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| AHYMSIN NEWSLETTER, ISSUE - April 2014 | ||||||||
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Bio-Feedback in Meditation SciencesDr. Prabhu, director at the Meditation Research Institute (the lab at Swami Rama Sadhaka Grama), was recently invited to speak at the National Symposium on "Scientific and Technological Concepts in Ancient Indian Scriptures" on 21st April 2014 at Bhabha Atomic Research Center in Mumbai, India.  Dr. Prabhu writes, “My talk at the National Symposium on ‘Scientific and Technological Concepts in Ancient Indian Scriptures’ was on ' Bio-feedback and its role in Meditation sciences.' …The talk was well appreciated. I included the research done in the lab and elaborated on it. People appreciated the backing of seemingly spiritual talk with hardcore evidence. People were interested and enquired about the programs / retreats offered at the Ashram. I explained to them the importance of the Himalayan Tradition in scientific way. Other eminent speakers at the Symposium were Dr. R. Chidambaram (Advisor of the Govt. of India on Science and Technology), Dr. Basu (Director, Bhabha Atomic Research Center, Mumbai). Astronomy, Scriptures, Sanskrit and the Vedas were at the heart of the most of the talks. Professors from I.I.T, B.H.U were also present.” Below you will find an article written by Dr. Prabhu that was published in their magazine. Biofeedback And Its Role In Yoga And Meditation Sciences Abstract:Biofeedback is useful for the monitoring and modulating of subconscious activities, which are mainly responsible for our fight-or flight response. This response is regulated by autonomic nervous system (ANS). The fight-or-flight response is the reaction of stress stimuli such as fear, embarrassment, threats, etc; all these are exciting situations in day to day life. Under this type of situation, the nervous system and endocrine systems are involved either consciously or unconsciously. The ANS part of the fight-or-flight response results in a general increase in sympathetic activity. Biofeedback promotes the adaptive capacity of individuals. Meditation further influences the ANS along positive lines by improving the body homeostasis. The underline mechanism involves the modulation of neuro-endocrinal processes along with parasympathetic dominance which improves the healing processes operating in the reign of the biofeedback system. Due to dominance of the parasympathetic activation, this ultimately yields psycho-physiological well being. Key words: Fight-or-Flight response, Homeostasis, Meditation Introduction:What is biofeedback?Biofeedback is a technique that trains people to improve their health by controlling certain bodily processes that normally happen involuntarily, such as heart rate, blood pressure, muscle tension, and skin temperature. Electrodes attached to your skin measure these processes and display them on a monitor [Electro Physiology]. With help from a biofeedback therapist, you can learn to change your heart rate or blood pressure, for example. At first you use the monitor to see your progress, but eventually you will be able to achieve success without the monitor or electrodes. Biofeedback is an effective therapy for many conditions, but it is primarily used to treat high blood pressure, tension headache, migraine headache, chronic pain, and urinary incontinence. When you raise your hand to wave hello to a friend, or lift your knee to take another step on the Stairmaster, you control these actions. Other body functions -- like heart rate, skin temperature, and blood pressure -- are controlled involuntarily by your nervous system. You don't think about making your heart beat faster. It just happens in response to your environment, like when you're nervous, excited, or exercising. One technique can help you gain more control over these normally involuntary functions. It's called biofeedback, and the therapy is used to help prevent or treat conditions including migraine headaches, chronic pain, incontinence, and high blood pressure. When you're under stress, these functions change. Your heart rate speeds up, your muscles tighten, your blood pressure rises, you start to sweat, and your breathing quickens. You can see these stress responses as they happen on the monitor, and then get immediate feedback as you try to stop them. Different types of biofeedback?
What Happens During a Biofeedback Session?In a normal biofeedback session, electrodes are attached to your skin. They send information to a small monitoring box that translates the measurements into a tone that varies in pitch, a visual meter that varies in brightness, or a computer screen that shows lines moving across a grid. The biofeedback therapist then leads you in mental exercises. Through trial and error, you can soon learn to identify the mental activities that will bring about the physical changes you want. The idea behind biofeedback is that, by harnessing the power of your mind and becoming aware of what's going on inside your body, you can gain more control over your health. Fight-Or-Flight:During hyperactivity called as fight-or flight response against stress related stimulation ( Tortoran and Anagnostakos, 1990) causes the activation of the sympathetic division, set into operation a series of physiological responses collectively referred as fight -or -flight responses .
