15 Ways Meditation Benefits Your Brain Power and Your Mood

Meditation Benefits Your Brain & Mood

What could be better than reaching your big goals? Well, it turns out that meditation—something you could be doing daily, at no cost and with little effort—offers benefits that success can’t bring. Meditation benefits can seep into every area of your life and improve your overall well-being in the long term.

Meditation as Mindfulness

The studies on meditation generally focus on a broad type of meditation that could be called mindfulness. Mindfulness simply means keeping one’s thoughts focused on awareness of a single thing or moment. It could be your breath (a typical point of focus in meditation), or it could be a single image, word, or emotion.

It sounds simple, but when you try it, you realize how much your mind wants to jump around. That’s okay: “When a ‘stray’ thought arises, the practitioner must be quick to recognize it, and then turn back to the focus of their attention,” says George Dvorsky, writing about meditation[1]. “And it doesn’t just have to be the breath; any single thought, like a mantra, will do.”

Here are 15 ways meditation benefits can improve your life, whether or not you ever reach those big goals.

1. Handle Stress Better

According to one source, “When you meditate, you clear away the information overload that builds up every day and contributes to your stress.”[2]

Much of our stress comes from too much input and a lack of time or tools to handle the input. We take in information and build emotions, and we get overloaded. Our brains don’t know what to handle first, so they just keep cycling through all the information.

Meditation helps your brain to let things slide away by simply giving it time to rest and meander through the information, bit by bit, letting go of what is unimportant.

2. Improve How Your Brain Functions

A 2012 study showed a brain process called gyrification happening more in people who meditate[3].

Gyrification is “the ‘folding’ of the cerebral cortex as a result of growth, which in turn may allow the brain to process information faster. Though the research did not prove this directly, scientists suspect that gyrification is responsible for making the brain better at processing information, making decisions, forming memories, and improving attention.”

If that’s not enough, there is also evidence from MRI scans that meditation can reinforce connections between brain cells. One study showed that meditation “may be associated with structural changes in areas of the brain that are important for sensory, cognitive, and emotional processing. The data further suggest that meditation may impact age-related declines in cortical structure.”[4]

In other words, meditation may not only make your brain work better, but it might also slow down the aging process within the brain.

3. Get in Touch With Yourself

The busyness of modern life, along with the perpetual onslaught of media that tells us how we ought to look, feel, and behave, can leave us feeling detached from ourselves. It can be difficult to connect with our own values and emotions. We see standards put into place, and we want to meet those standards, so we pretend to be a certain way even when, perhaps, we are not.

Meditation benefits can help us with that. According to researcher Erika Carlson,[5]

“Mindfulness helps us to see our authentic selves in two ways: nonjudgmental observation, and attention. Nonjudgmental observation enables people to really get to know themselves without feeling any negative feelings.”

4. Improve Your Grades

Whether you’re a part-time student, a full-time student, or someone who just likes to take tests for fun, meditation can help you learn and retain what you learn.

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One study[6] showed that mindfulness training resulted in “improved accuracy on the GRE and higher working memory capacity.” The researchers concluded that “the improvement could be explained, at least in part, by reduced mind wandering during the task.”

The researchers estimated that mindfulness training resulted in the equivalent of a 16 percentile-point boost on the GRE, on average.

5. Increase Productivity in High-Performance Situations

A study done in 2012 set participants up in a real-world multitasking situation. They had to do several activities that required various forms of input in a typical office setting, and they had to complete them all within 20 minutes.

Some of the participants received mindfulness training, and some didn’t. Then, they tested them all again. “The only participants to show improvement,” reported the researchers, “were those who had received the mindfulness training.”[7]

Another study showed that “daily meditation-like thought could shift frontal brain activity toward a pattern that is associated with what cognitive scientists call positive, approach-oriented emotional states — states that make us more likely to engage the world rather than to withdraw from it.”

Handling high-stress, high-performance situations like a pro could certainly be a handy skill to have, and it’s one that meditation benefits can help you cultivate. If you need more motivation to increase productivity, check out Lifehack’s free guide: Ultimate Worksheet for Instant Motivation Boost.

6. Appreciate Music More

Do you love but find yourself drifting off and missing out in the middle of a concert or show? Meditation can help you to stay tuned in and aware, one study showed[8].

