healthy wealthy and wise

HEALTHY, WEALTHY AND WISE
Raizel Robin. Canadian Business. Toronto: Nov 24-Dec 7, 2003. Vol. 76, Iss. 23; pg. 129

Abstract (Summary)
Keeping workers happy and healthy is not a new concept. In the 1940s and '50s, companies encouraged social clubs and organized outings and picnics. By the '70s and '80s, however, the strategy had shifted to individual fitness and smoking-cessation programs. In the '90s, the likes of workplace spirituality, motivational speakers and on-site yoga became the rage. Today, you could say the hottest trend is capitalizing on a little bit of them all under the banner of "workplace wellness." Non-smoking support groups, company gyms, family-friendly workplaces, counselling, meditation, workshops in stress management and effective communication techniques, even personal coaches for CEOs-all of them fall under the catch-all phrase. Most programs focus on physical fitness and nutrition, though that, too, is changing. "There is a shift happening," says Karen Seward, vice-president of marketing, business development and research at Warren Shepell, a Toronto-based national employee-assistance program provider and consulting firm. "People have made the link between mental health and productivity and absenteeism-and the whole notion that people who are happy at home and happy at work are more productive in the workplace."
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Full Text (2144 words)
Copyright Rogers Publishing Limited Nov 24-Dec 7, 2003
[Graph Not Transcribed]
The nature of work has changed dramatically over the last half century. "Knowledge workers," a term first coined by business philosopher Peter Drucker in the 1950s, have replaced industrial labourers as the backbone of most corporations. In his seminal book, Landmarks of Tomorrow, Drucker used the term mostly to describe IT personnel, such as programmers, systems analysts, technical writers and researchers. Today, it can refer to just about anyone using a university degree at work, including financial analysts, lawyers and scientists. Knowledge workers now permeate every industry. No company is without them. They give businesses a competitive edge and are key to a healthy, productive economy.
Yet the changing nature of work is making many of them sick. While the corporate world spent 50 years developing exercise, benefit and insurance programs geared to the occupational health and safety of industrial employees--programs that are still in place today--experts say the well-being of knowledge workers is suffering. Sure, their jobs are different from factory work--but they can be just as physically strenuous, contributing to illnesses such as heart disease and diabetes, and nervous disorders like anxiety and depression. The symptoms are not as obvious, say, as a broken leg, but they can be just as costly. Mental illness in Canada alone costs $8 billion annually in lost productivity, according to the Canadian Mental Health Association. Heart disease costs about $5 billion a year in lost productivity and disability. Recent research shows that knowledge workers are more stressed out than any other type of employee--and if their minds and bodies aren't working properly, neither do they.
The average Canadian spends more than half of his or her waking hours at work--and half say they frequently toil on evenings and weekends. Days lost to illness or disability, meanwhile, have climbed each year since 2000, when a wave of downsizing began and those who still had jobs were forced to work longer hours with fewer resources. More than half of the Fortune 500 firms that downsized in the 1990s (there were about 1,468 of them) reported that productivity deteriorated as a result. If companies value their employees as key assets, say human-resources specialists, it's essential they encourage them to stay mentally and physically healthy.
Just like keeping manufacturing equipment in top working order, employee health has a tremendous impact on the bottom line. B.C. Hydro, for instance, reports that the return on investment of its employee wellness program is $3 to $4 for every dollar invested. That's a common result for many wellness programs, which have been expanding significantly in recent years. But some, such as Canada Life's, get up to $6 back. The savings come from reduced absenteeism and fewer extended health benefits and disability payouts.
Keeping workers happy and healthy is not a new concept. In the 1940s and '50s, companies encouraged social clubs and organized outings and picnics. By the '70s and '80s, however, the strategy had shifted to individual fitness and smoking-cessation programs. In the '90s, the likes of workplace spirituality, motivational speakers and on-site yoga became the rage. Today, you could say the hottest trend is capitalizing on a little bit of them all under the banner of "workplace wellness." Non-smoking support groups, company gyms, family-friendly workplaces, counselling, meditation, workshops in stress management and effective communication techniques, even personal coaches for CEOs--all of them fall under the catch-all phrase. Most programs focus on physical fitness and nutrition, though that, too, is changing. "There is a shift happening," says Karen Seward, vice-president of marketing, business development and research at Warren Shepell, a Toronto-based national employee-assistance program provider and consulting firm. "People have made the link between mental health and productivity and absenteeism--and the whole notion that people who are happy at home and happy at work are more productive in the workplace."
There's no shortage of companies catching on. MDS Nordion, Steelcase, Canada Life, Royal Bank, Enbridge Inc., Rogers Communications (which owns Canadian Business)--most big corporations have wellness initiatives of some sort. "Business today is a stressful environment," says George Cope, president and CEO of Toronto-based Telus Mobility. "I think healthy employees become part of a good overall business strategy." A few programs, such as Dofasco's (see "Taking care of business," p. 133), have even won awards.
Most forward-thinking executives probably see the benefits, but the quality of wellness programs, and how often employees use them, are crucial to their effectiveness. In a national wellness survey of Canadian companies released in September by workplace wellness consulting firm Buffett Taylor & Associates of Whitby, Ont., 83.4% of respondents said their company offered at least one "wellness initiative," such as stress management techniques, weight-control programs, fitness incentives or nutrition awareness. That's a huge increase from 64% back in 2000, when economic times were much better.
The jump shows companies are taking wellness seriously enough to ensure they provide assistance even when times are tough. But the majority are not currently offering comprehensive programs. Feeling the pressure to implement wellness initiatives, but often constrained by tight budgets, some even count extended healthcare benefits as wellness, according to Warren Shepell's Seward. Though comprehensive programs are catching on, the numbers show there are barriers to their effectiveness. Despite corporate efforts, one in three workers reports being stressed out due to excessive work demands and long hours, according to Statistics Canada. A survey by the Heart and Stroke Foundation of Canada reported in 2000 that 43% of Canadians feel overwhelmed by their job, finances or family. Beverly Beuermann-King is a wellness consultant in Little Britain, Ont., with 13 years' experience. "Pessimism, dissatisfaction, lowered concentration, decreased motivation, accidents, absenteeism and poor health are all symptoms of job stress," she says.
