6 Benefits of mindfulness
Take the time to study the scientifically-backed benefits of mindfulness for your health.
Then, if you’d like to try it, read our guide for beginners to mindfulness meditation.
Mindfulness can improve your mental and physical health.
Furthermore, the practice of mindfulness can contribute to an improved handling of stress and emergency situations (Grossman et al., 2004).
1. Stress Management & Emotion Control
In addition, mindfulness can reduce the individual’s identification with negative thoughts by recognizing them as temporary. Thus, the effect of mental processes on the individual is influenced. As a result of the conscious awareness of inner processes, an appropriate way of dealing with them is made possible. Thus, mindfulness can contribute to stress management (Bishop et al., 2004).
Furthermore, the results suggest that participation in MBSR programs can promote the management of emotions and their influence. The authors suggest that mindfulness can be used as a strategy for emotion regulation. Acceptance of the emotions that arise could support the management of intense emotions (Robins et al., 2012).
Davidson et al. (2003) also investigated the influence of an MBSR program on the brain. The program was carried out in a work environment and with healthy employees as test subjects. The results of electroencephalography (EEG) suggest that meditation can activate brain areas that are associated with a reduction in anxiety. In addition, Davidson et al. (2003) suggest that this area may affect the adaptive response with respect to stressful events and may be related to emotion regulation.
Another study examining the impact of an MBSR intervention showed effects on participants’ mental health. The results suggest an improvement in mindfulness, perceived well-being, and empathy of the subjects due to participation in the MBSR program. Additionally, a decrease in perceived stress was noted (Shapiro, Brown, Thoresen & Plante, 2011).
According to Good et al. (2016), mindfulness has a variety of positive effects. For example, mindfulness can contribute to an improvement in sustained attention, which in turn can lead to a reduction in rumination and thus negative emotions.
In addition, Creswell et al. (2016) suggest positive effects of mindfulness programs on resilience to stress.
2. Unfiltered perception & Insight
Furthermore, according to Bishop et al. (2004), mindfulness offers a possibility for unfiltered perception of events. In this way, mental capacities released by a reduction in information processing (e.g., in the form of assumptions and wishes) can be used to view experiences directly.
Germer (2013) sees in it the possibility of being able to obtain an unimpaired view of inner and outer processes of one’s own existence. This can give the user an insight into the counterproductive nature of resistance to momentary events and lead to an overcoming of repetetive thought processes. This form of consciousness is considered wisdom in Buddhism (p. 10).
3. Mind wandering
A study conducted by Killingsworth and Gilbert (2010) suggests a connection between mind wandering and people’s satisfaction. Respondents indicated that they were less satisfied when their minds wandered.
In the research conducted by Ramel, Goldin, Carmona, and McQuaid (2004), subjects showed a reduction in brooding thoughts through the use of mindfulness meditation in the form of the MBSR program. Thus, mindfulness meditation can lead to the user not becoming entangled in mental processes, but rather adopting an observational stance. Thus, it enables the user to monitor his or her own mental processes in a detached manner (Ramel et al, 2004).
In a study by Robins, Keng, Ekblad, and Brantley (2012), participants in an MBSR program reported being more mindful and less likely to be absent-minded in everyday life as a result of the intervention. Consistent with the aforementioned studies, participants also described participants also reported a reduction in ruminative thinking.
4. increased mental capacaties
Hölzel et al. (2011) found effects on the brain of MBSR participants. For this purpose, healthy subjects were recruited who used MBSR courses as a measure to reduce stress. In the course of this, changes were found in the concentration of gray matter in the area of the left hippocampus, which is associated with emotions and memory. Due to the increase in areas of the brain associated with mental health, this change could contribute to improved mental performance (Hözel et al., 2011).
Following the implementation of an MBSR program, participants also showed cognitive changes in the form of improved performance in sub-areas of attention, as well as working memory (Jensen, Vangkilde, Frokjaer & Hasselbalch, 2012).
5. Physical health
In addition, a significant increase in the number of antibodies to an administered influenza vaccine was found in the meditators compared to the non-meditating control group (Davidson et al., 2003).
First, participants in a study by Black, O’Reilly, Olmstead, Breen, and Irwin (2015) showed improved sleep quality from a 6-week mindfulness intervention compared to a group that participated in training on sleep-enhancing behaviors.
