20/08/2020
Meditation affects the body in exactly the opposite ways that stress does—by triggering the body's relaxation response. It restores the body to a calm state, helping the body repair itself and preventing new damage from the physical effects of stress.
Newsletter
Day-8
Eliminate Stress through Meditation
Research has shown that more than 90% of the body's illness is due to stress. In stressful situations, the body moves into "fight or flight mode". The Body needs this mechanism to protect itself in emergency situations such as an animal chasing at us.
In this mode, our body pumps several stress hormones and pumps more blood into legs and hands for additional energy. This increases the blood pressure, breathing and heart rates, and tightening of muscles. In order to pump that extra energy, the body lowers its activity in other areas. This mode lasts only for a couple of minutes soon after the emergency condition goes away and the body returns to normalcy. This is all good to protect ourselves.
However, in the current times, people re-live past emotional events again and again and move the body into the same stressful situations constantly. The event need not be physically occurring. An event of heated argument at the workplace may be recalled again and again, leading one to move into constant stressful situations. This leads to sustained sub-optimal functioning of the body, causing all kinds of illnesses. It exhausts our entire nervous system. Decision making becomes poor and work performance suboptimal. Other ill-effects include premature aging, weakened immunity, and reduced brain capacity.
Through regular breath-mindfulness meditation, our mind chatter is significantly reduced, resulting in the reduction of stressful thoughts and memories. This helps to relieve the stress completely by structurally transforming the brain into how it responds to situations. There is no longer the constant rush of hormones into the body, and there is no interference in its natural functioning. There is a significant reduction in the brain's stress levels. In short, meditation helps our body to not go into "fight or flight" mode unnecessarily, and let it function at its best and most naturally.
Best Wishes,
Ravindra Gunturi