MEDITATION INFORMATION ARTICLES

How Meditating Helps in Dealing with Burnout

In our view, practically every Burnout patient can benefit from Meditation. Meditation helps us improve our health, keep our stress reserves up, and neutralize the stress reaction. It also teaches us to deal with stress in a less reactive and subconscious way. Meditation is a supportive technique and obviously never a complete solution to the problem. Good food, regular exercise, time for rest and recreation, social activities, making your life not too complicated, and a good working situation are essential to the prevention and the treatment of any disease. In this section, know how Meditation can be useful for the prevention and treatment of Burnout.

1. The medical effects of Meditation are unique.

Recovering from Burnout is usually a long process. The physical and mental reserves are exhausted and the body is full of tensions. When we look at the scientific studies on the effects of Meditation on our health, it is clear that Meditating can help any Burnout patient a lot with his healing process. We have put together the most important effects of Meditation on our body.

It stabilizes the autonomous nervous system.
It reduces the heart beat, blood pressure, and the metabolism.
Stress hormones in the body like adrenaline are decreased.
The Galvaic Skin Response is increased.
EEC-theta waves, delta waves, and alfa waves are increased. Beta waves are decreased.
EMG activities are increased.
The immune system is improved.
Cardiovascular effectiveness is increased.
Breathing effectiveness is increased; breathing speed is decreased.
The supply of blood to the skin is improved.
Stomach function and bowel function are improved.
The endocrine function is increased.
Muscle flexibility is increased; muscle tension is decreased.
The left brain and the right brain work better together.
The body position is improved.
Strength, stamina, and energy reserves are increased.
The time needed to fall asleep and the quality of sleep are improved.
Physical aches are decreased.
The production of serotine is increased.

It seems clear to us that as a result of all these positive effects and the fact that Meditation has no negative side effects, Meditation is very useful for all people, whether they have physical illnesses or not.

2. Meditation helps us to keep up and to maintain our stress reserves and our stress resources.

Everybody agrees that Meditation has a positive effect on stress prevention. In the first place, Meditation supports our parasympathic nervous system, which takes care of the building up of stress reserves, the maintenance of our body, and a speedy return to a state of balance after a stress reaction. Scientific research has demonstrated that people who meditate recover much faster from a stress reaction. The latest brain scan technology has demonstrated that meditating can not only train our mind but also structurally changes its functions. People who meditate regularly do not experience a fight or flight reaction very often. They are not so easily irritated or upset than people who do not meditate. Scans show that the activity of our brain is shifted from areas that are particularly active with people with a negative attitude to areas where a lot of activity is ob-served with people who are often enthusiastic, who have more interests and pas-sions, and who are more often relaxed and satisfied. When we meditate more often, we will discover that fewer and fewer stressors can really harm us. As a result, it is not surprising that Meditation gets a better mainstream character. Time Magazine (8/4/2003) states: "For upwardly mobile professionals convinced that their lives are more stressful than those of the cow-milking, butter-churning generations that preceded them, Meditation is the smart person's bubble bath."

3. Meditation teaches us to be able to interrupt and neutralize the stress reaction ourselves.

Burnout is an exhaustion reaction of the body and the mind to a long period of stress. If we want to be able to deal better with Burnout, we must learn to deal better with stress. It is considered a scientific fact that relaxation methods can break through the fight flight reaction. The well - known relaxation methods are: autogenous training, progressive relaxation, breathing techniques, hypnosis, auto-suggestion, visualisation, Yoga, Meditation, etc. It was already known in the seventies, after important research done by Dr Benson at Harvard, that Meditation brings about the opposite reaction of the fight or flight reaction. When we meditate, our breathing, our muscle tension, and our blood pressure decrease. We often feel tingling in our skin and some rumblings in our stomach. We also start to feel old aches again because there is a decrease of stress hormones. This means that we can use Meditation or similar relaxation techniques to neutralize the stress reaction. But Meditation goes further than the other methods mentioned above. First of all, Meditation teaches us to listen to ourselves better. We can observe our body and our mind so that we will sooner recognize the fight flight reaction. Think of our breathing, an important indicator of how body and mind feel at the moment. When we are better able to recognize stress, we can also intervene faster. Meditating teaches us to pay attention, to accept things, not to judge all the time, and to live with maximum awareness. Moreover, the qualities that were just mentioned can help us to cope with stress instead of reacting to it.

4. Meditation teaches us to deal with stress less reactively and subconsciously.

As mentioned before, many people react to stress subconsciously. When we are able to improve the perception of our stressors, the stress process and the consequences of our reaction, we are also able to change the way we experience the stress situation. When we change the experience, we can also change the results of stress on ourselves. When you are aware, you are part of the situation, you can influence what happens and you have options. This means that we must develop the skill of paying attention and being alert in order to create this level of awareness. Through Meditation, we learn to remain consciously in the present by means of focus and concentration. This means that we train exactly those skills that are needed to cope with stress instead of reacting to it blindly. During Meditations, we learn to deal with noise, aches, discomforts, and all sorts of thoughts and feelings. In fact, all thoughts that disturb our Meditation again and again are little stressors. We observe them, and try to let them be as they are without reacting to them. The key words are: acceptance, attention, not judging, concentration, letting go, the NOW, presence. When we see that we are in a state of excitement, we can break through the stress reaction by not only doing our relaxation exercises, but also by simply becoming aware of the moment. Meditation teaches us this skill. Being present means that we begin to see the situation more clearly, that we sometimes discover that our excitement is uncalled for, that we should less easily be led by our emotions, that we should not take everything so seriously and that there are ways to react to the situation more creatively and more effectively. We see both the stimulus and the response and can better use the space in between. We become aware of how we react to stress, how we let things get out of control, how we sometimes exaggerate things, without condemning ourselves and feeling guilty. By being aware we create options. When we start to experiment with these things, we will experience more and more often that in fact we will be upset by stress less frequently. We consider stress a problem less frequently, and start to regard it as a friend that constantly gives us feedback. By listening well to this feedback, we can get a better grip on any situation and respond to it properly. This gives us confidence and strength. An additional advantage of this approach is that it has no side effects and it does not cause new stress.

A more BEING - oriented lifestyle that is centred round things like attention, focus, go with the flow, following your feelings, living a meaningful life, emotional intelligence, relaxation, pro-activity, spirituality, and inner rest makes everybody stronger and more stable. Burnout, being overwrought, and other stress - related problems will no longer have a grip on you. Of course, this does not mean that you will never feel angry, fearful or threatened any more. But you will know better how to cope with it. Eventually, you will become a more stable person.

"A real awareness of the Here and Now is a key issue in learning how to let go, to accept, not to judge, have faith in yourself, and find patience and inner peace. I hope that many people will be able to get acquainted with this kind of relaxation.", These are words from Ger Otter of www.burnin.nl., Holland's most popular Burnout site. These words are a reaction on his website after attending a workshop on Meditation for beginners given by ABC-of-Meditation.

TIP:Read more about coping with stress in the great book Meditative Relaxation by John Kabat Zinn. A major part of our approach is based on his theory, way of handling things, and results.

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Friday 18th March 2011 at 8:24:58 AM


vir
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