What is meditation?Meditation is a specific technique for resting the mind and attaining a state of consciousness that is totally different from the normal awaking state. In meditation, you are fully awake and alert, but your mind is not focused on the external world or the events taking place around you. Neither is your mind asleep, dreaming, or fantasizing. Instead, it is clear, relaxed, and inwardly focused. Meditation is a practice that helps people achieve balance both mentally and physically as well as emotionally. How meditation helps:Meditation helps achieving higher state of consciousness through a fully rested and relaxed body and fully awake and relaxed mind. One important component of the meditation is total relaxation with self–awareness. Overstimulation is a panacea for many maladies and problems as it produce mental upsets, physiological hyperactivity leading the state of fight-or- flight reactions. The only safe remedy without side effect is meditation. Total relaxation with self-awareness is infecting abandonment of the body coupled with high degree of conscious awareness. In practice, it is conscious suspension of all gross movements of the body resulting in the relaxation of the skeletal muscles and drastic reduction of metabolic activities. (Barnes et al., 2004; Harianth et al., 2004; Chiesa, 2009) Scientific researches indicates that meditation alters physiological responses and in that way it enhances the beneficial output of biofeedback response, and also bring back various physiological activities in the body to the normal level. Oxygen consumption decreases drastically along with carbon dioxide elimination. It has also been observed that following meditation there is a significant reduction in metabolic rate, also in blood pressure and heart rate, and an increase in the alpha brain waves, a sharp decrease in amount of lactic acid in the blood and also an increase in the skin’s electrical resistance. Such response is characteristic of a highly relaxed state of body and mind. Different relaxation exercises:
What Research Suggests: Researchers aren’t sure exactly how or why biofeedback works. They do know that biofeedback promotes relaxation, which can help relieve a number of conditions that are related to stress. Research also suggests that thermal biofeedback may ease symptoms of Reynaud’s disease (a condition that causes reduced blood flow to fingers, toes, nose, or ears) while EMG biofeedback has been shown to reduce pain, morning stiffness, and the number of tender points in people with fibromyalgia. A review of scientific clinical studies found that biofeedback may help people with insomnia fall asleep. Other studies suggest it may even reduce the risk of cardiac events by lowering blood pressure levels and reducing the body's "sympathetic" response during times of stress. Biofeedback can also be used effectively in children. For example, EEG neurofeedback (especially when combined with cognitive therapy) has been reported to improve behavior and intelligence scores in children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Biofeedback, combined with a fiber rich diet, may help relieve abdominal pain in children. Thermal biofeedback helps relieve migraine and chronic tension headaches among children and teens as well. Why To Research Using Biofeedback In Yoga And Meditation?Research suggests that perhaps the main importance of biofeedback will be its potential as a research tool rather than its use as a form of therapy. It also indicates that certain states of consciousness brought about by meditation techniques appear to provoke specific brainwave patterns. These states are now being created by electronic and auditory stimulation, and they can be learnt through biofeedback. Question is ‘these kinds of stimulation and biofeedback useful tools for the mediators?’ What is the relationship of these technological methods to the meditation beyond techniques? Is this an example of bringing meditation together with science? It is a very complex question. You will have to understand one of the most fundamental things about meditation – no technique/tools lead to meditation. When the being of a person is in a state of meditation, it creates certain waves in the mind. These waves can be created from the outside by technical means. But those waves will not create meditation – this is the misunderstanding. Meditation is simply an understanding. It is not a question of sitting silently; it is not a question of chanting a mantra. It is a question of understanding the subtle workings of the mind. Biofeedback is meditation, but meditation is not biofeedback. You can't take meditation out of biofeedback, but you can take biofeedback out of meditation. Research shows that people who know how to meditate have faster results than those that do not. We have also found that with training anyone can learn meditation and attain positive results with biofeedback. But it is also true that meditation does not require biofeedback. Meditation transforms. It takes you to higher levels of consciousness and changes your whole lifestyle. It changes your reactions into responses to such an extent that it is unbelievable that the person who would have reacted in the same situation in anger is now acting in deep compassion, with love – in the same situation. Meditation is a state of being, arrived at through understanding. It needs intelligence, it does not need techniques. Our Observations and Current Research:Meditation research has proven meditation’s ability to train the mind to do certain things and create certain moods or have certain effects on the body and the mind. It has been proven that meditation helps to balance out the levels of certain chemicals in the body and in the brain in particular that affect mood swings. Meditation research has found that meditation has been proven to alleviate tension in the workplace and in the home, leading to better lives for people who struggle with this. Recently we had three experiments:
Swami Veda has multiple physical challenges such as acute diabetes for last 36 years, six coronary arteries 100% blocked, five ruptured disks in spinal column, newly developed lung problem. He is an 80+ age. He shows significant heart rate variability (H.R.V), below 1 Hz lower delta brain waves and at the same time can produce higher gamma waves (Lambda – above 100 Hz) in the occipital region. He also showed at lower delta brain wave, synchronized high power activity near Cz position (Center of the brain).He can change brain wave pattern within a fraction. All these Swami Veda’s readings confirm the ancient science of “Yoga and Meditation Science” explained in Bihar school of Yoga book “Swar Yoga” and other books, scriptures, literature. Also recently in January 2014, Dr. John Denninger director of research , Benson-Henry Institute of Mind Body Medicine at the Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston (U.S.A), showed that mind/body techniques of meditation can switch on and off some genes linked to stress and immune function. Conclusion:Yoga and meditation sciences are nothing but a path for tuning of body and mind through breath awareness. It also denotes the optimum operational level of biofeedback mechanism. It indicates that regular, disciplined, dedicated, proper guidance along with support of hatha yoga practice leads to brain plasticity. This ultimately may enhance manifold the modulating efficiency of sympathetic verses parasympathetic activities leading to a definite level of body and mind homeostasis (Danucalov et al., 2008?) "What we found is that the trained mind, or brain, is physically different from the untrained one”. In time, we will be able to better understand the potential importance of biofeedback in ‘Yoga and Meditation Sciences’ training and increase the likelihood that it will be taken seriously. References:Books:
Research Articles:
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