A worn-out, unhealthy workforce is a costly one. The Conference Board of Canada estimates difficulties employees have in balancing work with family life cost employers in this country $2.7 billion annually. Meanwhile, workplace stress and stress-related illnesses cost the economy about $5 billion a year, according to the Canadian Mental Health Association.
Psychiatrist Edgardo Perez, CEO of Homewood Health Centre, an employee assistance provider in Guelph, Ont., studies the effects of depression in the workplace and has found that up to 10% of employees at any given time will have moderate symptoms of depression or anxiety. Depressed workers may feel constant fatigue and worthlessness, he says. They may feel like failures, exhibit a loss of interest in their usual activities and withdraw from social situations. As well, they may be reluctant to work collaboratively. Anxious employees may also be irritable, have irrational fears of death and feel cut off from reality. "All of this interferes with their ability to concentrate and be productive," says Perez, who has found the problem can diminish an employee's productive work time by 20%.
According to Perez, depression costs the Canadian economy $12 billion a year. About $6.6 billion of that is due to productivity issues, and the rest is eaten up through the cost of medication and care. It's enough of a problem that several prominent Canadian business leaders decided to form the Business and Economic Roundtable on Mental Health, which calls depression an "unheralded business crisis in Canada."
But some companies are trying to turn the tide. Take B.C. Hydro, for instance. Its Lifestyle Program (see "Healthy idea," page 131) awards points to employees for doing any wellness activity, which can include working out at the on-site gym, spending time with family or even keeping a journal or meditating. Points can be redeemed for T-shirts, water bottles, baseball caps and other fitness gear, but are mainly a way to monitor the program's effectiveness. The employees who participate in the Lifestyle Program take, on average, two fewer sick days a year than employees who don't.
MDS Nordion, a company in Kanata, Ont., that provides most of the world's supply of radioisotopes used in nuclear medicine, implemented a wellness program that goes beyond health. It also studies how work is done and the amount of control given to employees. Since 1993, absenteeism has declined to four days per person a year from an average of five and a half.
As the evidence mounts in support of wellness programs, they will become more a social movement than a trend, say industry watchers. Martin Rutte is author of Chicken Soup for the Soul At Work, a 1998 book that has sold more than a million copies and made him a popular lecturer on the North American wellness circuit. "Twenty years ago, the only thing I could talk to you about in the workplace was the financial health of the company and maybe my career," says the Canadian writer, now based in Santa Fe, N.M. Today, the workplace is starting to acknowledge what he calls "the fuller human being"--the interconnectedness of mental, physical and even spiritual health. But for all the good intentions, if a company can't follow through with a culture that encourages employees to make time for wellness programs, they simply won't take advantage of them.
That's what happened to one senior human-resources director, Linda (her name has been changed at her request), who spent six years with a major chartered bank working 10-hour days on top of a two-hour commute. "My marriage suffered," she says. "We had to go to counselling because we were never there for each other."
Linda's health declined, as well; too busy to take a sick day, she developed pneumonia from a neglected cold. One Friday afternoon, as she was getting ready to enjoy a well-deserved weekend with her kids, her boss told her to come to work to finish a project--the following Sunday. Linda refused, but her superior kept pushing, and suggested they bring in both their daughters and plunk them in front of a TV while the women got their work done. Burned out, Linda later resigned--with no pay package and no other job to go to.
The funny thing about the bank Linda left, she remembers, is that it had a top-notch wellness program in place. "We had so many stress-management programs and work-life balance programs," she says. "There were counselling services and hotlines for day care and parent care." But the managerial culture, she says, prevented people from taking advantage of the services. It's a prime example of what Dr. Len Sperry, a professor of psychiatry at the Medical College of Wisconsin and a consultant to Fortune 500 companies, has called "a dysfunctional culture."
Just as people can be Type A's, so, too, can organizations. That can take its toll in many ways--but in Linda's case, the bank lost a key executive. "Having subsidized food in the caf and a free gym doesn't cut it these days," says Graham Lowe, a sociologist and president of the Graham Lowe Group, a consulting firm based in Kelowna, B.C. "It's relatively easy for an employer to invest in wellness," he emphasizes, but the program can be completely ineffective if its use isn't encouraged.
Linda's experience is all too familiar to Malcolm Weinstein, an executive coach and president of Weinstein Management Ltd. in Vancouver. Recent media attention to the plight of the under-appreciated, overworked, lonely-at-the-top CEO has had a positive effect on upper management, he says, but it's frequently middle managers who end up bearing the brunt of work-related stress--and they might be less inclined to take advantage of wellness programs. "I work with a lot of CEOs," says Weinstein. "They're more aware of achieving work-life balance now and are downloading their responsibilities." The pressure is worst among second-and third-tier managers who feel they must satisfy the most senior people and carry out orders they don't always want to, such as firing people. "There's a fear of admitting an inability to cope," says Weinstein. "There's pressure to be heroic that often extends beyond people's limits."
That's precisely why more companies are getting serious about their wellness programs. "HR people are asking us not just to put in wellness programs, but to think strategically about which programs will work best for them," says Seward of Warren Shepell. The attitude just a few years ago, she says, when companies would typically call up and ask for a catalogue of topics, then order a few sessions, was, "We'll send out an e-mail and hopefully people will come.' Now, companies are really making a clear link between their business objectives and mental health issues."
Linda, the former bank exec, found one organization that does just that. She's now happily employed at a large pharmaceutical firm and has no regrets about leaving her former job. Her new company's culture is entirely different, she says, because the president's corporate philosophy encourages wellness. If she works extra hours, she takes time in lieu. She feels encouraged to leave at a reasonable hour and has cut down her commute. And no more working weekends. "Life is a privilege," she says. "It's important to have a life outside work."
Indexing (document details)
Subjects:
Wellness programs, Employee benefits, Productivity, Manycompanies, Wellness programs
Classification Codes
9172 Canada, 5310 Production planning & control, 6400 Employee benefits & compensation, 9172
Locations:
Canada, Canada
Author(s):
Raizel Robin
Document types:
Feature
Document features:
tables
Publication title:
Canadian Business. Toronto: Nov 24-Dec 7, 2003. Vol. 76, Iss. 23; pg. 129
Source type:
Periodical
ISSN:
00083100
ProQuest document ID:
500107081
Text Word Count
2144
Document URL:
http://proquest.umi.com/pqdweb?did=500107081&sid=2&Fmt=3&clientId=19371&RQT=309&VName=PQD

