Meditation, Mindfulness, and Psychological Wellbeing

Introduction

The positive psychology arena has undergone swift expansion in the last ten years, with studies explicitly highlighting the significance of examining the processes, conditions, and factors that improve wellbeing, facilitate psychological prosperity, and optimize human functioning (Gable & Haidt, 2005; Seligman & Csikszentmihalyi, 2000). Mindfulness is one such factor that plays a part in psychological wellbeing and may be attained through meditation (Pepping, Donovan & Davis, 2013). The term "meditation" is used to define a set of practices that train awareness and focus, often aimed at promoting spiritual and mental growth and wellbeing. In meditation, the mind is trained and mental processes are brought under more conscious control, enabling one to guide them advantageously. Such control helps develop certain mental characteristics — including calm and focus — as well as positive feelings such as love, happiness, and empathy. Through increased awareness, an individual can gain clearer insights into him- or herself as well as his or her relationship with the world. Increased awareness is also said to result in a more accurate and profound knowledge of reality and consciousness (Shapiro, Walsh, Britton & Britton, 2003).

Why do individuals meditate? This question appears to have two answers. First, individuals engage in meditation to overcome emotional or mental issues — that is, meditation for self-regulation. Second, individuals engage in meditation to acquire a better grasp of life, grow wiser, and enlarge their consciousness — that is, meditation for positive changes in one's consciousness. Frequently, it is not possible to clearly separate these two goals, and the majority of meditation practitioners perhaps pursue both to some extent. Up until now, academic psychology in the West has concentrated on meditation in a therapeutic context. Despite growing public interest and a rise in the number of research works on the effects of meditation, there remains a surprising shortage of empirical evidence summaries, particularly when it comes to evidence arising from research conducted outside of the therapeutic setting. A large number of studies have been completed in the quest to identify meditation-related impacts; nevertheless, there remains a notable absence of detailed, advanced psychological theories making robust predictions about what one should expect from meditation (Sedlmeier et al., 2012).

Considerable evidence affirms the advantages of dispositional mindfulness. More "mindful" persons are shown to perform better across various psychosocial outcomes in comparison to less mindful persons. Mindfulness increases a person's awareness of the present, facilitating behavioral and cognitive flexibility and allowing for more adaptable reactions to situations, as opposed to reacting impulsively or habitually. Therefore, those with a more mindful disposition can respond to external and internal experiences more adaptably and flexibly, thereby potentially promoting psychological wellbeing. The quality of mindfulness also entails an approachable, friendly, and open-minded stance toward one's experiences, views, and feelings, which can help a person become less disapproving, condemnatory, and harsh toward him- or herself (Pepping et al., 2013).

Literature Review

Sedlmeier and colleagues (2012) provide an in-depth overview of meditation's impacts on psychological facets as extractable from empirical research, focusing on the influence meditation has on nonclinical adult meditator groups. Outcomes proved strongest — that is, large or medium in effect size — for changes in relationship and emotionality problems; less strong, around medium, for measures of concentration; and weakest, medium or small, for measures that were more cognitive in nature. Specific findings, however, differed across diverse meditation strategies, such as transcendental and mindfulness meditation. Remarkably, meditation experience covaried only partly with long-term effects on the studied variables. Both Western and Indian theories underscore impacts on attentional processes: every meditative method entails the detachment of attentional processes from routine scanning, cognition, analysis, and reaction (Kristeller & Rikhye, 2008). Such attentional alterations lead one to expect cognitive changes and, consequently, positive change in emotional responses. When practiced over longer periods, one can also anticipate positive modifications in personality and behavioral measures. Since the dependent measure predictions most commonly studied by meditation researchers remain imprecise, the ideal approach is apparently to undertake an exploratory consideration of the respective impacts while bearing in mind the differences across modes of meditation.

Hasenkamp and Barsalou (2012) attempted to address the impact meditation experience has on the brain networks that underlie cognitive actions utilized in contemplative practice. With the individual contributions of experienced meditation practitioners, salience network area activity was identified in awareness of executive network and mind-wandering (MW) areas during focused and changing attention. Default mode-linked brain areas were found to be active during MW, the reason being that repetitive attentional brain network activation arising from several years of practice can produce permanent functional connectivity modifications in relevant circuits. To study this possibility, active seeds representing networks were developed and used across the four stages of the prior research, with functional connectivity explored in the same subjects during a resting state. Subsequently, connectivity maps were compared between subjects with low versus high meditation experience. Subjects who meditated more displayed increased connectivity in attentional networks and also between medial frontal and attentional areas. These neural linkages might contribute to the development of cognitive skills — such as maintaining concentration and freeing oneself from distractions — that are typically reported in relation to meditation. Furthermore, since altered brain area connectivity among experienced meditators is observed in a resting or non-meditative state, this may be representative of an "off the cushion" transfer of cognitive skills into everyday life.

