Mind and Mediation Body, Mind, and Meditation

Different cultures throughout time and geography have viewed the mind and body connection from vastly different perspectives. Most ancient healing practices, such as Traditional Chinese Medicine and Ayurvedic medicine, emphasize the links between the mind and the body (Ehrlich, 2011). However, most of the Western medical perspectives viewed the mind and the body as two entirely separate systems that do not influence each other. Western medicine separated these two systems and ultimately treated them individually. However, Western medicine is beginning to accept a new paradigm that mirrors some of the more ancient perspectives.

One of the first psychologist to recognize that the mind in the body influence each other was George Solomon in 1964 when he noticed that some people with rheumatoid arthritis suffered worse symptoms when they were also depressed (Ehrlich, 2011). Since that time there have been many other psychologist and physicians that have begun to realize that the two different systems do in fact influence each other. Studies have shown that meditation can affect the blood pressure and mental and emotional cues could affect the immune system and its response to illness (Ehrlich, 2011).

Many psychologists believe that antidepressants are the ultimate treatment...

However, over the past decade many psychologists have come to recognize that depression is not merely a brain disease and altering chemicals alone will never work to overcome depression (Kirsch, 2011). One meta-analysis focused on depression studies in order to investigate the placebo effect and found that seventy-five percent of the benefits that antidepressant medication offered to a sample of over three thousand collective participants could be explained by the placebo effect (Kirsch, 2011).
Once the realization of the mind and body connection is made, the next step is determining what to do about it. There are many techniques that can train the brain how to focus with the ultimate goal of improving an individual's health such as providing biofeedback, cognitive behavioral therapy, and relaxation techniques. With biofeedback, people are trained to control certain bodily processes that normally occur involuntarily, such as heart rate or blood pressure (Ehrlich, 2011). Cognitive behavioral therapy focuses more on changing an individual's negative thoughts by conditioning more positive ones. Furthermore, there is a wide array of different relaxation techniques that can reduce stress and promote mindfulness.

The mechanisms that explain the ways in which the mind and the body are connected are beginning to be…