Mindfulness has its origins in Buddhist religious meditation; current research shows it reduces stress, anxiety, depression, cortisol, and blood pressure.
Q1. What is mindfulness?
Some people define it as purposefully paying attention to everything going on around you now; is that correct?
Surely, if it’s about focus but paying attention to what’s going on around you could just be vigilance.
Mindfulness is about self-control and particularly controlling your mind so that you focus on now, on the things you can affect and dismiss those you cannot.
You can practice being in control of your mind to improve your ability to focus. For example, you can start by deciding to focus on your breathing for a few minutes - do not try to control your breathing, just pay attention to when it’s going in and when it’s going out. You’ll likely be surprised by how difficult this is at first, your mind has a million things it thinks you should be worrying about and it will try and go there again and again. You need to catch your mind wandering around and bring it back into line.
Q2. Why would you want to control your mind?
To focus on the things that are in your control, not the ones you can do nothing about. This stops worry and stress.
Worrying about things you have no control over increases cortisol - the primary stress hormone. There are multiple studies showing that people practicing Mindfulness lower cortisol levels. For example, a 2013 study (1) from a top Thailand University, showed that after just one session of mindfulness, the average serum cortisol levels had fallen from 381.93 nmol/L (SD 97.74) to just 306.38 nmol/L (SD 90.95) - an almost 20% decline.
Cortisol, sleep, and cancer are interconnected through the body’s stress response and circadian regulation.Stanford researchers have shown this in a meta-analysis (2); and that disrupted cortisol rhythms are associated with earlier mortality in metastatic breast cancer. Cortisol spikes at night wake you up; and they also lower NK cell levels.
Q3. The Practical use of mindfulness
“Although I didn’t use mindfulness, I learned a long time ago in business that when there was a problem, if I could fix it, I did.
If I couldn’t I wouldn’t worry about it at all” said Chris Woollams during his Sunday Show on mindfulness.
Q4. Is Mindfulness the same as Meditation?
Mindfulness is a form of meditation. They are much the same thing.
Mindfulness is the practice of being fully present and aware of the current moment—your thoughts, feelings, bodily sensations, and surroundings. But the extra is to do this without judgment. It’s the judgment that causes the stress.
Mindfulness can be strengthened through regular practice.
Meditation is a formal technique used to cultivate mindfulness, often involving focused attention on the breath, bodily sensations, or thoughts, while gently returning attention to the chosen anchor whenever the mind wanders.
Q5. Does mindfulness have links to Buddhism?
For Buddhists mindfulness has been an important concept for over 2000 years. The term “mindfulness” is a translation of a Pali word sati, which is a core step in Buddhism. It is the first of the Seven Factors of Enlightenment, and Buddhists use mindfulness to develop self-knowledge and wisdom, in order to eventually achieve enlightenment, or freedom from suffering.
Meditation was originally only practiced by monastics, those who had devoted their life to Buddhism.
There are religious texts about focusing on different parts of your body and being ‘in’ that part of your body; being fully aware of the sensations there.
Each moment is constantly shifting, and that's part of why it is so important to be in the present. One way to do that is by focusing on the impermanence of things, including the impermanence of our bodies. Confronting one’s own mortality isn’t really part of everyday mindfulness but it is part of Buddhist religious mindfulness.
Q6. If you are focusing your mind away from the bad stressful things, there must be aspects of psychology that are helped by mindfulness.
Neuroscience experts have published many papers on mindfulness. For example, there are researchers who use mindfulness training to help combat soldiers deal with PTSD.
Emotional and psychological stress, including depression and anxiety are tied to sleep issues in cancer patients, because these cause a dysregulation of HPA axis which normally controls cortisol. Calming the psychological issues calms the cortisol.
Mindfulness researcher, Todd Braver, a professor of neuroscience, psychological and brain sciences, wants to be clear that we can’t ignore its religious roots. He doesn’t want to devalue any of the religious roots, but as a scientist he says he tries to keep fit and exercises to maintain health.why not practice mental fitness too? “Just as I might go for a run or watch what I eat, I'm also going to try to regulate my thinking and improve my ability to do that.”
In fact, the Dalai Lama, when he addressed a conference of 30,000 Neuroscientists said, “empirical evidence should triumph over scriptural authority, no matter how deeply venerated a scripture may be.”
Q7. Stress, anxiety and lowering cortisol - what else can mindfulness help?
In a 2019 clinical study (3) on Blood Pressure, one year after starting mindfulness, the average decline in systolic blood pressure was 6 mmHg; and amongst people starting at over 140 as a systolic level, a 15.1 mmHg was recorded.
Pregnant women with a history of depression often wish to avoid the drugs on offer. A study showed that mindfulness was an important alternative and prevented depressive relapse (4).
Q8. So how should interested people start?
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Focus on the breath or another anchor (e.g., body sensations, sounds).
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Notice when the mind wanders—and gently return attention to the anchor.
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Practice non-judgment: observe thoughts and feelings without labeling them as good or bad.
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Begin with just 3 to 5 minutes daily, gradually increasing to 10–30 minutes.
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References
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Effects of mindfulness meditation on serum cortisol of medical students; Wanpen Turakitwanakan et al; Journal of the Medical Association of Thailand, June 2013, 96 Suppl 1(Suppl 1):S90-5
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Effectiveness of stress management interventions to change cortisol levels: a systematic review and meta-analysis; Olivia Rogerson et al; Psychoneuroendocrinology, Volume 159, January 2024, 106415
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Mindfulness-Based Blood Pressure Reduction (MB-BP): Stage 1 single-arm clinical trial; Eric B Loucks et al; Clinical Trial PLoS One; 2019 Nov 27;14(11)
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Staying Well during Pregnancy and the Postpartum: A Pilot Randomized Trial of Mindfulness Based Cognitive Therapy for the Prevention of Depressive Relapse/Recurrence; Sona Dimidjian et al; J Consult Clin Psychol, 2015 Dec 14;84(2):134–145.