Scientific study on mindfulness in stress-reduction and improved mood

Hello everyone! I have always been a huge fan of mindfulness meditation, and recently I've been looking into some of the research that backs it up. I found this really great article, that I summarize here, that talks about a technique that has proven helpful, and also seems to not require a lot of time. I hope you enjoy it.

Traditionally studied meditation training programs, such as Transcendental Meditation and The Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction Program, can be very costly in terms of both time and money. Lane et al. (2007) wanted to test whether a shorter meditation training program would be effective in improving participants perceived stress and negative mood, and whether practicing more frequently resulted in more improvement.

In an effort to measure the potential benefits of this brief training, the researchers administered several stress and mood related tests prior to training, and after training, during monthly follow-up sessions that lasted for a total of 3 months. The training included four 1-hour sessions where the participants learned one mantra meditation technique. They were instructed to practice this technique twice a day. The participants selected a sound, word, or phrase that would serve as their mantra. The training required participants to sit with their eyes closed, to engage in abdominal breathing for ~1 minute, to repeat their mantra at a pace that felt natural to them for 15-20 minutes, and to then sit in quiet rest for several minutes. During the course of practicing, participants were instructed to direct their thoughts back to the mantra when intrusive thoughts or feelings came into their consciousness.

The researchers found that this brief meditation program significantly improved participants perceived stress, and negative mood. Participants reported improvements after a month of training and a persistence in this improvement during subsequent follow-up sessions. They also found that the participants who practiced more frequently, at least once per day, demonstrated better outcomes those who practice less frequently. In summary, this study demonstrates that even brief periods of this type of meditation training can be beneficial to those who would like to try it in an effort to reduce their stress and improve their mood.

If you would like to check out the study, and the details I might have left out, you can find the link to the study below.

(http://managestressnow.com/pubarticles/Brief%20Meditation%20Lane%20and%20Seskevich.pdf

To all the wonderful people out there, let's turn this awesome topic into several threads where we discuss our experiences and possible benefits that can result from practicing meditation/mindfulness.

I want to start this awesome discussion by encouraging all of you to tell us about some techniques that you use to help with stress, or what has helped you when you were feeling low.