your life?

Each week set aside priorities that move you toward fulfilling your goals and your soul’s purpose.

3) Organization & Understanding Time Suckers

With most my life coaching clients, I help them create structure. We create schedules of their week so that they can take back their time and empower themselves to be more in control of their lives vs their distractions like “time suckers”.  Time suckers are things we perceive to be important, but in actuality they may not be like Instagram & Facebook. I’m not saying these aren’t powerful marketing/promotional and social tools, but we all know that one post can lead to several hours of time lost. When we create schedules, we can allot how much time goes into our priorities first and then see where we are losing time or becoming inefficient.

4) Taking Back Control & Time

There are three work scenarios that I hear time and time again from people who overwork.

1) I stay late at work because I feel like I have to (regardless of whether there is work for me).  If I stay longer the perception is I work harder.
2) I have work to do, but I get distracted at work by conversations, food, and time suckers. I don’t get my work done. I must stay late.
3) There is just too much work and not enough man power.

We need to learn to empower ourselves to be productive, work efficiently, speak up and create healthy boundaries so that we are doing the work we get paid for.  This is healthy for you and best for your employer.   The fact is, we need to be more in control of our time and perceived perceptions of pressure and stress.  All of these scenarios are changeable if you are willing to accept responsibility.  And when we take back our power, many things in our lives shift.

5) Understanding Your Value & Self Worth

Many clients that I work with have an inherent self-worth issue. This is an epidemic in our society.  We are caught in the program loop of “lack” and “not enough”.  We have been spoon fed this idea that we don’t have the power to create what we desire in our lives.

Human beings were gifted with the Spark of the Divine (the Creator) thus we have the ability to Create! We need to understand that it is our birth right to summon this energy and use this to create what our Soul desires and to express our passions, gifts and talents.

6) Understanding your Gifts, Passions and Soul’s Desire

Based on the previous, if we can let go of these ideas of lack and not enough, we can jump the hurdle of fears and limited perceptions that keep us small.  We need to do the inner work to understand what are heart and soul is desiring based on what our passions, gifts and talents are.  Without this knowledge we get caught up in the mind’s perceptions that may not reflect the True Self.

Honoring the True Self is the Key to Being Happy!

I hope you find these tips helpful. As a mentor coach, there are so many tools in our tool box that can catalyze real change. We act as your accountability partner to keep you on track and empower you to shift your perceptions and overcome your shadows and blind spots. Ultimately, its about creating the understanding that the power to create anything is within you and you hold the key to your happiness.