Meditation benefits for your brain are plentiful. Meditation not only strengthens your brain’s neural pathways but can literally alter the structure of those networks. With consistent practice, you will cultivate a resilient neurobiology that: Meditation increases self-awareness. Increases mood. Reduces emotional stress.
Meditation benefits also extend to reducing long-term meditators’ pain. Meditation is known to reduce blood pressure and heart rate. Long-term meditators have been shown to demonstrate less pain in a variety of circumstances, including car accidents, dental operations, and even cancer surgeries. Additionally, meditators show less pain after an injury or surgery, as well as taking longer to recover from them. This suggests that the cortex of the brain associated with pain and suffering is less activated in long-term meditators.
Meditation also helps people who are easily distracted focus on one task at a time, which boosts their attention span. Meditation benefits also extend to improving memory and concentration. People who meditate regularly show a greater ability to remember things and to focus on the information that they need. Meditation benefits also extend to improving attention span and increasing the duration of a task.
However, the mind has a tendency to wander during meditating. It’s not uncommon for meditators to briefly slip into a state of hyper-agitation, where they are aware of everything around them, while still fully awake. This experience does not necessarily translate to better brain health. Rather, the hyper-agitation associated with meditation is actually a helpful mechanism that allows a person to bring his attentional awareness back to the present moment, bringing more clarity and focus to both his physical and mental well-being.
The state of rest that comes from meditating is also helpful when it comes to promoting overall brain health. The relaxation experienced as a result of meditation helps the brain slows down. There is some research conducted on the effect of this on patients with Alzheimer’s disease. Preliminary research indicates that the decrease in volume of the amygdala (which is primarily responsible for fear and anxiety) is linked to the novice meditator’s ability to meditate.
Research from the Mayo Clinic indicates that meditation helps control and reduce stress, which in turn improves the functioning of the immune system and reduces the likelihood of the development of degenerative diseases such as osteoarthritis. Finally, according to the Mayo Clinic, meditation helps control depression, insomnia and other psychological disorders. The American Journal of Psychiatry reports that more research is needed to validate the claims of meditation benefits in the treatment of depression. More studies are needed to establish how meditation helps control anxiety and other symptoms of depression. Some preliminary evidence indicates that meditators have a lower risk of certain types of cancers.
