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By Lional Wijesiri
Courtesy : VESAK LIPI
Scientists are now taking advantage of new technologies to see
exactly what goes on inside the brains of Buddhist monks and other
indivi duals when they meditate intensively and regularly. The
neuroscientists have discovered that regular meditation actually
alters the way the brain is wired, and that these changes could
be at the heart of claims that meditation can improve health and
well-being.
In 1998 Dr. James Austin, a neurologist, wrote the book 'Toward
an understanding of Meditation and Consciousness' Several mindful
researches cite his book as a reason they became interested in
the field. In it, Austin examines consciousness by intertwining
his personal experiences with meditation with explanations backed
up by hard science. When he describes how meditation can "sculpt"
the brain, he means it literally and figuratively.
Before Austin, others had aimed to teach meditation to individuals
without experience but who hoped to reap mental and physical health
benefits.
EFFECTS OF MEDITATION.
For decades, researchers at the Harvard University and the University
of Wisconsin, have sought to document how meditation enhances
the qualities societies need in their human capital sharpened
institution, steely concentration and plummeting stress levels.
What's different today is groundbreaking research showing that,
when people meditate, they alter the biochemistry of their brains.
The evolution of powerful mind-monitoring technologies has also
enabled scientist to scan the minds of meditators on a microscopic
scale, revealing fascinating insights about the plasticity of
the mind, and meditation's ability to sculpt it.
Some of those insights have emerged tn the lab of Richard Davidson,
a Professor of psychology and psychiatry at the University of
Wisconsin at Madison. Throughout his career, Davidson has pondered
why people react so differently to the same stressful situations,
and for the past 20 years he has been conducting experiments to
find out. Davidson has been placing electrodes on meditating Buddhist
monks, as they lay on his lab floor watching different visual
stimuli - flash on a screen. Davidson and his team then observe
the monks as they meditate while ensconced in the clanking, coffin-like
tubes of MRI machines.
What the researchers reveal are brains unlike any they have observed
elsewhere. The monk's left prefrontal cortices - the area associated
with positive emotion - are far more active than in non-mediators'
brains.
In other words, he says, the monks' meditation practice, which
changes their neural physiology, enables them to respond with
equanimity to sources of stress. Meditation doesn't make meditators
sluggish or apathetic; it simply allows them to detach from their
emotional reactions so they can respond appropriately.
"In our country people are very involved in the physical-fitness
craze, working out several times a week" says Davidson. "But
we don't pay that kind of attention to our minds. Modern neuroscience
is showing that our minds are as plastic as our bodies. Meditation
can help you train your mind, in the same way exercise can train
your body."
Davidson's research didn't stop with the monks. To find out whether
meditation could have lasting, beneficial effects in the workplace,
he performed a study at Madison Biotech Company employees. Four
dozen employees met once a week for eight weeks to practice mindfulness
meditation for three hours. The result, published last year showed
that the employees' left pre-fontal cortices were enlarged, just
like those of the monks (but not that much).
CANCER PATIENTS
In a series of experiments conducted at Canada's Princess Margaret
Hospital,cancer pain patients have found out that pro-found changes
are possible with meditation. Take the case of Melissa Munroe,
a first-class professional athlete, in Canada.
After being diagnosed with cancer about six years ago. Melissa
Munroe suffered excruciating pain when tumors pressed against
her nerves and organs. Making things worse was the trauma of her
diagnosis. It was shocking, because Munroe had led such a healthy
lifestyle.
Munroe said, "I've never drank alcohol in my whole life,
never smoked cigarettes in my whole life and never taken drugs
in my whole life. It was a shock to me when I was diagnosed with
cancer." At Hospital where she underwent chemotherapy, Munroe took a meditation
program with a psychiatrist. Munroe soon learnt that pain is not
just a physical sensation, but can be worse through anxiety. Daily
meditation helped her isolate her pain and manage it, despite
her initial reservations.
The meditation was so effective that Munroe was able to avoid
any pain medication.
While Munroe initially tried meditation to manage her chronic
pain on advice of a colleague, she soon learned that the program
was having a profound impact on her general sense of well-being.
She is now highly enthusiastic about the process as only a daily
practitioner could.
Munroe sees meditation as a way to raise a person's quality of
life by learning to focus on what's important, and ignore fleeting
and meaningless desires. For patients like Munroe, who has learned
to regain control of her life by gaining control of her pain,
meditation is now a natural part of her daily existence. She encourages
everyone to try it.
Courtesy Ceylon DAILY NEWS. 21-10-05
(Article abridged)
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