Why This Is The Year To Cultivate Mindfulness

This is the year to cultivate mindfulness. Here's why.

- Kalwyna Rathod

Mindfulness is about focusing on the present while acknowledging and accepting your thoughts, feelings, and bodily sensations. Health coach and yoga expert Shreya Sethi shares how this technique will help give you the answers you seek.

MINDFULNESS REDUCES STRESS

Many people start meditating for its benefits in stress reduction, and there is evidence to support this rationale. There's a whole new subgenre of meditation called Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR), developed by Jon Kabat-Zinn at the University of Massachusetts's Center for Mindfulness, which aims to reduce a person's stress level, physically and mentally, says Sethi. “Studies have shown its benefits in reducing anxiety, even years after an initial eight-week course.

Research has also shown that mindfulness meditation, in contrast to attending to only the breath, can reduce anxiety. “Mindfulness meditation has been shown to help people with social anxiety disorder, Sethi informs. A Stanford University team found that MBSR brought about changes in brain regions involved in attention, as well as offered relief from symptoms of social anxiety.

MINDFULNESS REWIRES THE BRAIN