Does meditation lead people to behave better, improve their relationships or make them happier?

Tony Schwartz has some doubts about the value of meditation.

How to make stress your friend

Kelly McGonigal explains how changing our minds about stress can make us healthier:

So Hum Mantra Meditation

And here is something for those who enjoy a little mantra meditation:

Mindfulness may have a negative effect on creativity

In 2012, Jonathan Schooler, who runs a lab investigating mindfulness and creativity at the University of California, Santa Barbara, published a study titled “Inspired by Distraction: Mind Wandering Facilitates Creative Incubation.” In it, he found that having participants spend a brief period of time on an undemanding task that maximizes mind wandering improved their subsequent performance on a test of creativity. In a follow-up study, he reported that physicists and writers alike came up with their most insightful ideas while spacing out. “A third of the creative ideas they had during a two-week period came when their minds were wandering,” Schooler said. “And those ideas were more likely to be characterized as ‘aha’ insights that overcame an impasse.” The trick is knowing when mindfulness is called for and when it’s not. “When you’re staring out the window, you may well be coming up with your next great idea,” he said. “But you’re not paying attention to the teacher. So the challenge is finding the balance between mindfulness and mind wandering. If you’re driving in a difficult situation, if you’re operating machinery, if you’re having a conversation, it’s useful to hold that focus. But that could be taken to an extreme, where one always holds their attention in the present and never lets it wander.”

There is growing evidence that optimistic people not only tend to live longer but may reap physical benefits as well, allowing them to continue working, volunteering, participating in activities or doing whatever they deem important

A recent study analyzed data on 3,199 people, 60 and older, including their attitudes about how much they enjoyed life, any problems they had with basic daily functions such as dressing and bathing, and how mobile they were. About 21% were deemed to have a high level of enjoyment about life, 56% a medium level and 23% a low level of enjoyment. In an eight-year span, problems with day-to-day tasks generally increased and mobility declined. About 4% of those most upbeat about life developed two or more new functional impairments, compared with 17% of those who enjoyed life the least. During this time, people assessed as enjoying life at a medium or low level were about 80% more likely than their happier counterparts to have developed mobility and functional problems. In general, people who meditate tend to be more optimistic than those who don't, so meditation may provide health benefits for us as we move into our golden years.

Does mindfulness have a downside?

Mindfulness may have a negative effect on learning and memory.

What is mindfulness?

Here is how Jon Kabat-Zinn defines it:

The effortful effortlessness of meditation

George Hofmann feels that mindfulness risks becoming the latest self-help fad to perish from oversimplification.

Religion may be the answer to combating work stress because it can provide a buffer against the strains of modern life

Dr Roxane Gervais, a senior psychologist at the Health and Safety Laboratory in Stockport, surveyed employees to find out how content they were with their working lives. Her study concluded that employees who are more actively religious are more likely to report low levels of anxiety, depression and fatigue and also higher presence of meaning in life, that is feeling that their lives have meaning. Workers said that attending religious services connects them to a higher being as well as makes them feel better about themselves. These findings are being presented at the Annual Conference of the British Psychological Society’s Division of Occupational Psychology’s in Brighton. Previous studies have shown that companies who accommodated workers beliefs improved morale, staff retention and loyalty. The report also found that those who regularly practiced religion were more likely to have healthier lifestyles and so took fewer sick days.

What keeps some people from meditating?

Diane Winston: The Practice of Mindfulness

Diana Winston, a former Buddhist nun who is the director of Mindfulness Education at UCLA Mindful Awareness Center, discusses mindfulness meditation:

Meditation podcasts

The UCLA Mindful Awareness Research Center has some free guided meditations that you can play or download onto your computer.