How Much Do You Know About Meditation

True or False? Meditation can reduce high blood pressure. (See number3 below)

True or False?

1. Although psychological studies have shown that meditation can be beneficial, the average person is a little hazy about it, and may even find it difficult to define.

2. Meditation is not difficult – even small children can do it and achieve excellent results.

3. Meditation can reduce high blood pressure.

4. Meditation only works for your waking life-it does not affect your sleep or dreams.

5. Meditation can give your career a shot in the arm.

6. There is no such thing as meditating too much.

Answers
1. True. One of the best and simplest definitions of meditation is set forth in a leading psychology dictionary: "A quiet and relaxed state in which a person achieves an awareness of feelings, attitudes and ideas, often but not necessarily – with the belief that this is achieved with the cooperation of a 'divine spirit' or principle."

2. True. There are many meditation techniques. A simple and effective method, which can be learned in a few minutes, is described by a team of psychiatrists from the University of California and the Sacramento Medical Center. The person makes himself comfortable in a chair with his eyes closed; breathing and muscles are relaxed; then he is instructed to allow his mind to wander in the direction of a restful and pleasant memory. The subject is further instructed: "Now, present that memory very gently to your mind and simply allow yourself to experience it. When your thoughts begin to drift off, simply bring yourself back, very gently, by presenting the memory to your mind again and allowing yourself to experience it".

In a New York University study, school children were instructed in a similar method, and it was demonstrated that even boys and girls in the third-grade age bracket can practice meditation effectively. The children who were given meditation practice became more independent and self-confident and appreciably less subject to worry and anxiety. And psychological studies also show excellent results with Transcendental Meditation - a technique employing the use of a "mantra"

3. True. As evidenced by a Harvard Medical School study in which blood pressure was measured 1,119 times in 22 hypertensive subjects. "After control measurements were taken, the subjects altered their behavior by regularly practicing a meditational technique."

Results: High blood pressure was significantly lowered. Conclusions of the investigators: Elevated systemic arterial blood pressure may be reduced by the altered behavior of practicing meditation.

4. False. At Old Dominion University in Norfolk, Va., a questionnaire dealing with sleep was administered to groups of meditators and non-meditators.

Results: "Meditators reported that they awakened in the morning more rested than non-meditators; while non-meditators reported having more bad dreams and nightmares than
meditators.

5. True. As one authority points out, the heightened self-understanding achieved through meditation is knowledge which can be applied in choosing and advancing a career. And a team of behavioral specialists finds from its studies that the practice of meditation can increase energy, productivity and self-reliance. And, as another investigator observes, many career people are fitting time into their daily schedules for a few minutes of meditation.

6. False. As psychologists Patricia Carrington and Harmon S. Ephron observe in their monograph "Meditation as an Adjunct to Psychotherapy," "Excessive use of meditation is sometimes encountered.

Too much time spent in meditation may lead to unconscious material surfacing so rapidly that it cannot be properly assimilated." Thus, it is recommended that the practice should not exceed two or three 30 minute periods daily.

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