People who meditate grow bigger brains than those who don't. Researchers at Harvard, Yale, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology have found the first evidence that meditation can alter the physical structure of our brains. Brain scans they conducted reveal that experienced mediators boasted increased thickness in parts of the brain that deal with attention and processing sensory input.  In one area of gray matter, the thickening turns out to be more pronounced in older than in younger people. That's intriguing because those sections of the human cortex, or thinking cap, normally get thinner as we age.

By Salynn Boyles
WebMD Health News

Nov. 15, 2005 -- Early research suggests that daily meditation can alter the physical structure of the brain and may even slow brain deterioration related to aging.

The study showed that parts of the brain known as the cerebral cortex were thicker in 20 people who meditated for as little as 40 minutes a day, compared with 15 people who did not meditate.

The region plays a critical role in decision making, working memory, and brain-body interactions, researcher Sara Lazar, PhD, tells WebMD.

Lazar is a research scientist at Harvard Medical School's Massachusetts General Hospital. She presented the study at Neuroscience 2005, the annual meeting of the Society for Neuroscience. It also appears in the latest issue of the journal NeuroReport.

Western-Style Meditation

The findings are not the first to suggest that meditation can change the way the brain works and that this change can be measured through brain imaging. Recent studies involving Buddhist monks in Tibet suggest that meditation alters key electrical impulses within the brain.

But the monks in the study had devoted their lives to the practice of meditation. The 20 people who meditated in the latest research did so for an average of about six hours a week, with some meditating for as little as four hours weekly.

"Our findings provide the first evidence that alterations in brain structure are associated with Western-style meditation practice, possibly reflecting increased use of specific brain regions," Lazar says.

Specifically, brain regions associated with attention, sensory processing, and sensitivity to stimulation originating within the body were thicker in the meditators. There was also some suggestion that meditation may protect against age-related thinning of this specific region of the brain.

"We are talking about a small but important region involved in working memory, which has been shown to decrease rapidly during aging," Lazar says.

Dalai Lama Weighs In

The study is one of several exploring the potential impact of meditation on the brain presented at the Society for Neuroscience meeting. The topic was widely covered by the media, thanks to the presence of the Dalai Lama at the meeting.

In a speech to the group on Saturday, the Tibetan spiritual and political leader told the gathered neuroscientists that they should increase their efforts to understand how meditation and similar practices affect brain activity.

The question is getting a lot of attention from the media, but Harvard Medical School professor of psychology Stephen Kosslyn, PhD, tells WebMD that the hype is getting ahead of the science.

Kosslyn moderated a seminar in which the new studies on meditation and brain activity were presented.

"These studies show that it is possible to do science on this topic, but it is much too early to conclude anything at all from them," he says.

February 23, 2006  by Linda Simmon http://www.dailyindia.com/show/3986.php

More and more doctors now realize that hypnosis is powerful medicine. Why this is and how it happens is still something of a mystery, but science is proving that hypnosis can improve your health in amazing ways. It can help relieve pain, make breathing easier for people with respiratory illnesses, aid with gastrointestinal ailments and relieve depression just to name a few. The most astonishing evidence is coming from research on healing.

In a pilot study published in 1999, Harvard University psychologist Carol Ginandes, Ph.D., showed that hypnosis can help broken bones heal faster and, in a follow-up experiment published in 2000, Ginandes and her research team discovered that women who had breast reduction surgery recovered far more quickly after undergoing hypnosis.

Living under too much stress may harm your brain as well as your body. Previous studies have already shown that stress hormones, such as cortisol, can increase the risk of heart disease and other ailments.  but a recent study shows that stress hormones may also shrink the brain.

Researchers found that older adults with high levels of cortisol performed poorly on memory tests and had a smaller hippocampus, the part of the brain responsible for learning and memory. "Stress has become more commonplace and accepted in our everyday lives," says researcher Sonia J. Lupien, PhD, of McGill University in Montreal. "Many studies show the negative impact of stress on physical health such as blood pressure, heart disease, etc., but few address the effects on mental health. Our studies look directly at the long-term effects of stress and stress hormones on brain function."

Choosing to work with a life coach is the decision to employ a trustworthy navigator to assist you as you pilot your life. Life coaches offer wonderful opportunities through the development of character and confidence, and they do it in an effective, interpersonal manner. When considering the prospect of working with a life coach, you'll want to shop around for a qualified professional who “clicks” with you, understands your goals, intuitively responds to your thought process and inspires within you a passion to achieve.

Consider the following seven benefits of working with a highly professional, personal and intuitive life coach.