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As research has burgeoned in recent years, mindfulness has migrated from spiritual retreat centers to counseling and medical facilities. The National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), the largest scientific organization in the world dedicated to research on the understanding and treatment of mental illness, is getting serious about investigating mindfulness as a complementary treatment for a range of mental health conditions.Mindfulness helps to train individuals in bringing back the attention time and time again when it has wandered. And it is precisely through helping individuals to not get carried away by their thoughts that mindfulness has been shown to be so effective for conditions like anxiety and depression.
A landmark study from researchers at Lund University showed a group mindfulness treatment to be as effective as traditional talk therapy for treating anxiety and depression.
Evidence of the efficacy of these mindfulness-based treatments continues to grow. According to Insel, there are now nearly 500 scientific studies on mindfulness/meditation and the brain in the National Institute of Health’s PubMed database.
With proper coaching, mindfulness works as a “do it yourself” therapeutic intervention for these conditions.
“When they’re depressed, people are locked in the past. They’re ruminating about something that happened that they can’t let go of,” said Insel. “When they’re anxious, they’re ruminating about the future — it’s that anticipation of what they can’t control.”
The beneficial effects of mindfulness also extend to non-clinical populations. Anyone will benefit from learning to cultivate a focused, non-judgmental awareness on the present moment, adding a powerful balance in our busy modern lifestyles that are often characterized by stress, sleep deprivation, multitasking and digital infatuations.