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Thread: Benefits of Zen Meditation

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    Default Benefits of Zen Meditation

    http://www.physorg.com/news139635145.html

    "Experienced Zen meditators can clear their minds of distractions more quickly than novices, according to a new brain imaging study. After being interrupted by a word-recognition task, experienced meditators' brains returned faster to their pre-interruption condition, researchers at Emory University School of Medicine found.

    The results will be published online by the journal Public Library of Science One (PLoS ONE). http://dx.plos.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0003083

    Giuseppe Pagnoni, PhD, Emory assistant professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences, and co-workers used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to examine changes in blood flow in the brain when people meditating were interrupted by stimuli designed to mimic the appearance of spontaneous thoughts.

    The study compared 12 people from the Atlanta area with more than three years of daily practice in Zen meditation with 12 others who had never practiced meditation.

    While having their brains scanned, the subjects were asked to focus on their breathing. Every once in a while, they had to distinguish a real word from a nonsense word presented at random intervals on a computer screen and, having done that, promptly "let go" of the just processed stimulus by refocusing on their breath.
    The authors found that differences in brain activity between experienced meditators and novices after interruption could be seen in a set of areas often referred to as the "default mode network." Previous studies have linked the default mode network with the occurrence of spontaneous thoughts and mind-wandering during wakeful rest.

    After interruption, experienced meditators were able to bring activity in most regions of the default network back to baseline faster than non-meditators. This effect was especially prominent in the angular gyrus, a region important for processing language.

    "This suggests that the regular practice of meditation may enhance the capacity to limit the influence of distracting thoughts. This skill could be important in conditions such as attention deficit and hyperactivity disorder, obsessive-compulsive disorder, anxiety disorder and major depression, characterized by excessive rumination or an abnormal production of task-unrelated thoughts," Pagnoni says."

    Dirk

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    Interestingly within psychiatry something called dialectical behavioural therapy (DBT) is being offered to individuals with borderline personality disorder. Part of the therapy is the teaching of mindfulness which clearly borrows unashamedly from zen. In fact the leaflet I was reading about it sounded a bit like the Tokuhon.
    Kempo for all I say and rid the world of it's ills!
    Regards Tracey
    Tracey Fuller
    Bournemouth, Shorinji Kempo

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    Gasso!

    The time Shorinjikempo kenshi spend in Chinkon gyo are about 5-10 minutes 2 times a week.

    I personally think it is not fair to compare this to 1 hour a day that many Soto zen practitioners spend in Zen meditation.

    Johan Frendin

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    Quote Originally Posted by johan_frendin View Post
    Gasso!

    The time Shorinjikempo kenshi spend in Chinkon gyo are about 5-10 minutes 2 times a week.

    I personally think it is not fair to compare this to 1 hour a day that many Soto zen practitioners spend in Zen meditation.

    Johan Frendin
    True, but the potential is there.
    Even 5-10 minutes is probably a bit of an exaggeration. More like 2-3 in my experience. However I, like a lot of Westerners, cannot sit zazen SK style with any degree of comfort for more than that long, and have never been able to. To meditate properly in a similar position one needs a small bench to sit on.
    http://www.meditationbench.com/

    Dirk

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    Gassho!

    I have the same problem Dirk. 3 to 4 minutes and my back hurts.
    I have done a little bit zazen by myself in the morning with a small pillow under my butt but find it hard to continue. It is much more fun with moving meditation like doing embu!!!

    Johan Frendin

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    Quote Originally Posted by johan_frendin View Post
    Gassho!

    I have the same problem Dirk. 3 to 4 minutes and my back hurts.
    I have done a little bit zazen by myself in the morning with a small pillow under my butt but find it hard to continue. It is much more fun with moving meditation like doing embu!!!

    Johan Frendin
    And I'm sure that if you do a continuous, unbroken, one hour per day you will get the same benefits :-)

    Dirk

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    Default Hmmm (or should that be 'Ommmm')

    I went along to a couple of Zazen classes some years ago mostly with view to practising meditation in more sustained way. The extent to which I succeeded can be accurately gauged from the fact that I said a couple of Zazen classes - I discovered that an hour's meditation is not for me, even though they did kindly provide a cushion to sit on.

    In the space of that hour, I had the instructor have to ask me to moderate my stertorous (think Darth Vader) breathing style ( he said I had the noisiest breathing of anybody he'd ever had in the class, though he was favourably impressed by the fact that when he asked - no names involved - for the person doing the Vader impressions to please stop, I did immediately apologise to everyboy else there), spent about fifteen minutes surreptitiously massaging my legs so I wouldn't just fall over when I had to stand up to do the walking medidation, singularly failed to cope with the chanting bit with a straight face, and very nearly provoked an inter-Zen diplomatic incident when the bloke sitting next to me made gassho rei ('hey, I know what that is - ' I thought ' -Should I be doing that?' only to be almost deafened by the almighty slap he got on the shoulder from the instructor's stick. Had this been done to me I suspect I might have taken it badly, but would then promptly have been set on by the four or five people in the room who then had much more martial arts experience than me.. )

    I have heard Mizuno Sensei refer to Shorinji kempo the martial discipline as 'moving Zen', and certainly I would regard the practice of the more aesthetic elements of Shorinji Kempo as equally valid elements of Zen practice as zazen itself. It'd be interesting to monitor the brain wave activity of somebody doing kata for example, and to compare it with that of somebody practising Zazen.

    Tony leith

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    Meditation is not for me.

    However, it I have a few minutes to spare, I'll have a quick nap. I did not have to attend any classes to learn this, I find lying down or sitting reclined comfortable, I feel calm and refreshed thereafter and I suspect the health benefits are similar to those of meditation.
    Robert Gassin
    Melbourne ShorinjiKempo Branch
    Australia

    "Never fight an idiot. He'll bring you down to his level and then beat you with experience"

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    Default Excuse number 1 for the wife

    Quote Originally Posted by Rob Gassin View Post
    Meditation is not for me.

    However, it I have a few minutes to spare, I'll have a quick nap. I did not have to attend any classes to learn this, I find lying down or sitting reclined comfortable, I feel calm and refreshed thereafter and I suspect the health benefits are similar to those of meditation.

    Gassho

    I like to have a nap too.

    I sometimes pretend I'm meditating (to the wife.)

    I don't think she believes me though.

    Kesshu
    A man with small testes should never get involved in a fight requiring cojones

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    Quote Originally Posted by Rob Gassin View Post
    Meditation is not for me.

    However, it I have a few minutes to spare, I'll have a quick nap. I did not have to attend any classes to learn this, I find lying down or sitting reclined comfortable, I feel calm and refreshed thereafter and I suspect the health benefits are similar to those of meditation.
    If you want to use a shortcut to a very interesting meditative state then binaural tones work well. You need to listen through a headset. If anyone is interested I'll explain what's special about them, but here's an example:
    http://www.onetribe.me.uk/wordpress/?p=56

    Use the streaming player built into the web page.

    Dirk

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