digital dharma

Digital Dharma
Hal Stucker. Photo District News. (Eastern ed.). New York: Feb 2008. Vol. 28, Iss. 2; pg. 112, 3 pgs

Abstract (Summary)
EURO RSCG WORLDWIDE RECENTLY CREATED A PRINT campaign for Wasa whole-grain crisp breads that cleverly associate the wholesome snack with the ancient practice of yoga. The images also contain a striking number of visual puns based on the motifs common to Nepalese paintings: apple slices arranged to resemble a lotus blossom, green beans laid together to resemble a halo, and kiwi slices in the shape of two faces-mirror images of each other-that look down on the scene below and seem to shine with an inner light.
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Full Text (1565 words)
Copyright VNU eMedia, Inc. Feb 2008
[Headnote]
A series of ads for a healthy snack took inspiration from the ancient practice of yoga, and the modern practice of Photoshop.
EURO RSCG WORLDWIDE RECENTLY CREATED A PRINT campaign for Wasa whole-grain crisp breads that cleverly associate the wholesome snack with the ancient practice of yoga. Art director Paul Chiemmongkoltip brought the idea to fruition with the help of photographer Kate Turning and retoucher Amy Dressers. The series of ads was based loosely on Nepalese thangka paintings. These are a colorful type of Buddhist religious paintings traditionally used to teach about the life of the Buddha. The Wasa thangka, however, would feature a young female yoga practitioner surrounded by healthy fruits and vegetables, temptingly laid out on the company's whole-grain crackers.
Dresser describes the Wasa ads as "Kaleidoscopic-sort of fantasy, high-key color images with a central figure and a flurry of stuff going on around them, so your eye goes all over the page."Turning says that her images had to suggest a "mystical world of health and well-being," so each element had to have a mysterious, floating quality.
While Turning and Chiemmongkoltip were shooting the food and the yoga practitioners, Dresser first tackled the backgrounds, creating them from several stock images. "The art director wanted them to basically be the Himalayas, but not exactly, with more of an illustration feel to the foreground and the clouds," Dresser recalls. Each line of background mountains is subtly different due to Dresser's manipulations, with "slight variations," she says. "The main mountain line and the skies are similar, but the clouds are more painterly in some and fading more in others."
Though Chiemmongkoltip had drawn up what Dresser described as a very tight layout, the choice of colors for the background was left mostly up to her. The retoucher was relieved to find that she could be more experimental with tints and tones and wasn't tied down to, say, matching a specific Pantone color. Dresser also did a considerable amount of hand painting, for example adding several layers of mist to the mountains. For this, she says, she used a "weak little fuzzy zero-percent hardness brush that I labored over them with, trying to make them look fake and real at the same time."
Dresser carefully amplified the highlights on the clouds and mountains, giving the overall light a somewhat otherworldly effect. "That's one of my main missions in most of the images I work on: making the highlights look as nice and as pretty as I can possibly get away with." The background was given an overall tint with a hue saturation layer, and then very specific color adjustments were applied to small parts of the image using color adjustment layers.
"There was no one layer that would either make or break the whole thing, just a lot of them put in doing tiny adjustments." Dresser ultimately ended up with a big folder full of adjustment layers for the background, usually about 15 to 20 for each background image.
To place the cracker, food and yoga figure elements into each shot, Dresser began by cutting the items from the backgrounds by hand. "I do most of my work using Photoshop paint tools, and really don't use things like vectors very often," she says. "Most of the images here were shot on white, so it was easy to isolate them from the backgrounds using channels, and then I traced around the edges and painted the masks in by hand. I've found that when I use shortcuts, cleaning up the edges sometimes takes as long as it does when I'm doing it all by hand."
She also took special care in cutting out the crackers. "I really was careful to cut out all the nooks and crannies on them, because I knew that they'd really care about the product looking as genuine as possible. So I didn't cut off the little imperfections or even out the bumpsI was very loyal to what the product actually looked like."
