THE BENEFIT OF BEING PRESENT

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THE BENEFIT OF BEING PRESENT
How Mindfulness Practice Positively Impacts Our
Health and Well-Being
Garrett Hooper Body Mind Wellness Challenge March
2010
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Mindfulness is a moment-to-moment,
non-judgmental awareness, cultivated by paying
attention in a specific way, that is, in the
present moment, and as non-reactively, as
non-judgmentally, and as openheartedly as
possible.Jon Kabat-Zinn, Coming to Our Senses
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What is Mindfulness?

• Present moment awareness
• Non-judgmental
• Non-reactive
• Openhearted
• Challenge to the monkey-mind

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Mindfulness is not.

• Thinking
• Daydreaming
• Spacing out
• Repeating affirmations
• Self-hypnosis
• Sleeping

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Mindfulness Is

• Stopping our automatic, habitual pattern of
  reactivity
• A space between ones perception and response
• Reflectivity, not reflexivity
• Investigative awareness
• Observation, discrimination, causality

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Orientation to Experience

• Attitude of curiosity
• Where the mind goes
• What is the object of experience?
• Everything is relevant
• Not trying to produce a state
• Acceptance of each moment

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The Stress Response

• Good stress, bad stress
• Life on the Serengeti
• Life commuting on the 405
• Chronic stress shutdown
• Immune system
• Digestive system
• Reproductive system

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Predictions

• Reduced use of strategies to avoid aspects of
  experience
• Increase dispositional openness
• Change of psychological context
• Improved affect tolerance
• Emotional awareness
• Relationship between thoughts, feelings, and
  actions

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Predictions

• Insight into the nature of thought
• Passing events of the mind, NOT
• inherent aspects of the self
• Awareness of thoughts as
• Contextual
• Relativistic
• Transient
• Subjective

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Origins

• Most cultures have some form of mindfulness
  practice
• Breath meditation
• Mantra
• Yoga
• Tai Chi
• Contemplative prayer

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Why Mindfulness?

• Physiological Benefits
• Decreased heart-rate during meditation
• Lower blood-pressure in normal and moderately
  hypertensive individuals
• Quicker recovery from stress
• Increase in alpha rhythms (relaxation)
• Increase in synchronization (hemispheres)
• Reduced cholesterol levels
• Reduction in the intensity of pain

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Why Mindfulness?

• Psychological Benefits
• Greater happiness and peace of mind
• Less emotional reactivity
• Increased empathy
• Enhanced creativity
• Heightened perceptual clarity
• Reduction in acute and chronic anxiety
• Enhanced self-actualization

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Therapeutic Interventions

• Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR)
• Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy (MBCT)
• Reduction of symptoms
• Chronic Pain
• Anxiety
• Depression
• Eating Disorders
• Fibromyalgia
• Psoriasis
• ADHD

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MBSR

• 8-week program meditation, body scan,
• hatha yoga
• Baers Meta-analysis MBSR effective in reducing
  stress, increasing well-being
• Research reduction of stress in medical students
• Shapiro, et al., 1998 Rosenzweig, et al., 2003
• Research reduction of stress in cancer patients
• Carlson, et al., 2004 Tacon, et al., 2004.

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The Science of Mindfulness

• Reduction of negative affect
• Increase in left-side activity of the prefrontal
  cortex
• Increase in immune-system functioning
• Increased gamma-wave oscillations (synchrony)
• Davidson, R. J., Kabat-Zinn, J., Schumacher, J.,
  Rosenkranz, M., et. al. (2003). Alterations in
  brain function produced by mindfulness
  meditation. Psychosomatic Medicine, 65, 564-570.

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Everyday Mindfulness

• Breath Meditation
• ?
• Walking Meditation
• ?
• Eating Meditation

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Making Time for Mindfulness

• Set aside 5-10 minutes per day
• Find time before, during, or after one of your
  regular activities
• Add 5 minutes of mindfulness during mealtime
• Meditate for a few minutes before watching TV
• Meditate before work begins, during your lunch
  hour, or at the end of the workday

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References

• Baer, R. A. (2003). Mindfulness training as a
  clinical intervention A conceptual and empirical
  review. Clinical Psychology Science and
  Practice, 10(2), 125-143.
• Bishop, S. R., Lau, M., Shapiro, S., Carlson, L.,
  Anderson, N. D., Carmody, J., Segal, Z. V.,
  Abbey, S., Speca, M., Velting, D., Devins, G.
  (2004). Mindfulness A proposed operational
  definition. Clinical Psychology Science and
  Practice, 11(3), 230-241.
• Brown, K. W., Ryan, R. M. (2003). The benefits of
  being present Mindfulness and its role in
  psychological well-being. Journal of Personality
  and Social Psychology, 84, 822-848.
• Rosenzweig, S., Reibel, D. K., Greeson, J. M.,
  Brainard, et. al. (2003). Mindfulness-based
  stress reduction lowers psychological distress in
  medical students. Teaching and Learning in
  Medicine, 15(2), 88-92.
• Shapiro, S. L., Schwartz, G. E., Bonner, G.
  (1998). Effects of mindfulness-based stress
  reduction on medical and premedical students.
  Journal of Behavioral Medicine, 21, 581-599.

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References

• Tacón, A. M., Caldera, Y. M., Ronaghan, C.
  (2004). Mindfulness-based stress reduction in
  women with breast cancer. Families, Systems,
  Health, 22, 193-203.
• Teasdale, J. D., Williams, J. M., Soulsby, J. M.,
  Segal, Z. V., Ridgeway, V. A., Lau, M. A.
  (2000). Prevention of relapse/recurrence in major
  depression by mindfulness-based cognitive
  therapy. Journal of Consulting and Clinical
  Psychology, 68, 615-623.