Furthermore, Hughes et al. (2013) found evidence that mindfulness intervention, in the form of MBSR, can lead to a reduction in blood pressure.
6. Dealing with Addiction
Garland, Roberts-Lewis, Tronnier, Graves, and Kelly (2016) demonstrated improvements in addiction craving among participants in a mindfulness-based addiction rehabilitation program compared to cognitive behavioral therapy.
Literature
Bishop, S. R., Lau, M., Shapiro, S., Carlson, L., Anderson, N. D., Carmody, J., . . . Ab-bey, S. (2004). Mindfulness: A proposed operational definition. Clinical psychology: Science and practice, 11, 230-241.
Black, D. S., O’Reilly, G. A., Olmstead, R., Breen, E. C. & Irwin, M. R. (2015). Mind-fulness meditation and improvement in sleep quality and daytime impairment among older adults with sleep disturbances: A randomized clinical trial. JAMA In-ternal Medicine, 175(4), 494–501.
Creswell, J. D., Taren, A. A., Lindsay, E. K., Greco, C. M., Gianaros, P. J., Fairgrieve, A., . . . Ferris, J. L. (2016). Alterations in Resting-State Functional Connectivity Link Mindfulness Meditation With Reduced Interleukin-6: A Randomized Con-trolled Trial. Biological Psychiatry, 80(1), 53–61.
Davidson, R. J., Kabat-Zinn, J., Schumacher, J., Rosenkranz, M., Muller, D., Santorelli, S. F., . . . Sheridan, J. F. (2003). Alterations in Brain and Immune Function Pro-duced by Mindfulness Meditation. Psychosomatic Medicine, 65(4), 564–570.
Garland, E. L., Roberts-Lewis, A., Tronnier, C. D., Graves, R. & Kelley, K. (2016). Mindfulness-Oriented Recovery Enhancement versus CBT for co-occurring sub-stance dependence, traumatic stress, and psychiatric disorders: Proximal outcomes from a pragmatic randomized trial. Behaviour Research and Therapy, 77, 7–16.
Good, D. J., Lyddy, C. J., Glomb, T. M., Bono, J. E., Brown, K. W., Duffy, M. K., . . . Lazar, S. W. (2016). Contemplating Mindfulness at Work. Journal of Manage-ment, 42(1), 114–142.
Germer, C. K. (2013). Mindfulness: What Is It? What Does It Matter? In C. K. Germer, R. D. Siegel & P. R. Fulton (Eds.), Mindfulness and psychotherapy (2. Ed.) (pp. 3-35). New York: Guilford Press.
Grossman, P., Niemann, L., Schmidt, S. & Walach, H. (2004). Mindfulness-based stress reduction and health benefits. Journal of Psychosomatic Research, 57(1), 35–43.
Hölzel, B. K., Carmody, J., Vangel, M., Congleton, C., Yerramsetti, S. M., Gard, T. & Lazar, S. W. (2011). Mindfulness practice leads to increases in regional brain gray matter density. Psychiatry Research, 191(1), 36–43.
Hughes, J. W., Fresco, D. M., Myerscough, R., van Dulmen, M. H. M., Carlson, L. E. & Josephson, R. (2013). Randomized controlled trial of mindfulness-based stress reduction for prehypertension. Psychosomatic Medicine, 75(8), 721–728.
Jensen, C. G., Vangkilde, S., Frokjaer, V. & Hasselbalch, S. G. (2012). Mindfulness training affects attention — or is it attentional effort? Journal of Experimental Psychology, 141(1), 106–123.
Killingsworth, M. A. & Gilbert, D. T. (2010). A wandering mind is an unhappy mind. Science, 330, 932.
Ramel, W., Goldin, P. R., Carmona, P. E. & McQuaid, J. R. (2004). The Effects of Mindfulness Meditation on Cognitive Processes and Affect in Patients with Past Depression. Cognitive Therapy and Research, 28(4), 433–455.
Robins, C. J., Keng, S. L., Ekblad, A. G. & Brantley, J. G. (2012). Effects of mindful-ness-based stress reduction on emotional experience and expression: a random-ized controlled trial. Journal of Clinical Psychology, 68(1), 117–131.
Shapiro, S. L., Brown, K. W., Thoresen, C. & Plante, T. G. (2011). The moderation of Mindfulness-based stress reduction effects by trait mindfulness: results from a randomized controlled trial. Journal of Clinical Psychology, 67(3), 267–277.