Relaxation Response*
*A pretty amazing state your body enters when you meditate.
A huge amount of research was carried out into meditation in the 1960s and 70s, meaning that instead if relying on people’s accounts of how it had improved their health and wellbeing, there was suddenly evidence, results and hard data that illustrated what was happening in the brain and body due to meditation. New technologies that before had been unimaginable, like MRI (magnetic resonance imaging) scans and EEG (Electroencephalography) machines opened up a whole new world to track what effect mindfulness and meditation had, even being able to pinpoint varying effects between different types and techniques.
Around this time a cardiologist at Harvard Medical School called Dr Herbert Benson studied people who practiced Transcendental Meditation (a form of mantra meditation where you repeat a word, short phrase or sound inside the mind). He observed physiological changes that occurred during meditation and in the early 1970s he coined the phrase ‘Relaxation Response’ to explain what was happening.
He wrote an entire book on the subject [The Relaxation Response 1975] and defined this state as the opposite or counteract to the ‘flight/fight’ stress response. This ‘stress’ response happens naturally whenever we perceive a threat or excessive pressure, prioritising our ability to act fast to avoid danger. It sends signals to release adrenaline and cortisol, which increases heart rate and blood pressure, quickens breathing, dilates pupils, releases glucose for energy and puts the brain into survival mode meaning anxiety is increased and rational thinking is reduced. This can help keep us safe (think jumping out of the way of something potentially harmful), but when we remain in this state for prolonged periods/at high frequency, it can be highly detrimental for our health and can lead to significant medical conditions. The key findings he discovered were that while meditating, when we enter this ‘relaxation response’, the following changes were observed:
Lowering of heart rate
Lowering of ‘stress’ hormones like adrenalin and cortisol (potentially decreasing these by 30-40%)
Lowering of blood pressure
Body releases signals and chemicals that cause muscles and orans to slow down
Increased blood flow to the brain
Nervous system switches from sympathetic (associated with fight/flight stress response) to parasympathetic (relaxation, restoring balance)
Not only were his findings truly astounding to many, they demystified meditation and had a huge influence of repositioning it as a genuine stress reduction technique, encouraging it into the mainstream and replacing the fiction around it with facts and scientific backing. It also found that with consistent practice of 10-20 minutes of meditation a day, a range of health conditions caused or exacerbated by chronic stress can be alleviated including fibromyalgia, insomnia, hypertension, anxiety and gastrointestinal ailments.
As the popularity and accessibility of meditation and mindfulness continues to grow, I find it fascinating to take a look back to the history of those individuals who made it their priority to take it seriously and to uncover the findings that empower us to use it as a tool to improve our own health and wellbeing…to know that whenever we choose, we have it within us to access that relaxation response.
Emma x
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