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• The Center for Health Promotion & Wellness

Mindfulness, Meditation, Stress Reduction: An Overview

Mindfulness is the ability to pay attention to what you’re experiencing from moment to moment without judgment. Mindfulness helps you relate directly to whatever is happening in your life, including the challenges of stress, pain, illness, and the everyday demands of deadlines and assignments.

Mindful awareness is the foundation for all health-behavior change. Greater awareness of your habitual thought patterns and behaviors can empower you to make healthier choices, whereas a chronic state of unawareness can prevent you from understanding and responding to your body’s signals and needs. This unawareness can lead to physical illness and disease as well as addictions to tobacco and other drugs, alcohol, food, sex, or work.

Ways to Cultivate Mindful Awareness

Mindfulness meditation is the practice of directing attention to whatever presents itself, whether it is an external object or sound, a physical sensation, an emotion, or a thought. It is often practiced while sitting but can also be practiced while walking, standing, or lying down. Consistent practice is crucial to experiencing the benefits of mindfulness meditation.

Mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR) is a more integrated approach to cultivating mindfulness. MBSR programs emphasize sitting and walking meditation and yoga. MBSR programs have the goal of helping individuals develop lifelong skills for dealing with emotional and physical stress and improving overall well-being.

Benefits of Mindfulness

In recent years, a significant amount of research has been conducted on the benefits of mindfulness meditation and MBSR programs. For example, meditation has been shown to lower blood pressure, reduce overall arousal, and have positive effects on other autonomic physiological processes. Research also suggests that meditation and other mindfulness techniques may:

• Improve concentration and creativity
• Contribute to significant decreases in anxiety and depression
• Improve self-esteem
• Reduce pain levels
• Improve immune system functioning
• Result in a greater sense of well-being and satisfaction with life

How MIT Medical Can Help

MIT Medical offers several programs to help you cultivate mindfulness techniques and reduce stress, including:

• Easing Stress with Mindfulness: This course is offered three times a year for graduate students and once during the Independent Activities Period (IAP) for the entire MIT community. This mini-course is designed after the MBSR curriculum.
• Mindfulness Meditation: This course is open to everyone and includes instruction, guided meditation practice, and discussion.
• Mindful Practices to Support Quitting Smoking: This course teaches mindfulness techniques for quitting smoking.

For more information on classes and workshops, contact:
Lauren Mayhew, health educator
Center for Health Promotion & Wellness
617-258-6965
mayh@med.mit.edu

Information and Education

The multimedia library at the Center for Health Promotion & Wellness has a number of books, pamphlets, and other materials on mindfulness and stress reduction. Stop by the library (room E23-205) Monday through Friday, from 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m., and check out these resources free of charge.

To learn more about MBSR programs and research, go to UMass Medical’s web site for the Center for Mindfulness in Medicine, Health Care, and Society.