7 Science-backed reasons you should meditate
Do you think meditation actually does any good? Is it effective or just a fancy thing rich people do to look cool? Is it an overrated practice or is actually worth doing? In this article, you can find answers to these questions because here I bring you a list of scientifically proven benefits a meditation practice can provide you.
You will find meditation in the daily rituals of many highly successful people. It is a practice of calmness. It is used as a tool to lessen stress and anxiety in chaos and difficulty. Practicing mindfulness regularly can effectively lower your stress levels and making it a part of your daily routine will increase your emotional intelligence (EQ).
Let’s dive in and see what meditation can do for you;
1. Meditation improves sleep quality
Studies show that meditation helped people recover from insomnia. Being mindful relaxes the mind and improves the quality of sleep. Better sleep is essential not only for proper physical activity but also for good cognitive functioning.
If you don’t sleep well you will feel tired and unmotivated all day long, meditation can help you avoid this misery because it improves sleep quality and establishes harmony between body and mind.
2. Mediation boosts memory
Mindfulness makes synaptic connections between brain cells stronger. These synaptic connections are vital for making memories in the mind. Meditation also increases the blood supply to the brain, when the cerebral cortex is richly supplied with oxygen and nutrients its ability to retain information is increased. Thus, meditation reinforces the memory capacity of the brain. It improves concentration and strengthens working memory.
You can learn your lessons better and faster and remember them for a longer time with even a brief regular meditation practice.
3. Meditation reduces pain
Perception of physical pain is largely dependent on the mental state of the person experiencing it. It feels more painful if you are stressed and mentally disturbed.
Meditation reduces stress levels and helps in relieving pain. Research have shown that meditation lessens haspain intensity. Mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR) is a meditation program that has been proven helpful in making the quality of life better for chronic pain patients.
4. Meditation improves focus
A relaxed mind can focus better and meditation relieves the mind from countless thoughts and allows it to relax.
The ability to focus depends upon short-term memory which can only hold a few things at a time, in everyday life, humans are bombarded with different sorts of information all the time, and resultantly it becomes difficult to retain focus on a single subject.
Meditation requires you to be mindful of your thoughts and directs you to let go of unnecessary ones so that you could focus better. Research has also proven that meditation improves accuracy as well as the span of attention.
5. Meditation decreases depression and anxiety
Emotional health gets significant benefits from meditation as mindfulness calms down the mind and reduces stress levels. It has been reported that meditation therapy reduces depression.
People experienced lesser negative thoughts after a mindful exercise as compared with the members of the control group.
One way meditation reduces depression is that it lowers the level of inflammatory chemicals released due to high stress.
6. Meditation takes care of your heart
People who meditate are at lesser risk of heart disease. High blood pressure not only puts a burden on the heart but also damages other major organs and minimizes their efficiency.
Meditation maintains blood pressure to optimized limits. It also benefits cardiovascular patients, improving the rate of blood flow and reducing the risk of stroke and heart attack.
7. Meditation enhances self-awareness
Some meditation exercises called self-inquiry meditation, require you to think about yourself and your likes and dislikes. Such practices develop a clear vision of yourself in your mind and make you feel empowered.
Other practices involve the identification of your thoughts as harmful, positive, constructive, or destructive. This awareness leads to the decision of whether to let such thoughts prevail over the mind or not.