Pepping and colleagues (2013) extended prior work to further examine the relationship between self-esteem and mindfulness. In the first study, a theoretically derived model was put forward and tested, examining the role mindfulness plays in predicting life satisfaction and feelings of self-worth. Four aspects of mindfulness were identified as significant predictors of greater self-esteem, which in turn predicted overall life satisfaction. In the second study, this work was expanded by examining the direct effects of a brief mindfulness induction on state self-worth. It was revealed that experimental enhancement of state mindfulness resulted in higher state self-worth. Together, these two studies explicitly demonstrate that feelings of self-worth and mindfulness are interlinked, and — more importantly — that mindfulness training directly and positively impacts feelings of self-worth. Mindfulness interventions are therefore highly promising for the enhancement and maintenance of positive self-worth. Considering which elements of mindfulness are most closely associated with self-esteem is vital. Several mindfulness-centered interventions emphasize distinct elements of mindfulness based on the population for which the intervention is designed. Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT), for instance, stresses mindfulness skills associated with distress tolerance and emotional regulation — such as non-reactivity and non-judgment of inner experiences — since these issues are widely experienced among those with borderline personality disorder. Likewise, mindfulness-based binge-eating treatments revolve around non-reactivity toward the urge to eat.

The literature above indicates that meditation positively impacts psychological wellbeing in addition to the cognitive functioning of an individual. Moreover, those who engage in meditation typically experience improvements in self-worth. The practice of meditation therefore has a broadly positive effect across multiple dimensions of wellbeing.

Conclusion

As mentioned earlier, meditation represents a skill that one must gradually hone. Mindfulness cannot be attained overnight. Up until now, I have had an incredible experience practicing meditation. As explained throughout this paper, studies have corroborated the positive influence meditation has on the emotional and psychological wellbeing of a person. The main reason for my choice of practice was to help alleviate my anxiety, which stems from an overactive mind — one that begins overthinking and even manufacturing nonexistent problems. McGee's (2008) research revealed meditation's beneficial impacts on both psychosomatic and psychological issues, including anxiety, depression, violence, sleeplessness, addiction, suicidal tendencies, hypertension, and chronic pain. Further, Pepping and colleagues (2013) discovered that mindfulness training directly and positively impacts self-worth, with meditation being a core component of mindfulness training.

These findings align well with my own thoughts and experience. While it has been only five weeks since I began meditating, I already perceive several positive changes within myself. Previously, I would always wake up restless in the morning. Now, when I wake up with the determination to meditate, I feel calm and peaceful.

References

Gable, S. L., & Haidt, J. (2005). What (and why) is positive psychology? Review of General Psychology, 9, 103–110. DOI:10.1037/1089-2680.9.2.103

Hasenkamp, W., & Barsalou, L. (2012). Effects of meditation experience on functional connectivity of distributed brain networks. Frontiers in Human Neuroscience. Retrieved from https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnhum.2012.00038/full

Kristeller, J. L., & Rikhye, K. (2008). Meditative traditions and contemporary psychology. In K. R. Rao, A. C. Paranjpe & A. K. Dalal (Eds.), Handbook of Indian psychology (pp. 506–538). New Delhi, India: Cambridge University Press.

McGee, M. (2008). Meditation and psychiatry. Psychiatry, 5, 28–40.

Pepping, C. A., Donovan, A., & Davis, P. (2013). The positive effects of mindfulness on self-esteem. The Journal of Positive Psychology, 8(5), 376–386.

Sedlmeier, P., Eberth, J., Schwarz, M., Zimmerman, D., Haarig, F., Jaeger, S., & Kunze, S. (2012). The psychological effects of meditation: A meta-analysis. Psychological Bulletin, 138(6), 1139–1171.

Seligman, M. E. P., & Csikszentmihalyi, M. (2000). Positive psychology: An introduction. American Psychologist, 55, 5–14. DOI:10.1037//0003-066X.55.1.5

Shapiro, S., Walsh, R., Britton, W., & Britton, B. (2003). An analysis of recent meditation research and suggestions for future directions. The Humanistic Psychology, 3(2–3), 69–90.