Two years ago researchers at Justus
Liebig-University in Giessen, Germany and Harvard Medical School integrated
decades of existing research into a comprehensive
conjectural report, which explains the various neurological and
conceptual processes through which mindfulness mediation works (and which recent studies have continued to affirm.)
The report suggests that mindfulness
meditation operates through a combination of several distinct mechanisms:
attention regulation, body awareness, emotion regulation, and a change in
perspective on the self. Each component is believed to assist us in various
aspects of our lives, and when functioning together, the cumulative process
claims to lend an enhanced capacity for "self-regulation" — the
ability to control our own "thought, affect, behavior, or attention"
(The loss of which has been cited as the cause of much psychological distress and
suffering).
In other words, the researchers suggest that
the practice allows us to develop a stronger command over the machinery of the
mind, a dexterity which, according to a study released this week, stays with you long after you finish meditating.