The majority of the people in the “mindfulness groups” in the study said that the mindfulness task had “modified their listening experience by increasing their ability to focus on the music without distraction.”

7. Positive Effects Even When Not Meditating

Researchers have found that the way meditation helps your brain to work better is consistent, staying with you not just when you’re sitting on a cushion with your eyes closed, but all the time. According to the research, “the effects of meditation training on emotional processing might transfer to non-meditative states.”[9]

The researchers point out that this may mean that the benefits of meditation are not specific to a task or certain stimulus (such as that cushion or a mantra) but are process-specific, meaning that they “may result in enduring changes in mental function.”

8. Reduce Isolation and Feel Connected

It’s strange that in the age of constant connectivity, isolation and loneliness can feel even more poignant. But it happens, and when that sense of isolation descends, it can be overwhelming.

However, meditation was shown to reduce feelings of loneliness in a study on older adults[10], and those who have been practicing transcendental meditation, even for a very short time, say that the practice of meditation provides a feeling of being connected and whole, a “fundamental level of unity”[11].

9. Reduce Symptoms of Anxiety and Depression

Meditation can help you feel connected and handle stress, but what about an ongoing anxiety disorder? What about overwhelming negative feelings or that debilitating sense of depression?

Well, a study done on high school students showed that mindfulness and meditation benefits could help a lot with both: students who stuck with a mindfulness program “exhibited decreased symptoms of stress, anxiety, and depression both immediately after and six months after the program”[12].

10. Fight Disease and Stay Healthier

Meditation benefits can be useful for both the brain and body. Being able to handle stress better can reduce its impact on your body, which can decrease symptoms and physical aggravation of various health issues, including chronic pain.

A researcher at one of Harvard Medical School’s teaching hospitals[13] notes that “The kinds of things that happen when you meditate do have effects throughout the body, not just in the brain.” Health benefits abound when you devote yourself to meditation.

11. Sleep Better

Let’s do a quick review: meditation can help you cope with stress better, help you know (and like) yourself more, and help you lessen anxiety and depression.

With those meditation benefits alone, it seems pretty likely that you’d be able to get a better night’s sleep. After all, if you can stop your brain from racing and your emotions from raging, you’ll be much more likely to drift off into sweet dreams. Research concurs[14]:

“Meditation practices influence brain functions, induce various intrinsic neural plasticity events, modulate autonomic, metabolic, endocrine, and immune functions and thus mediate global regulatory changes in various behavioral states including sleep.”

12. Help With Weight Loss

When a group of psychologists were asked to recommend a few strategies for reaching weight-loss goals, 7 out of 10 said meditation, or mindfulness training, would be beneficial[15].

The popular meditation app, Headspace, notes that meditation can help you focus on mindful eating, which encourages you to eat when you’re hungry, not when you are stressed or upset[16]. When you develop this skill, it can help you lose weight the natural way, which is one of the most useful meditation benefits for many.

13. Make You a Better Friend

It makes sense that being able to know and accept yourself better might help you to know and accept others, as well. Other studies have also shown that meditation increases the “mental expertise to cultivate positive emotion”[17].

In other words, people who meditate tend to respond with more positive emotions rather than negative ones. They have a stronger sense of empathy and compassion for others, making them an overall better friend to others.

14. Increase Your Attention Span

Studies show that mindfulness training helps the brain to connect better. What that means for you is that your brain, after meditating, finds it easier to access and process information. Along with that, mindfulness trains your brain to release the information that’s not important, and quickly[18].

Therefore, meditation benefits help you get better at collecting information, processing it quickly, and discarding the stuff you don’t need. Doing that well is what allows you to keep your attention focused on the information and tasks in front of you.

15. Generate More Ideas

If you wish you could access the creative, idea-making part of your brain more easily, it’s time to quit stalling and start meditating. The “catch-and-release” nature of mindfulness, that ability to let thought in and let it go, turns out to be very helpful for what one study calls “divergent thinking”[19].

The meditative practice helps your brain to be less judgmental and more accepting while exercising less “top-down control and local competition.” Your brain opens up to new ideas and inputs, which, say the researchers, “facilitates jumping from one thought to another – as required in divergent thinking.”

