Meditation Techniques and Neurological Effects

 Perhaps your life has become too tough to handle. You may be feeling run-down, stressed and anxious and cannot wait to find some time to wind down and relax. Your mind could be preoccupied, thinking about financial worries, deadlines, work, kids and health issues. Consequently, you have found it impossible to switch off.

One of the solutions you may have come across is meditation, the benefits of which include reduced stress levels and better sleep. However, the benefits do not just end there. Tuning inwards can actually make lasting physical changes, and not just in the way you feel. Meditation can literally change your brain. Let's take a look:

An overview: The brain on meditation  

The brain is divided into various segments, each having its own role. The frontal lobe (located at the front end of the brain), helps us plan, reason, emote and be aware of ourselves. MRI scans have shown that during meditation, the frontal lobe slows down and tunes off. 

Meditation can also have an impact on the thalamus. This area of the brain coordinates our senses and channels them from different parts of the body to the brain. During meditation, this processing slows down. 

The reticular formation is also affected during meditation. It is responsible for keeping the brain alert, based on the stimuli it receives.

7 ways meditation affects the brain 

1. Meditation promotes new connections in the brain 

Meditation stimulates the growth of new brain cells, promoting more gray matter (the part of the brain whereby neurons connect to one another and which is activated in the process of learning new skills). As we age, we naturally begin to lose some of the mass of the grey matter. However, meditation can help slow this process down. 

2. Meditation improves your memory 

Due to the effects that meditation has on gray matter, it has also been found to affect the hippocampus, the area of the brain that focuses on memory, helping us learn and internalize new skills and information. Furthermore, research conducted by Osher Research Center and Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging, illustrated that people practicing mindful meditation have the ability to adjust their brain waves, tuning out distractions. Consequently, this increases productivity and boosts memory.

3. Meditation helps control emotions  

Meditation affects the pre-frontal cortex, the part of the brain responsible for regulating emotions, by increasing the amount of gray matter in this area. As a result, meditation enables us to deal better with our emotions and feelings. 

4. Meditation diminishes stress 

 Meditation affects the amygdala center - most commonly associated with fear and stress. When we feel stressed, this part of the brain becomes activated, triggering the fight or flight response. Meditation can reduce the activity of the amygdala, enabling us to control our anxiety and stress levels that come about for no apparent reason. Furthermore, a study conducted to discover the benefits of meditation in 2012, analyzed three groups to test which of the three can handle stress better. The first group practiced mindful meditation; the second focused on body relaxation training and the third were given no training whatsoever. A multi-tasking, stress-inducing test portrayed that those who meditated showed less stress than the group that didn't. 

5. Meditation promotes a relaxed state of mind  

In its aroused state, your brain releases alpha waves, keeping you alert and hyped up. However, MRI scans have shown that during meditation, your brain predominantly releases theta waves - associated with a relaxed state of mind. 

6. Meditation reduces anxiety 

In an upsetting situation, the prefrontal cortex causes you to feel anxious. This response can be controlled with regular meditation. Meditating enables a lesser reaction in the prefrontal cortex, reducing pangs of anxiety, enabling you to evaluate the situation in a rational way. 

7. Meditation increases resilience  

Researchers at Wisconsin Madison University analyzed MRI images of Tibetan monks and discovered that meditation and resilience have a deep-rooted connection.

Picking the right meditation for you  

Meditation can be practiced in a variety of ways. Methods vary in the same way that people vary in their attitudes, character, and nature. Therefore, picking the right method of meditation for you comes down to fitting the right method of meditation to your nature, as opposed to trying to fit your character to a certain technique. Doing so will only cause you to feel frustrated after some time. However, when you find the right meditation for you, you will feel a certain ease and comfort in your practice, and you will flourish.

4 ways beginners can meditate 

1. Breathing: Following the breath is a great way to start your meditation practice, before moving on to more in-depth meditations. Focusing on the breath brings about a restful and calm nature. Here are three breathing techniques you could try. 

2. Gazing: This method of meditation uses our sense of sight to silence the mind. You can practice it anywhere, focusing your mind on something specific. In the yoga tradition, trataka is often practiced. This form of meditation focuses on gazing at a still candle flame in the dark. Practicing this method of meditation enables your mind to become focused. 

3. Visualization: In this meditation, your eyes are closed. It requires the use of your inner eyes or your mind's eye. While there are many forms of visualization meditation, it often focuses on connecting with and visualizing an object, such as your heart - serving as an object of meditation. Alternatively, you may also visualize a calm space, such as a beach, creating your surroundings in your mind's eye. 

