Meditation 101
“If you have time to breathe, you have time to meditate.”
Although meditation has been practiced by spiritual and religious traditions across the world for thousands of years, many styles of meditation trace their roots back to yogic, Vedic, and Buddhist lineages.
When discussing benefits that can be derived from meditation, it is important to be specific about which styles of meditation are being discussed. Otherwise, these overgeneralizations can be compared to talking about the benefits of “sports” rather than referring to the benefits of each specific type of sport (e.g., football, golf, swimming).
Although the benefits derived from some of these sports may be similar, others will be entirely different. Similarly, different styles of meditation have been developed over the years for different reasons; therefore, the benefits that a person receives from meditation will depend on which style of meditation they practice.
Although there are many different styles of meditation (e.g., mindfulness, transcendental, guided, body scan, metta, mantra, walking, moving), many meditative styles can be placed into one of two broad categories: (1) styles of meditation that practice focused attention and (2) styles of meditation that practice open monitoring. The first category, focused attention, instructs participants to place their attention on a chosen object (e.g., breath, affirmation, mantra, visualization) and to bring their attention back to the chosen object whenever they notice themselves thinking about something else. The second category, open monitoring, is embodied in practices such as mindfulness meditation, which instructs participants to become nonjudgmental and nonreactive observers to the thoughts, feelings, and sensations that they experience from moment to moment. It is worth noting that some meditation styles include components of both focused attention and open monitoring. In fact, both styles of meditation are included as part of the mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR) curriculum.
Although peer-reviewed research has found many different forms of meditation to be effective, the participants’ preferences must also be taken into account when deciding which style of meditation would be the best fit for them. Ultimately, consistent practice of one’s chosen meditation style is more important than which style of meditation the person practices. If a person does not enjoy meditation for whatever reason, a few adjacent relaxation techniques that may be worth checking out would include biofeedback, progressive muscle relaxation, and guided imagery.
References
Boccia, M., Piccardi, L., & Guariglia, P. (2015). The meditative mind: A comprehensive meta-analysis of MRI studies. BioMed Research International, 2015.
Burke, A. (2012). Comparing individual preferences for four meditation techniques: Zen, Vipassana (Mindfulness), Qigong, and Mantra. Explore, 8(4), 237-242.
Lutz, A., Slagter, H. A., Dunne, J. D., & Davidson, R. J. (2008). Attention regulation and monitoring in meditation. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 12(4), 163-169.
Travis, F., & Shear, J. (2010). Focused attention, open monitoring and automatic self-transcending: Categories to organize meditations from Vedic, Buddhist and Chinese traditions. Consciousness and Cognition, 19(4), 1110-1118.