The Bottom Line

Meditation benefits are wide-ranging and can have a positive impact on many areas of your life. Whether you’re looking to increase your focus, develop more compassion, or get healthier, meditation can help with it all, especially if you become a long-term meditator. To get started with meditation, find a local or online meditation program, and check out this simple 5-minute guide.

Source: lifehack.org ~ By: Annie Mueller ~ Image: Canva Pro

Reference

[1] Gizmodo: The science behind meditation, and why it makes you feel better
[2] Mayo Clinic: Meditation: A simple, fast way to reduce stress
[3] Science Daily: Evidence builds that meditation strengthens the brain
[4] Neuroreport.: Meditation experience is associated with increased cortical thickness
[5] HuffPost: Mindfulness Helps Us Understand Our True Personalities, Study Says
[6] APS: Brief Mindfulness Training May Boost Test Scores, Working Memory
[7] The New York Times: The Power of Concentration
[8] Psychology of Music: Mindfulness, attention, and flow during music listening: An empirical investigation
[9] Frontiers in Human Neuroscience: Effects of mindful-attention and compassion meditation training on amygdala response to emotional stimuli in an ordinary, non-meditative state
[10] Brain, Behavior, and Immunity: Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction training reduces loneliness and pro-inflammatory gene expression in older adults: A small randomized controlled trial
[11] Medical News Today: Does meditation have benefits for mind and body?
[12] HuffPost: Mindfulness Programs In Schools Reduce Symptoms Of Depression Among Adolescents: Study
[13] Bloomberg: Harvard Yoga Scientists Find Proof of Meditation Benefit
[14] Frontiers in Neurology: Meditation and its regulatory role on sleep
[15] Consumer Reports: Lose weight your way
[16] Headspace: Meditation for weight loss
[17] PLOS One: Regulation of the Neural Circuitry of Emotion by Compassion Meditation: Effects of Meditative Expertise
[18] The New York Times: Study Suggests Meditation Can Help Train Attention
[19] Frontiers in Psychology: Meditate to create: the impact of focused-attention and open-monitoring training on convergent and divergent thinking

Top 5 End-of-Year Tax Strategies for Small Businesses

Navigating the tax season is rough for every company, but small businesses are exceptionally vulnerable when it comes to dissecting tax issues and making optimal decisions for financial health. The time to think about tax season isn’t at the first of the year — it’s all year long, and these five strategies can help any small business plan for a simpler tax season with fewer headaches.

1. Make balancing your taxes a priority.

Traditional tax planning involves trying to accelerate deductions and credits, while deferring income. Many taxpayers are cash-basis taxpayers, which means that they get to deduct expenses when the expense is paid, and they have to declare income when payment is received. Therefore, expediting expense payments while deferring income payments can improve the current year’s tax position.

Keep in mind that the inverse is also true. If your business anticipates more significant revenue in 2016, it’s wise to collect income this year and delay deductible expenses until 2016 in order to head off a bad situation for 2016.

2. Invest in retirement now.

If you own a small business, you can create retirement plans that take advantage of tax deferral rules to maximize tax savings now and retirement savings later. Instead of trying to tackle the ins and outs of setting up a retirement plan yourself, consult a professional. There are so many different options — 401(K), SEP IRA and SIMPLE plans — that it’s worth having a seasoned expert to help you navigate the system and choose an ideal option that will serve both your business and personal financial health now and in the future.

3. Understand taxable versus untaxable fringe benefits.

Fringe benefits such as a company car, subsidized meals and insurance can be a great way to pay for services and decorate a more enticing employee package. However, these fringe benefits are taxable most of the time — unless they are specifically excludable by law. Knowing which fringe benefits linger outside the taxable realm can ease the tax burden every year. When your business understands which benefits pack this double punch, you can save money on payroll taxes. The tax rules for each are a little different, so it’s important to choose the right fringe benefit investment for your individual company.

4. Find the silver lining in a loss.

Most small businesses end up with net operating losses (NOL) during the first few years of operation. A net operating loss means tax deductions are greater than the taxable income, which usually happens when business expenses have exceeded earnings. Though this seems like bad news, NOLs can be used to recover past tax payments and reduce future tax payments. NOLs can create tax relief by applying loss to past payments and receiving a credit or by applying the net loss to future income taxes. The rules vary based on your business, so knowing how to work them can have a huge impact.

