1.) It might help you modify disease by controlling stress.
Long-standing stress can exacerbate and worsen conditions including high blood pressure, high blood sugar, depression, anxiety, muscle tension and pain, insomnia, stomach upset, and asthma. Meditation may soothe the feelings and thought processes that add fuel to a stress response, producing calmness instead of stoking distress. The conjecture, says Richard Davidson, neuroscience and meditation researcher at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, is that "there are circuits in the brain that are up-regulated by stress that can be down-regulated by meditation." The sympathetic nervous system, which initiates the fight or flight response, and the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenocortical axis, which controls stress reaction and other processes including mood and the immune system—often hyperactivated if a person is anxious or distressed—are probably calmed by meditation, experts theorize.
2.) It may enhance the immune system.
Research is emerging that suggests meditation could boost your ability to fight off infection, possibly through a quelling of the body's stress and inflammatory responses, experts speculate. Davidson conducted a small study that showed a heightened response to the flu vaccine, measured by an enhanced antibody response, in participants who had done an eight-week mindfulness meditation program, compared with control participants.
3.) It might improve quality of life.
Meditation appears to promote feeling more in control and less a slave to one's anxieties. "There is no problem with thinking [such thoughts], only a problem with believing them—a lot of times those fears don't materialize," explains Jeffrey Greeson, meditation researcher and assistant clinical professor in the department of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Duke University School of Medicine. Recent research published in the journal Integrative Cancer Therapies suggested that meditation improved older breast cancer patients' overall quality of life, measured by improvements in emotional and social well-being and mental health after practicing transcendental meditation, compared with the control subjects. Separate research has suggested that meditators also have greater activity in areas of the brain associated with positive emotions.
4.) It may help you weather addiction's cravings.
Managing the urge is one of the biggest challenges for people who battle addictions. The goal in mindfulness meditation is not to prevent such thoughts entirely but rather to notice them and let them fall away instead of getting hijacked by them. Explains Greeson: "We can feel the impulses and not succumb to them."
5.) Your doctor might be benefiting from it.
Primary care physicians are plenty stressed out, which may affect quality of care. A September study in the Journal of the American Medical Association suggested that primary care physicians who participated in a "mindful communication program," which included seated and walking meditation exercises, reported improved measures of well-being—better resilience and capacity to handle challenge, and less burnout—and attitudes toward patient-centered care. The benefits were seen in the short term but also appeared to be sustained.
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