Posts tagged with 'relaxation'
Barbara Fredrickson’s recent research study on loving-kindness meditation (third post)
21st December 2008
What are some implications for using forms of mind training for ourselves and for teaching others? Reading this research study leads me to think about optimum amount of time spent practising these methods, the importance of encouraging application during daily life. I discuss these issues in this blog posting. It …
Recent research: mind-body & body-mind effects for cancer, allergy, dementia, & mental health
18th December 2008
Here are five studies on the loose theme of how the mind affects the body, and the body affects the mind ... and that the distinction between mind and body is pretty arbitrary anyway. Using meta-analysis, Chida & colleagues highlight considerable evidence suggesting that stress-related psychosocial factors have an adverse …
Barbara Fredrickson’s recent research study on loving-kindness meditation (second post)
14th December 2008
I have already written an initial blog post about Barbara Fredrickson and colleagues' interesting recent research paper (Fredrickson, Cohn et al. 2008) on the effects of teaching people loving-kindness meditation. So what are some possible implications of this research for people in general, for using forms of mind training (meditation, …
Barbara Fredrickson’s recent research study on loving-kindness meditation (first post)
7th December 2008
I've just been reading the recent paper by Barbara Fredrickson and colleagues "Open hearts build lives: Positive emotions, induced through loving kindness meditation, build consequential personal resources" (Fredrickson, Cohn et al. 2008). It's quite a long read - 16 closely printed A4 pages - and it's fascinating in a whole …
Four aspects of helpful inner focus: 2.) nourishing positive states (part A)
29th October 2008
Ten days ago, on this blog, I wrote about "Reducing negative states" as one aspect of a simple model entitled "Four aspects of helpful inner focus" (see below). The model is a method I've evolved to help me organize and think about the many facets of deliberately induced altered states …
Four aspects of helpful inner focus: 1.) reducing negative states
19th October 2008
I started meditating regularly while I was still at university in the early 1970's. I then went on a number of meditation retreats and visited a whole series of monasteries and ashrams. By the late 70's I had a good deal of experience of a fruit salad of methods including …
Recent research: four happiness studies on traditional advice, health benefits, and the particular value of safety & contentment
16th October 2008
It seemed time to post on recent research involving happiness and wellbeing. Here are four studies from the current issues of the Journal of Happiness Studies (the September edition is open access with all full articles freely viewable) and the Journal of Positive Psychology. Ad Bergsma discusses advice on how …
Handouts & questionnaires for wellbeing and calming skills
13th October 2008
I continue to slowly add handouts & questionnaires to the relevant area in the website's "Good Knowledge" section. Here are a some that I use largely in the territory of wellbeing, mindfulness and relaxation. Some are assessment and monitoring questionnaires. Some provide orientating information. Some describe specific exercises to do. …
Recent research: half a dozen depression & anxiety papers on CBT, telephones, exercise, relaxation, prevention and more
2nd October 2008
Here are half a dozen recent papers on aspects of depression and anxiety. They include an interesting overview on brain-psychology connections by Aaron Beck, one of the originators of CBT; a meta-analysis of studies on psychotherapy delivered by phone, internet & videoconferencing; details of a free database of studies on …
Draft SIGN non-pharmacological depression treatments guideline, 6th post: effectiveness of psychological therapies 1b
23rd September 2008
This is the 6th in a series of blog posts about the recent day seminar introducing a Scottish draft guideline for "Non-pharmacological management of depression." In my last post I discussed Gary Morrison's initial presentation of the day's second session on "Effectiveness of Psychological Therapies in Depression 1". Gary talked …