5. Invest in counsel to benefit your business.

Tax planning shouldn’t be an end-of-year scramble. Instead, it should involve a consistent, yearlong conversation with your tax attorney or accountant. It’s better for your business’s continual health — and your sanity — to work with a professional who can provide meaningful counsel on a variety of choices you make throughout the year that can drastically change your tax situation. When you establish a relationship with a tax advocate, you’re less likely to face audits and more likely to save significantly as your business grows.

Source: entrepreneur.com ~ By: Garrett and Deborah Gregory, Co-founders of Gregory Law Group

7 Ways to Bootstrap Your Business to Success

Bootstrap Your Business to Success

Most first-time entrepreneurs seem to believe the myth that they need a minimum of a half a million dollars to start a business. At least that is usually the lowest number I see requested from our local angel investment group. In reality, over 80 percent of successful new businesses are self-funded for much less — often as little as $10,000. I’m convinced this also reduces risk.

Starting a new business on a limited budget without investor involvement is called bootstrapping, and it’s the only way to go if you don’t want to spend months on the investment pitch preparation and delivery circuit. Also, with bootstrapping, you won’t have the added pressure and risk of an investor boss hanging over your shoulder and second-guessing your every move.

Over the years, I’ve accumulated a list of common startup practices from entrepreneurs who have managed to avoid the ironic pain and suffering of comfortably starting a business with a large cash stash from a rich uncle or a vulnerable investor.

1. Stick to a business domain you know and love.

Starting a new business in an area where you have no experience, just because it appears to have great potential, is a recipe for failure. There are unwritten rules in every business, and your lack of insider’s knowledge will cost you dearly. Good connections can get things done for very little cash.

2. Find team members to work for equity rather than cash.

People working with you need to understand their failure means startup failure, rather than expect money up front. Managing employees and contracts is difficult and expensive, and new entrepreneurs aren’t very good at it anyway. Equity is your best assurance of commitment and focus.

3. Build a plan around your budget, rather than around your wishes.

Entrepreneurs who start without a plan spend more money. Likewise, those who feel compelled to keep up with the popular media will spend most of their time courting investors. Most investors agree that too much money leads to poor spending decisions and lack of controls.

4. Defer your urge to find office space until you have customers.

Remote startup team members are the norm today and can be very productive with smartphones, video and the high-speed Internet. Office space costs money up front, requires equipment, staffing and travel expenses. With a website, your business can look as big as any competitor.

5. Ask for advance on royalties and vendor deferred payments.

If you solution has real value, future partners will jump on discounted future royalties, and many vendors and existing partners will understand your cash flow challenges. You may also be able to barter your services to offset theirs. It never hurts to ask. Practice your sales skills early.

6. Negotiate inventory management with suppliers and distributors.

For many products, suppliers or distributors will direct ship your product to eliminate your inventory. For services, don’t be afraid to ask for a retainer up front to offset your costs. Business terms are negotiable, but new entrepreneurs with plenty of cash don’t bother to ask.

7. Choose a business model to optimize your revenue flow and timing.

Popular examples include monthly subscription fees and optional service fees, versus one-time product sales. Another is the use of an ecommerce site, rather than retail, to facilitate product sales seven days a week, around the clock and around the world.

One of the biggest ways to reduce your budget and your risk is to use social media, which essentially is free, to find our whether you have an attractive solution, before you invest your time and limited resources in creating the product or service. Social media is also an invaluable and inexpensive marketing approach, since no one buys a solution they can’t find or don’t know anything about.

A limited budget can be viewed as your biggest constraint, or as an incentive to do things more creatively. With startups, there is a big premium on creativity and innovation. Big competitors are quick to copy a conventional solution with minimal risk. Let a limited budget be your driver to winning, rather than a curse.

Source: entrepreneur.com ~ By: Martin Zwilling

Updated 7/21/23

E Commerce Economy – Plan B?

The Evolved Economy and Isagenix

This philosophy is what changed my lifestyle from – 60 hour commuting work weeks – reporting to people and making others tons of money and me a great living but no financial security and no down time.

