Currently, there seems to be more stress and anxiety to life! The reason for this is the pandemic. The infection and death rates and the present way of life have made people more anxious and nervous. Despite the global vaccination drive, people are apprehensive about getting infected by the invisible virus. It has been affecting the mental health of people. And it’s essential to remedy the same. Meditation can help.
Simply put, meditation is the practice of focusing on one’s mind for a certain period. There are several types of meditation, but the main goal is inner peace and relaxation, which ultimately improves mental health. Vic Di Criscio shares how meditation can improve mental well-being during the pandemic.
- Meditation can reduce stress
When you practice mindfulness meditation, your cortisol (stress hormone) level gets reduced, enabling you to feel better and relaxed. Also, when you repeat a mantra, which can be a phrase or a word during meditation, you can witness a calming effect. When you focus on the mantra, you can shift the focus away from disturbing thoughts. You can get the same effect by practicing transcendental meditation. When the mind often gets filled with negative and disturbing thoughts during the pandemic, you can meditate to attain mental stability and stillness.
- Meditation helps to manage depression or anxiety
When you practice mindfulness meditation, your brain gets trained to concentrate on the present moment. That means it reduces your mental habit of ruminating on tensed thoughts that often leads to depression.
There are many researches that supports the advantages of MBSR (Mindfulness-based stress reduction). It is a therapy that adds the techniques of mindfulness meditation. Also, studies highlight that MBSR is effective for people who have anxiety symptoms. It helps reduce the depression symptoms, calm their minds, and help them address issues like low mood, appetite loss, and problems with sleep.
- Meditation helps to fight addiction
The pandemic with its stagnation has made many people resort to smoking or alcohol! Meditation can change the brain receptors linked with alcohol or drug addiction, that can bring down the cravings for specific substances. Also, mindfulness meditation can maximize craving awareness and help you to manage it better.
According to a study in 2018, which got published in Substance Abuse and Rehabilitation, mindfulness training can make sure that there are no future relapses with people having substance abuse disorder. Meditation results in a therapeutic impact that regulates how the brain witnesses’ pleasure and curbs addiction.
- Meditation makes you more loving and kinder
People are becoming more fearful and stressed during the pandemic. It’s essential to become kinder and loving instead to be happy. Meditation can help promote compassion for the self and others. It can strengthen the brain circuits that respond to other’s emotions. It helps to encourage altruistic behavior and brings down unconscious and implicit bias, which is accountable for prolonging damaging stereotypes.
When you develop a feeling of love and kindness for others, you can replace your fearful thoughts with love and gratitude. It can help you to be happier and more peaceful during turbulent times.
Meditation has helped many people to boost their mental well-being. You can practice meditation during the pandemic for better mental health.