The images also contain a striking number of visual puns based on the motifs common to Nepalese paintings: apple slices arranged to resemble a lotus blossom, green beans laid together to resemble a halo, and kiwi slices in the shape of two faces-mirror images of each other-that look down on the scene below and seem to shine with an inner light. To create the kiwi effect, Dresser modified a mask she had hand-drawn for one of the figures seen in profile. "I started with that, but then we wanted to make the face look more like it was drawn and less photographic, so I did some tweaking on the mask, giving it more or less forehead, more full lips, trying to make it look a little softer." She then put in a darker outer edging on the face to set it off from the background, painting the tone in using a separate curve layer laid over the top.
The series has been very successful, with ads running in both the U.S. and Europe. And the campaign apparently has good karma to spare. Dresser, a vegetarian, took home several packages left over from the shoot and her boyfriend started eating them. And even though the initial freebies are long gone, he now goes out and buys Wasa.
[Sidebar]
AMY DRESSER
Phone: (323) 662-6377
E-mail: someone@urbancom.net
Web: www.amydresser.com
Principal Contact:
Amy Dresser is represented by Kate Chase Presents
Contact: Kate Chase
Address: 40 Arago Street, San Francisco, CA 94112
Phone: (415) 337-1700
E-mail: kate@katechase.com
Equipment: Power Mac Gii with a quad-core processor, eight gigs of RAM; Mitsubishi Diamond Pro monitor with an Envision LCD for menus; a Wacom Pen Tablet, Photoshop CS2
Sample Clients:
Bacardi, UPN Networks, CBS1TNT Networks, Best Buy, Kodak, Honda, Proctor & Gamble, Pepsi, RJ Reynolds, Smuckers, Warner Brothers Records, Atlantic Records, Entertainment Weekly, Time, Maxim
Grain of truth. Opposite page: The final ad for Wasa Is based loosely on Nepalese thankga paintings. The imagery was shot by Kate Turning and the extensive post-production was done by Amy Dressers. Left: Two ads from the same campaign. Above: The various elements that made up the final ad.
TIPS AND TRICKS
COLOR PALETTE AND CONTRAST-Dresser had to create a separate color scheme for each image, similar in nature to the colors on the original Buddhist paintings she was imitating, which were very bright and very highly saturated. "I'm not that scientific a retoucher," she says, "I'm not that mathematical, so that fact that I didn't have to match a specific Pantone color and that I could just make the colors look good to my eye was a huge weight off my shoulders."
As a general matter of style, Dresser tries to make things look "fake and real at the same time," usually by hand painting to amplify highlights and deepen shadows, though she says she is "usually more focused on highlights than she is on shadows," trying to make the highlights "a little more amplified than they ever could be in real life." For the Wasa images, the idea was to give the clouds in the background an "imaginary, mystical, unrealistic look and feel. They all began from shots of real clouds, and I used that as a template, but sampled different parts of that image, and then painted over it on several layers-dark, light and medium-painting over the light and dark areas to amplify them, and particularly trying to amplify the highlights as much as I can get away with."
TWEAKING THE YOGA FIGURES-Symmetry was also critical to making them work as a takeoff on the Nepalese paintings. Each image had a separate model, and all of them also had to look as though they were expert yoga practitioners, shining with the inner glow of enlightenment. This meant Dresser had to do a fair amount of tweaking in order to make the figures look both symmetrical and also to make them appear to be holding their yoga postures correctly. "I feel the most at home retouching people," says Dresser. "With these, there was a little bit of cheating, there are some parts that are flips, to make them more symmetrical than they actually were, and there was also some tweaking of the poses."
For example, one model's knees needed to be brought down to get her into a correct half-lotus position. Another model was holding a pose that involved standing on one leg. This made her shift her weight, so that the top portion of her body was leaning slightly over in one direction. Here, Dresser had to straighten her spine. For all the models, "I drew a bunch of guidelines to make sure that elbows were at the same level, that shoulders were even and that torsos were straight up and down." For this Dresser used mostly cut-and-paste. "I'm not a big fan of the liquefy tool, and with some of the adjustments on these models, they were fairly severe. It wasn't just a matter of smooshing in an arm here or there; I had to create a whole new angle for some of their limbs. They weren't really heavy-duty adjustments, but I did have to work out the symmetry of the body before I started masking it all out."
Above: More elements that were composited into the final ad. The retoucher describes the ads as "fantasy, high-key color images with a central figure and flurry of stuff going on around them."

