Healthcare Costs cut by Meditating

Sometimes the best things in life are free… Researchers studying meditation show that stress is a vicious cycle: Unchecked stress turns into anxiety; anxiety turns into depression, which over time turns into a hormone that plays havoc with the internal organs of the body, producing a variety of illnesses and disorders.

Meditation can turn that around, reducing anxiety, depression, and the hormones that damage our body. Both adults and children are using meditation to control feelings and behavior. When you look at how our children interpret the body’s responses, these feelings are externalized as both bodily dysfunction and behavior issues. We are seeing that all of these complaints are endemic in our country and in the world.

Viewed from a hormonal level, meditation can counteract the fight-or-flight response that floods the body with a stress hormone which also shuts down the parasympathetic system. This hormone normally restores order after the fight-or-flight response alert is over. Overtime when it doesn’t restore the system, the hormone reacts with a vengeance on it. Taking a closer look on a molecular level, meditation slows metabolism in red blood cells and suppresses the production of proteins associated with the kind of heightened immune response often seen in stressed-out subjects. In one study, meditating a mere 15 minutes twice daily reduced doctor visit over a six-month period saving this health-care system $200 a patient.

Now let’s be honest, maybe we are not so concerned with saving the health care system a lot of money. But aren’t we concerned with how we feel on a daily basis and wouldn’t we want our health care costs lower? I think most of us would agree with these outcomes right? So if 15 minutes twice a day can do that for us, would it be worth your time? I would think so, and if proper breathing and some time can do that, it might be well worth the short commitment. See, sometimes the best things in life are free!

About the Author

Shirley Ryan is the author of Searching for the Waters of Antiquity: A Follow-Along Meditation Process (Soul Moments Publishing, $24.95), a meditation tool with a unique integration of symbol and archetypes demonstrated her painting and meditation skills. The founder and president of Working Together, a business specializing in helping people manage life’s changes in mind, body, and spirit, Ryan has worked as a professional life coach since 1994. See her work at http://www.searchingforthewaters.com