These days, without wishing to sound morbid, living seems to get harder and harder. Over the past 20 years or so, and partly due to incredible advances in the ease of communication, the world seems to be full of famine, disease, environmental breakdown and war. One could be forgiven for thinking that the end is nigh!
As one starts to personalise this state of affairs, one finds oneself out of a job, or simply wondering when their time will come, losing their home and possessions due to the economic crash, or spending much mental time and energy on wondering how to keep afloat.
Things that have been held as absolute truths have been questioned and then dismantled, and when this happens, when all yardsticks by which we measure ourselves have been discredited, we no longer feel we know what is right or correct, and do not know where to go to get the answers we need.
We are encouraged to be positive and reject negativity, to conform to whatever the rules happen to be and accept "spin" as part of everyday life.
All this causes stress and worry, communities fragment as people have to travel to find work, people feel marginalised and lonely, depression, stress and finally stress related diseases begin to take their toll.
Meditation helps to find that inner peace or sense of self. Like all things, it has to be practised regularly, but with practice it becomes easier and as one's experience of meditation increases, finding time to meditate becomes much easier, as we all find the time to do something we enjoy.
In fact, the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology found that people who had practiced meditation had improved cognitive and behavioural abilities, and lived longer than people who do not meditate.
The study used 73 residents of retirement homes who were over 81 years old. They were randomly split into 4 groups - those who had no treatment, those who underwent training in meditation, a third group who were given mindfulness training in active distinction making and a fourth group who underwent relaxation training.
After 3 years all of the meditation group members were still alive compared to 87.5% for the mindfulness training group and lower rates for the other two groups. In addition, when tested for attributes such as associative learning, cognitive skills, mental health, aging and behavioural flexibility, the meditation group did much better than the other three groups.
The study therefore suggests that if you meditate you will live longer, have better mental capacity and be less prone to mental disease and depression.
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