Indexing (document details)
Subjects:
Yoga, Mountains, Color
Author(s):
Hal Stucker
Document types:
Feature
Document features:
Photographs
Section:
CREATE TOUCH OF CLASS
Publication title:
Photo District News. (Eastern ed.). New York: Feb 2008. Vol. 28, Iss. 2; pg. 112, 3 pgs
Source type:
Periodical
ISSN:
10458158
ProQuest document ID:
1432861681
Text Word Count
1565
Document URL:
http://proquest.umi.com/pqdweb?did=1432861681&sid=7&Fmt=3&clientId=19371&RQT=309&VName=PQD

eat, love, pray

LOVE IT/LOATHE IT
JENNIFER REESE, Alynda Wheat. Entertainment Weekly. New York: Feb 1, 2008. , Iss. 976; pg. 79

Abstract (Summary)
[...] rather than a pumpkin coach, a juicy book contract transports our heroine to her metaphorical ball, letting her travel the globe, consume mountains of Roman spaghetti, practice yoga, and eventually replace David with a devoted Latin lover.
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Full Text (262 words)
Copyright (c) 2008 Time Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this material may be duplicated or redisseminated without permission.
Two critics weigh in on Elizabeth Gilbert's divisive best-selling memoir, 'Eat, Pray, Love'.
LOVE IT
Shelve it among the fairy tales. Elizabeth Gilbert's incandescent memoir succeeds as a wish-fulfillment fantasy for women who no longer relate to Cinderella. Replace the timid, motherless maiden with a newly husbandless writer in her 30s; instead of evil stepsisters, sub in David, a rebound boyfriend who's Just Not That Into Her. And rather than a pumpkin coach, a juicy book contract transports our heroine to her metaphorical ball, letting her travel the globe, consume mountains of Roman spaghetti, practice yoga, and eventually replace David with a devoted Latin lover. She returns home not just healed, but a superstar. Is it all a little gooey? You bet. I can't defend this luscious confection any more than I can resist it.
LOATHE IT
The problem isn't the book, it's the author. Eat, Pray, Love is, after all, Elizabeth Gilbert's lavish reward to herself for dumping a seemingly unobjectionable husband and taking up with a cad. For the next year, on perhaps the most expensive backpacking trip in recorded history, she babbles about her selfless generosity to her ex (!), how much pasta she can pack away, and what a devoted, spiritual creature she's become. That's scarcely a triumph over adversity--and even if it were, Gilbert created that adversity herself. Besides, courtesy dictates more grace in winning. If, despite a marked self-centeredness, you somehow manage to end up with everything everyone has ever wanted, keep it to yourself.
[Author Affiliation]
JENNIFER REESE

Alynda Wheat

[Illustration]
[PHOTO]


Indexing (document details)
Subjects:
Autobiographies
People:
Gilbert, Elizabeth
Author(s):
JENNIFER REESE, Alynda Wheat
Document types:
Feature
Section:
THE REVIEWS: BOOKS
Publication title:
Entertainment Weekly. New York: Feb 1, 2008. , Iss. 976; pg. 79
Source type:
Periodical
ISSN:
10490434
ProQuest document ID:
1418281161
Text Word Count
262
Document URL:
http://proquest.umi.com/pqdweb?did=1418281161&sid=7&Fmt=3&clientId=19371&RQT=309&VName=PQD

boost ur brain power

Boost your brainpower
Mark Witten. Chatelaine. (English edition). Toronto: Oct 2004. Vol. 77, Iss. 10; pg. 97, 4 pgs

