“For many people, this situation is not just about stress; it’s about life and death,” says Justin Laube, MD, an assistant clinical professor at the UCLA Center for East-West Medicine. “Given this pandemic, which is something many of us likely didn’t even have on our radar much at all until recently, and then looking at the rising statistics, it would be hard not to at least have our own mortality come up, however subtly.” While this is prime time for fear, Dr. Laube says, “it also opens the opportunity for personal growth, reflection, and calibration on how we want to live our lives.” That’s where meditation comes in. Meditation has been shown to strengthen immunity, reduce anxiety, and help you to get a good night’s sleep — all aspects of self-care that are important to keep in mind as we all work through this confusing time. Continue reading to learn about seven science-backed benefits of meditation that will motivate you to pull up a cushion and get started. RELATED: A Guide to 7 Different Types of Meditation A comprehensive review published in the journal PLoS One in 2014 looked at 34 studies to evaluate the effects of mind-body therapies (MBTs), including meditation, yoga, qi gong and tai chi, on the immune system. The researchers found that MBTs reduced markers of inflammation and influenced virus-specific immune responses to vaccination, which could be key to staying healthy in uncertain times.
2. You’ll Choose Salads Over Sweets
Stress can lead to overeating and eating too much of the wrong (unhealthy) foods. “In the midst of all the anxiety hanging in the air right now, we are becoming emotionally depleted, and that’s where the craving for comfort food comes in,” says Naomi Torres-Mackie, an advanced PhD candidate at Columbia University and an adjunct lecturer in psychology at the City College of New York. “Many of my therapy patients have told me that all of a sudden they feel unable to resist overeating.” Compounding the problem, the American Institute of Stress notes that increased stress increases levels of the stress hormone cortisol, which in turn increases abdominal fat deposits. The good news: Practicing mindfulness — both on your meditation mat and at the kitchen table — may help decrease deep belly fat, according to a study published in Obesity. The study recruited overweight and obese women who felt that stress influenced their eating behavior and weight. Participants were instructed in various mindful meditation and breathing exercises. They were also led through guided meditations that emphasized mindful eating practices, such as paying attention to physical sensations of hunger, stomach fullness, taste satisfaction, and food cravings. The more mindfulness the women practiced, the greater the drop in their anxiety, chronic stress, and deep belly fat. In addition, the women in the mindfulness program maintained their body weight, while the women in the control group increased their weight over the same time period. “Practicing meditation relaxes the sympathetic nervous system so that you become calmer, less impulsive, and more likely to make food decisions you won’t end up regretting,” says Torres-Mackie.
4. You’ll Be Less Anxious
A small study published in FASEB Journal and presented at the American Physiological Society annual meeting in April 2018 found that a single 60-minute guided meditation session reduced anxiety for up to an hour post-meditation. But if you’re overseeing your kids’ studies or working at a hospital or supermarket during the pandemic, it may be difficult to steal even an hour away from the reality of the day. Leah Lagos, PsyD, a health and performance psychologist and the author of the forthcoming book Heart Breath Mind, encourages her patients to practice a mindfulness technique known as a “heart pivot” to shift from a negative to a positive emotional state no matter where they are. To do this, Dr. Lagos says to first think about a time in your life when you felt incredibly safe and grateful. Perhaps it was the first time you held your newborn or your first day of a dream job, she suggests. Find three such experiences, and practice bringing them to mind on demand. The next time you find yourself spinning post-apocalyptic scenarios in your head or you’re at the grocery store piling rolls of toilet paper into your cart out of fear you’ll run out, pivot your heart, she says. Focus on that past happy experience as you inhale, and then let go of any fear or anger as you exhale. For best results, Lagos suggests repeating this mental exercise five times.
5. Setting Up a Regular Practice Can Help Structure Your Day
As the world deals with the coronavirus pandemic, most countries where the virus is widespread have enacted shelter-in-place policies, and everyone’s normal routine has been thrown off balance. Torres-Mackie says that a lack of structure “can add to feelings of stress and panic in a big way.” To combat this, she suggests setting specific times to meditate once or twice a day. “Scheduling 5 or 10 minutes [or more] a day to meditate, and literally putting it on your calendar in order to commit to it, can go a long way.” If you can’t find a quiet place in your crowded home or tiny apartment, Laube suggests taking your meditation outdoors. “Walking meditation, commonly performed on longer retreats, includes walking back and forth between two points, which are a specified distance, such as 10 feet apart,” he says. “This allows you to focus more on the body-mind relationship when moving through space.” There is also the option to walk and meander, letting the body and mind move wherever it prefers. Tied to your desk? Laube recommends standing up while you’re on a conference call or while banging out a report. “Standing is useful when you’re feeling tired and opens up awareness of the feet, posture, and more body awareness.”
6. It Will Help You Avoid Vices
In an effort to keep calm and carry on, some may turn to alcohol or other vices to blunt emotions or pain. “Many of us are feeling various degrees of fear in the current environment, and it’s challenging to sit with this,” says Laube. “Partaking in alcohol initially brings calm. The challenge is that while it may help in the short term, in the longer term, it can lead to addiction and ill health.” In addition, your sleep quality may suffer, since alcohol blocks REM sleep, which is considered the most restorative kind, according to the National Sleep Foundation. Meditation can be an alternative. Research published in November 2017 in the International Journal of Neuropsychopharmacology found that just 11 minutes of mindful meditation may help even heavy drinkers cut back on alcohol. In the study, participants who listened to an 11-minute recording that taught basic mindfulness strategies, like thinking consciously about one’s feelings, drank 9.3 fewer units of alcohol (about three pints of beer) in the following week than they had the week before the study. “Mindfulness can help increase awareness of our behaviors, thoughts, emotions, and bodily sensations, and to recognize the limitations of addictive tendencies,” explains Laube. RELATED: How Meditation Can Help Manage Illness
