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How Meditation Affects The Brain: The Science Behind The Practice

How-Meditation-Affects-Our-Brain

Meditation is an art. It is the delicate process of letting go of all your wandering thoughts, the efforts to relax into your true nature, which is love, joy, and peace.
There are numerous ways of doing Meditation. This can be done in silence or with the help of chanting for a number of reasons, ranging from religious or prayer purposes to as a method for evoking relaxation. People often confuse meditation with prayer, but it is important to know that praying is talking to the universe. Meditation is listening to it. Meditation has gained traction in recent years as a fast way to reduce stress. Furthermore, there are many amazing meditation benefits for brain.

Both spirituality and science back the amazing benefits of meditation. If you are planning to indulge in meditation practices but do not know where to start, we are here with a list of seven types of meditation, you can choose the practice that suits you the most.

Mindfulness Meditation

Mindfulness Meditation

Mindfulness Meditation is the most common way of being completely present with your thoughts. Being careful means monitoring where we are and what we’re doing and not being excessively responsive to what exactly is happening around us. When performing mindfulness meditation, you focus on your thoughts and feelings but let them pass without judgment. 

Yoga Meditation

Yoga Meditation

The act of yoga traces all the way back to ancient India. There is a wide assortment of classes and styles of yoga. However, they all include a series of postures and controlled breathing activities intended to advance adaptability and quiet the brain. The poses require balance and concentration, and practitioners are urged to focus less on interruptions and stay more in the moment. 

Chakra Meditation

Chakra Meditation

Chakras allude to the focus of energy and spiritual power in the body. There are believed to be seven chakras. Chakra meditation consists of body relaxation techniques focused on bringing balance and well-being to the chakras. A portion of these methods visually pictures each chakra in the body and its relative color.

Loving Kindness Meditation (Metta Meditation)

Loving Kindness Meditation

Metta-Meditation or Loving-Kindness Meditation is the practice of directing warm words toward others. Those who practice, recite exact words and expressions intended to bring out thoughtful sentiments. This is also common in vipassana and mindfulness meditation.

Transcendental Meditation

Transcendental Meditation

Transcendental meditation is a simple method in which a personally selected mantra, such as a word, small phrase, or sound, is repeated in a specific way. It’s practiced 20 minutes two times each day while sitting relaxed with closed eyes. The thought is that this method will allow you to settle inward to a significant condition of relaxation, determined to accomplish inner peace without concentration or effort.

Guided Meditation

Guided Meditation

Guided meditation or guided imagery or visualization is a meditation technique in which you form mental pictures or circumstances that you find relaxing. This method is typically led by a guide or teacher, hence “guided.” 

Vipassana Meditation (Sayagyi U Ba Khin Tradition)

Vipassana Meditation

Vipassana meditation is an ancient Indian type of meditation that means to see things as they indeed are. The goal of this meditation is self-change through self-observation. This is achieved through focused attention to physical sensations in the body to establish a deep association between the brain and the body—the continuous interconnectedness results in a balanced mind full of affection and compassion.

How does Meditation affect the Brain?

If you start preparing a list of meditation benefits for brain, then it might turn out never-ending. All you need to know is Meditation can make your life a lot better; you will start noticing the changes soon after you start.

Meditation prompts mental clearness, so next time you don’t have to struggle to decide what to order from Zomato? or which series to watch on Netflix.

Stress has become a constant companion of millennials, as stress has taken a vow to never leave us alone, but with Meditation, you can burst stress like a pro.

If you are a science nerd and wonder, how does meditation affect our brains? Then we have got you covered too.

Meditation Effect On Brain

Research conducted at Yale University found that mindfulness meditation decreases activity in the default mode network (DMN). This network is responsible for all the overthinking you often find yourself engulfed in. The DMN is “on” or active when we’re not thinking about anything; in particular, when our minds are just wandering from thought to thought. This wandering often results in emotional turmoil. Several studies have shown that meditation, through its quieting effect on the DMN, makes the mind quiet, And even when the mind does start to wander, because of the new connections that form, meditators are better at snapping back out of it.

Another study at Harvard has found that mindfulness meditation can actually change the structure of the brain: Eight weeks of Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) was found to increase cortical thickness in the hippocampus, which governs learning and memory. There were also decreases in brain cell volume in the amygdala, which is responsible for fear, anxiety, and stress

One study claimed that just a couple of weeks of meditation training helped people’s focus and memory during the verbal reasoning section of the Competitive exams, so students! Take notes.

It was found that students improved scores by up to 16 percentile points.

Meditation is proven beneficial for toddlers and school-going kids in their studies and concentration.

So you see, there are tons of meditation benefits for brain and not a single drawback, isn’t it a great deal?

The bottom Line

Whether you’re looking to reduce stress or find spiritual enlightenment or are looking for meditation benefits on brain, there’s always a meditation practice for you.

If you find it difficult to practice meditation on your own or want to practice meditation in a proper way. There is a number of meditation centers like Tushita Meditation Center, Dhamma Bodhi, Ashiyana Yoga Retreat, and Isha Yoga and Meditation which can help you immensely.

Now that there is no excuse left, you better start practicing meditation. After all, what could be better than a life full of joy, tranquillity, and purpose Meditation gives you all.

Meditation is not a thing to force on you. It is all about comfort and relaxation. You will be amazed to see how magnanimous transformation meditation brings to our lives. So start early and become part of eternal bliss.

References: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4895748/#:~:text=In%20meditation%2C%20the%20feedback%20loop,life%20and%20improves%20overall%20health.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4895748/#:~:text=A%20feedback%20loop%20to%20the,life%20and%20improves%20overall%20health.

https://www.liebertpub.com/doi/abs/10.1089/acm.2013.0204

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