Abstract (Summary)
Contrary to the belief that one has a fixed number of brain cells that diminish over time, research over the past two decades reveals that one's brain is like a renewable garden. The brain needs tending or will grow barren as one ages. Witten offers 10 mind-sharpening tricks, such as embracing tranquility, eating breakfast with fresh fruits, yogurt and whole grain bread or cereal, and having eight hours of deep sleep each night.
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Full Text (1434 words)
Copyright Rogers Publishing Limited Oct 2004
[Headnote]
Sure, going to school will make you sharper. But so will snoozing in a cool bedroom, digging into fresh fruit and frolicking with your kitty. Try these 10 mind-sharpening tricks today. By Mark Witten
Kick-boxing to Mozart. Yakking with your neighbour. Meditatig in the sun and sleeping soundly after making love. Who knew such pleasurable activities could boost your brainpower? Contrary to the belief that we have a fixed number of brain cells that diminish over time, research over the past two decades reveals that your brain is like a renewable garden. "If you stimulate your brain, it will promote cells and put out more branches like a tree," says Rémi Quirion, scientific director of the Institute of Neurosciences, Mental Health and Addiction, of the Canadian Institutes of Health Research at McGill University in Montreal. But your brain needs tending or it will grow barren as you age. Here's how to cultivate your mind today:
1 'Schmooze it or lose it Make time to chat with a neighbour or confide in a friend. A University of Michigan study found that gabbing with friends, neighbours and relatives is as good for your brain as intellectual activities such as reading or learning new computer skills. "People who grow older 'with a rich network of family and friends tend to keep their minds sharper than those who are isolated or alone," says Dr. Howard Chertkow, a neurologist at the Jewish General Hospital in Montreal and director of the Bloomfield Centre for Research in Aging at the Lady Davis Institute of McGiIl University. So, lighten up and take a break, because all work and no play isn't good for your noggin.
2 Travel to Thailand (or make coconutchicken soup) People who participate in mentally challenging activities throughout their lives increase the number and strength of brain cell connections, providing a reserve capacity as you age, according to research from Harvard University in Boston. "If you have more connections to start with, you can afford to lose some before the effects become apparent," says Carol Greenwood, senior scientist at the Toronto-based Baycrest Centre for Geriatric Care. No need to become a student again, though. Go to public lectures, start a chess club or travel to an exotic destination. Even processing the information in a new recipe can help keep your brain nimble. Looking for inspiration? Head to our Recipe File at www.chatelaine.com.
3 Say "om" Practise meditation, yoga or tai chi to reduce the toxic effect of stress on your brain. Scans conducted at the University of Wisconsin showed that Buddhist-style meditation quiets the part of the brain associated with negative emotions and boosts the feel-good zone. "Prolonged exposure to stress hormones has been related to brain shrinkage and memory problems," says McGiIl neuroscientist Sonia Lupien. "Pick whatever stressreduction method works for you." Build 30 to 60 minutes of tranquility into your, day, for example, by meditating with a CD by. University of Massachusetts researcher Jon Kabat-Zinn or decompressing with quiet time. "One hour alone per day can work for everyone. I walk the dog," says Dr. Lupien.
4 Get more zzz's for brighter ideas After waking from a sleep, the British poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge wrote "Kubla Khan." Paul McCartney woke with "Yesterday" playing in his head. Imagine what you could do by catching up on your sleep debt. Eight hours of deep sleep each night will boost your creativity and problem-solving abilities, according to research by German scientist Jan Born. During sleep, information and memories from the day are moved from one region of the brain to another and reorganized in the process. This reshuffling allows you to see problems from a fresh perspective and create new solutions. To improve your sleep, keep your bedroom slightly cool and go to bed at similar times each night. If you're still not getting enough shut-eye, visit the Canadian Sleep Society's website (www.css.to) to find a sleep disorders clinic near you.