 4. Chanting mantras: Mantras are believed to be a powerful sound or vibration that can be used to enter a deep state of meditation. Repeating mantras can help the mind become calm and more focused.

This is only for your information, kindly take the advice of your doctor for food, medicines, exercises and so on.   

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MIT Neuroscience Says This Is What Happens to Your Brain Without Enough Sleep

On my last day at work a few years back, they gave me a going-away party, and it turned into something more like a roast. One of the top leaders told a story I’d sort of hoped he’d forgotten. 

The context was when my wife and I were brand new parents and we were struggling through extreme sleep deprivation. After one especially rough night, I came into work for a key meeting.

Our boss told the story in a way that had everyone laughing:

• How I called our CEO by the wrong name three times.
• How I botched simple math and insisted I’d gotten it right.
• How I nearly fell asleep at the conference table.

The punchline: “Then Murphy said, ‘Sorry. I slept only 45 minutes last night and it turns out that’s not enough.’ And then he stood up and walked out the door.”

Why you can’t pay attention

Maybe you’ve been there. Someone’s talking directly to you, maybe even asking you a question, and your mind just disappears.

Now, a new neuroscience study from MIT suggests a fascinating explanation. In short, when your attention vanishes after a sleepless night,your brain is literally flushing itself clean.

Writing in the journal Nature Neuroscience, MIT researchers found that during those frustrating moments when you can’t pay attention, waves of cerebrospinal fluid are washing through your brain—the exact same cleansing process that normally happens while you’re sound asleep.

Your brain tries to catch up—at a cost

The MIT team, led by Laura Lewis, an associate professor with a PhD in neuroscience, recruited 26 volunteers who were each tested twice: once after a full night of sleep, and once after staying up all night in the lab under constant supervision.

During both sessions, participants performed simple attention tasks while researchers monitored their brain activity, heart rate, breathing, pupil size, and, crucially, the flow of cerebro-spinal fluid in their brains.

The sleep-deprived participants performed significantly worse, missing more cues and responding more slowly. But the striking finding was what happened during those attention lapses.

At the exact moment when focus disappeared, cerebro-spinal fluid (CSF) would surge out of the brain. Then, when attention returned, the fluid would flow back in.

“If you don’t sleep, the CSF waves start to intrude into wakefulness where normally you wouldn’t see them,” Lewis said in a statement. “However, they come with an attentional tradeoff, where attention fails during the moments that you have this wave of fluid flow.”

A body-wide event

Each attention lapse was also accompanied by a whole cascade of bodily changes:

• Pupils constricted (starting about 12 seconds before the fluid wave)
• Heart rate dropped
• Breathing slowed
• Brain wave patterns shifted

Then, after the lapse, everything reversed: pupils dilated, heart rate increased, and breathing sped back up.

“It suggests that there’s a tight coordination of these systems, where when your attention fails, you might feel it perceptually and psychologically, but it’s also reflecting an event that’s happening throughout the brain and body,” Lewis explained.

Sleep’s housekeeping can’t wait

The overall theory:

• Your brain accumulates waste products throughout the day that need to be cleared out.
• Normally, this happens during sleep, when those rhythmic waves of cerebro-spinal fluid (CSF) wash through, removing toxins and restoring balance.
• But when you skip sleep, your brain becomes so desperate for this maintenance that it starts forcing these cleaning cycles during waking hours—even though it means your attention has to shut down temporarily.

“One way to think about those events is because your brain is so in need of sleep, it tries its best to enter into a sleep-like state to restore some cognitive functions,” said Zinong Yang, an MIT visiting graduate student and the lead author of the paper.

Your brain, taking charge

We like to think we’re in control—that willpower, caffeine, and determination can overcome a missed night of sleep. However, this research suggests otherwise.

When your brain needs to clean itself, it’s going to find a way to do it, whether you’re ready for it or not.

Thus, attention lapses aren’t a sign of weakness or lack of focus. They’re your brain literally hijacking your consciousness to perform essential maintenance.

So, the next time you’re sitting in that meeting, struggling to concentrate after a rough night, at least you’ll know what’s actually happening: Your brain is taking matters into its own hands, doing the housekeeping you denied it the night before.

The only real solution? Get enough sleep.

 

This is only for your information, kindly take the advice of your doctor for medicines, exercises and so on.   

https://gscrochetdesigns.blogspot.com. one can see my crochet creations  
https://gseasyrecipes.blogspot.com. feel free to view for easy, simple and healthy recipes    
https://kneereplacement-stickclub.blogspot.com. for info on knee replacement
https://GSiyers home remedies.blogspot.com   is the latest addition to my blogs