My life has been transformed:

  • from purpose-less to purpose-filled – knowing my future was in my control
  • I am experiencing a new level of health and wellness from the inside out
  • to feeling 20 years younger
  • I have more sustained energy – I got rid of the highs and lows still being an energizer bunny!
  • Today I am always on high sustained energy withOUT dips or exhaustion

What if just one of these changes can happen for you? WHAT IF?

Message me if just a tinch of hope was felt in your body – THIS IS THE EVOLVED ECONOMY! MY PERSONAL GOAL IS TO EMPOWER WOMAN TO AN EXTRAORDINARY LIFE WITH HEALTH AND WEALTH!!!

You know they say there is nothing sexier than a woman with money . . . and American Express just released a survey that 500 Woman a day are started home based businesses. It is also a very well known fact that Woman create wealth and use it for very good causes . . .
And, a woman that is emotionally free, caring and giving to others whether it is her family or friends with no stress of financial monthly expenses but abundance and freedom to contribute – is who I am looking to co-create a business and a life with!!

Are you up to the challenge? Contact Me

Want a lifetime of better brain function; science says change this one habit

better brain function

It’s a simple change. But not an easy one.

We all want brains that function at their best, today, tomorrow, and–we hope–for the rest of our lives. What can we do to make that happen? To try and answer that question, scientists at Massachusetts General Hospital studied 17 “superagers,” people over 65 who have the mental function of those in their 20s. The goal was to find out if there were any observable differences between superager brains and normal brains, and if so, whether the rest of us could use that information to give ourselves better brain function through the years.

The answers are yes and yes. Superager brains were thick in places where the control groups were thin. But they weren’t, as you might guess, the areas related to cognitive processes, the kinds of brain matter that may be aided by things like crossword puzzles and online brain games. They were areas associated with strong emotion, which researchers have discovered in recent years also perform other important brain functions, as researcher Lisa Feldman Barrett explained recently in The New York Times.

So how do we keep these emotional centers humming? You might think the answer would be to watch a really sad movie or throw the occasional temper tantrum, but it’s much simpler and much harder than that, Barrett says. It comes down to this: Stop only doing what’s easy and pleasant. If you’re in a great routine at work, break out of it by adding new responsibilities. If you’ve got an effective workout that you can do without even giving it much thought, add some new elements or up the ante by making it longer and more intense.

In short, do stuff that’s difficult. Challenge yourself, and keep challenging yourself until you encounter enormous frustration. And then push on through that frustration and try some more.

Whether you actually achieve your objective isn’t the point–the point is to push yourself just a little beyond your limits. In other words, get outside your comfort zone. Strangely, it doesn’t seem to matter whether the limits you push are mental or physical. Both strenuous physical effort, such as a challenging hike, or strenuous mental effort, such as mastering a difficult math equation, will do the trick. Barrett points to the Marine motto, “Pain is weakness leaving the body.” Superagers, she explains, are like Marines. “They excel at pushing past the temporary unpleasantness of extreme effort.”

Sounds like a good idea–but not sure how to achieve a Marine-like effort. Here are some ideas:

1. Learn to play a musical instrument.

Make it an instrument you haven’t played before, and set yourself the task of playing a complete piece or song in front of your family, friends, or co-workers. For extra pressure, plan a date when you will give this performance and invite your family and friends to hear you play.

2. Study a language you don’t know.

Or take a language you know a little to the next level. Set yourself a deadline to read (and understand) a book in that language. Or book a vacation to a country where the language is spoken and force yourself to talk to the locals in their native language even if they offer to speak English.

3. Sign up for a triathlon (or other challenging event).

If you’re not a triathlete and hate the idea of biking, swimming, and running, find something else that will push you to your limits. Sign up for CrossFit or martial arts or with your local hiking or skiing club. Make sure to commit to something that’s a little harder than whatever you normally do. Then push yourself to do it.

4. Get up onstage.

Does stretching yourself emotionally work as well as stretching yourself mentally or physically? Barrett doesn’t say, but it seems logical that it would. So book yourself to give a speech or lead a panel if you’ve never done it before. If you’re an old hand at giving speeches, try an improv, acting, or singing class. Just remember, whatever it is has to be a big challenge for you. If it isn’t difficult–if it isn’t a stretch–it won’t do you any good.

Source: inc.com ~ By: Minda Zetlin ~

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