5 Put on a Barry White CD and get it on An active sex life can breed babies and new brain cells. In experiments with adult mice, University of Calgary researcher Samuel Weiss observed that production of prolactin during mating and pregnancy prompts stem cells (primitive cells from which other cells evolve) in the brain to divide. These mature into neurons that migrate to the brain's "smell centre" and may allow the mother to recognize and care for her offspring. "We know that in humans the act of mating increases prolactin in the bloodstream. So, it's possible that prolactin released during sex could stimulate the growth of new brain cells," says Weiss, noting that within five to 10 years advanced imaging technologies may allow scientists to see new brain cells being created in humans. Until then, it cant hurt to make time for a little lovin.
6 Kick your brain into shape Jog, cycle or walk briskly to stimulate the growth of new brain cell connections that you won t get as a couch potato. Aerobic exercise makes sedentary people "smarter," according to studies by U.S. psychologist Arthur Kramer. Fit people also do better on complex attention - demanding tasks than their less fit counterparts. Brain scans showed that physically fit subjects had more grey matter ("smart" cells) and white matter (fibres that send signals through the brain) than those who exercised less. So, kick up your heels: just 30 minutes of salsa dancing three times a week, for instance, helps keep your brain and body young.
7 Beat the blues Improving your mood, with sunshine, playing with your pet I or taking prescribed antidepressants can keep your memory sharp. While brain scans show that long-term depression shrinks the hippocampus, thought to be the memory region of the brain, Columbia University, researchers found that antidepressants such as Prozac may reverse this effect. "When people v are treated for depression with medicine or psychotherapy, their memory problems tend to decrease," says Dr. Angela Troyer, a psychologist at the Baycrest Centre for Geriatric Care. Mood lifters range from munching on bananas to boost serotonin to seeking help from a qualified therapist.
8 Drop those fries and boost your IQ Lowering cholesterol levels in women helps prevent cognitive impairment, according to a recent University of California study. "High cholesterol levels around the membranes of nerve cells in the brain keep it from working well," says Dr. Howard Feldman, head of the University of British Columbia's neurology division. "A balanced diet without excess cholesterol is good for the heart and brain." High blood pressure, diabetes, smoking, obesity and inactivity are also risk factors for stroke, linked to cognitive impairment and dementia, says Dr. Feldman. So, skip foods high in sodium and saturated and trans fats, and ask your doctor or a registered dietitian for advice if you have high blood pressure or high cholesterol.
9 Listen to Mozart College students who listened to the sweet strains of Mozart's "Sonata for Two Pianos in D" performed better afterwards on tasks measuring the ability to manipulate complex mental images than those who didn't, according to a University of California at Irvine study. Other research demonstrates that music training boosts vocabulary, learning and memory in children. Playing, singing or listening to your favourite tunes will get your brain cells dancing to a faster beat.
10 Dig into a fruit cocktail Start your day with fresh fruit, yogurt and whole grain bread or cereal. Complex carbohydrates in this breakfast of champions provide essential B vitamins and a steady supply of slow-release energy to the brain, while antioxidants in the produce help keep your brain cells from rusting out. Eggs are also a rich source of memory-boosting choline. "It's as important for adults as it is for children to eat a healthy breakfast," says Greenwood. She believes that fad diets high in fat and protein and low in complex carbs may be bad for your brain. But does it matter whether you get complex carbs and antioxidants from eating blueberries or bananas rather than peaches, spinach or broccoli? "The fruit cocktail is best. Buy a variety of fruit and vegetables to suit your preferences," says Greenwood.
Smart pills?
Looking for a memory fix or an elixir to make you smarter? A trip to your local pharmacy can give you a mental edge, say some supplement and drug manufacturers. We checked with our McGiII University-based experts, neurologist Howard Chertkow and Rémi Quirion, scientific director of the Institute of Neurosciences of the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, to see if these "smart" pills live up to their claims. Talk to your doctor before taking any supplement.
Indexing (document details)
Subjects:
Brain, Diet, Nutrition, Meditation, Cells, Memory
Author(s):
Mark Witten
Document types:
Feature
Document features:
Photographs
Section:
health
Publication title:
Chatelaine. (English edition). Toronto: Oct 2004. Vol. 77, Iss. 10; pg. 97, 4 pgs
Source type:
Periodical
ISSN:
00091995
ProQuest document ID:
696631901
Text Word Count
1434
Document URL:
http://proquest.umi.com/pqdweb?did=696631901&sid=2&Fmt=3&clientId=19371&RQT=309&VName=PQD

