Month: February 2010

Stress and worry

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Researchers at the Harvard School of Public Health have found that high levels of worry and anxiety in older men may increase the risk of coronary heart disease.

This problem is probably likely only to get worse, as worrying seems to be increasing due to many different factors in present day society. A study done done by Jean Twenge, Ph.D., between the 1950’s and the 1980’s seems to indicate this. In it children between 9 and 12 were asked to rate statements such as “I worry about what is going to happen”. The study found that normal samples in the 1980’s outscored psychiatric populations from the 1950’s, meaning that our everyday anxiety now matches the diagnosed fears shown by those suffering from anxiety-related conditions back then.

The School recommends a number of steps which greatly reduce risks, including regular exercise and changes in diet.

On achieving results

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Sometimes the reason why we do not acheive something, or even set out to achieve something is that we are afraid of failing, or that we imagine a possible conclusion even before we have taken one step. In other words, we are already in the future when we need to concentrate on the present and the little first steps we can do here-and-now. This form of “all-or-nothing” thinking is a very common trap that people, including me, like to fall into. It essentially says, “If I can’t do it all, then why bother?” or “it is obvious I will not succeed so let me give up already”

In his book Excuses Be Gone! Dr. Wayne Dyer identifies this as one of the main reasons people do not pursue their goals. He names this the “It’s too big” excuse. He goes on to say that we tend to think of successful people as “big thinkers” when, in actual fact, successful people have a knack for thinking “small” or breaking down their big vision into small, manageable pieces.

Once you get started, you only have to do one step at a time.
Often, getting started is by far the hardest part.

Sunday morning

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Calmness
comes from the ability
to let the mind
be at ease and relaxed
in whatever the situation.

Internet generation

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There is no doubt that the internet brings the capacity for connection with others; however, there is an equally important downside of this phenomenon:

If boredom is the great emotion of the TV generation, loneliness is the great emotion of the Web generation. We lost the ability to be still, our capacity for idleness. When we live exclusively in relation to others, what disappears from our lives is solitude.“

William Deresiewicz, “The End of Solitude”, The Chronicle of Higher Education.

Not letting our fears control us 1: Let go

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The river flows rapidly down the mountain, and then all of a sudden it gets blocked with big boulders and a lot of trees. The water can’t go any farther, even though it has tremendous force and forward energy. It just gets blocked there. That’s what happens with us, too; we get blocked like that.

Letting go at the end of the out-breath, letting the thoughts go, is like moving one of those boulders away so that the water can keep flowing, so that our energy and our life force can keep evolving and going forward. We don’t, out of fear of the unknown, have to put up these blocks, these dams, that basically say no to life and to feeling life.

Pema Chodron

More mindfulness research

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Some people have wondered whether the effects of the MBSR programme could be due to other factors, such as the presence of the group, people simply taking time to reflect on their lives, or whether just listening to relaxing music would have the same effect. However research at the University of Tilburg in the Netherlands found support for the effectiveness of mindfulness meditation. They looked at 40 women and 20 men who were experiencing distress, separated out different factors, and found evidence for the effects of mindfulness as an individual stress reliever in its own right, independent of other stress reduction factors in the intervention. This gives research backing to what many people have found – the practices of mindfulness are effective against the stresses which modern life can throw at us.

Nyklíček I, Kuijpers KF. “Effects of Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction Intervention on Psychological Well-being and Quality of Life: Is Increased Mindfulness Indeed the Mechanism?” Annals of behavioral medicine, June 2008.