depresstion

For a Happy Heart ; Depression, loneliness and anger take a toll on cardiac health. New research shows how to help.; [Atlantic Edition]
Anne Underwood. Newsweek. (International ed.). New York: Oct 4, 2004. pg. 55

Abstract (Summary)
The Japanese have a word for it--karoshi, or "death by overwork." But can stress on the job really do you in? Finnish researchers decided to find out. The years 1991 to 1993 in Finland were as bad as it generally gets economically, with unemployment nearly tripling. Those who survived the downsizing had to assume greater work loads. During this period and for seven years afterward, Dr. Jussi Vahtera and psychologist Mika Kivimaki at the Finnish Institute of Occupational Health in Helsinki followed municipal workers who survived the cutbacks in four towns. Their sobering conclusion appeared this February in the British Medical Journal. Kivimaki puts it bluntly: "Those in work units with the most downsizing suffered twice the death rate from heart attack and stroke."
The implications are dramatic--not only for our risks of developing heart disease, but also for treating it. Along with low- fat diets and exercise, stress reduction should be an integral part of any program for healing heart health. Stress reducers like yoga, meditation and group sharing have direct effects on cardiac risk, lowering levels of stress hormones and helping to relax arteries. They also have indirect effects. Practitioners gain a sense of well- being that helps them stick to a diet and exercise plan. "Simply looking at the picture of someone you love can help dampen stress responses," says [Timothy Smith] in Utah.
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Full Text (757 words)
(Copyright Newsweek, Incorporated - 2004. Reproduced with permissionof copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited withoutpermission.)
The Japanese have a word for it--karoshi, or "death by overwork." But can stress on the job really do you in? Finnish researchers decided to find out. The years 1991 to 1993 in Finland were as bad as it generally gets economically, with unemployment nearly tripling. Those who survived the downsizing had to assume greater work loads. During this period and for seven years afterward, Dr. Jussi Vahtera and psychologist Mika Kivimaki at the Finnish Institute of Occupational Health in Helsinki followed municipal workers who survived the cutbacks in four towns. Their sobering conclusion appeared this February in the British Medical Journal. Kivimaki puts it bluntly: "Those in work units with the most downsizing suffered twice the death rate from heart attack and stroke."
It should come as no surprise that emotions affect the heart-- and not only in metaphorical terms. Suffer a fright, and your heart begins to pound. Get angry, and your blood pressure rises. Thirty years ago scientists told us that men with type A personalities-- hard-charging, competitive and hostile--were more likely to suffer heart attacks. That turned out to be only partly true. Upon further investigation, anger and hostility were a problem, but not simple ambition or competitive drive. Today scientists are using high-tech instruments to elucidate the mind-body connections that damage the heart. And they are pointing the way to nonsurgical treatments that may benefit all of us.
If belligerence puts people at risk, science increasingly shows that a life of quiet desperation does, too. Patients who are depressed at the time of bypass surgery are more than twice as likely to die in the next five years as patients without clinical depression. Heart-attack survivors who live by themselves die at twice the rate of those who live with others. In a major study in the Lancet this month, researchers surveyed more than 11,000 heart- attack sufferers from 52 countries and found that in the year before their heart attacks, the patients had been under significantly more stress than some 13,000 healthy control subjects. "Severe stress didn't pose as great a risk as smoking," admits senior investigator Dr. Salim Yusuf of McMaster University. "But it was comparable to risk factors like hypertension and abdominal obesity. That's much greater than we thought before."
At every stage of heart disease, state of mind appears to play a role. It's most obvious in the later phases, where one can easily tally up heart attacks and deaths. But scientists are now showing that it plays a role in the initial phases as well. Psychologist Timothy Smith of the University of Utah is using CT scans to detect tiny calcium deposits in coronary arteries, an early sign of arterial damage. At the Society of Behavioral Medicine this year, he reported that couples with no history of heart trouble who were hostile or domineering in their interactions over money, kids, in- laws and household chores were more likely to have this type of damage. "The more strained their relationships, the more severe the silent atherosclerosis tended to be," he adds.
If there's a common explanation for these various effects, it may lie in the stress response. The classic stress condition is the fight-or-flight syndrome. The heart shifts into high gear and blood pressure rises, as the body speeds delivery of oxygen and glucose to muscles. Platelets in the blood become more "sticky" to aid clotting in the case of a wound. That's perfect for emergencies. But when the body responds the same way to everyday stressors like honking horns and looming deadlines, the cardiovascular system suffers. Chronic high blood pressure damages blood vessels, leading to inflammation and plaque formation. Turbulent blood flow can rupture a plaque, with the resulting blood clot leading directly to a heart attack.
The implications are dramatic--not only for our risks of developing heart disease, but also for treating it. Along with low- fat diets and exercise, stress reduction should be an integral part of any program for healing heart health. Stress reducers like yoga, meditation and group sharing have direct effects on cardiac risk, lowering levels of stress hormones and helping to relax arteries. They also have indirect effects. Practitioners gain a sense of well- being that helps them stick to a diet and exercise plan. "Simply looking at the picture of someone you love can help dampen stress responses," says Smith in Utah.
It only goes to show, as the Bible says in Proverbs 17:22, "A cheerful heart is a good medicine." And that's reason for all of us to take heart.
Indexing (document details)
Author(s):
Anne Underwood
Section:
Cover Story: Cardiac Care
Publication title:
Newsweek. (International ed.). New York: Oct 4, 2004. pg. 55
Source type:
Periodical
ISSN:
01637053
ProQuest document ID:
702121561
Text Word Count
757
Document URL:
http://proquest.umi.com/pqdweb?did=702121561&sid=2&Fmt=3&clientId=19371&RQT=309&VName=PQD

mindfulness

Buddha Lessons ; A technique called 'mindfulness' teaches how to step back from pain and the worries of life; [Atlantic Edition]
Claudia Kalb, With Clint Witchalls in London. Newsweek. (International ed.). New York: Oct 4, 2004. pg. 52

Abstract (Summary)
With its roots in ancient Buddhist traditions, mindfulness is now gaining ground as an antidote for everything from type-A stress to depression. At the Center for Mindfulness in Medicine, Health Care and Society at the University of Massachusetts, where MBSR was developed by Jon Kabat-Zinn, 15,000 people have taken an eight-week course in the practice; hundreds more have signed up at medical clinics across the United States. Now scientists are using brain imaging and blood tests to study the biological effects of meditation. The research is capturing interest at the highest levels: the Dalai Lama is so intrigued he has joined forces with the Mind & Life Institute in Boulder, Colorado, which supports research on meditation and the mind. Next month, scientists will meet with the Dalai Lama in Dharamsala, India, for a major conference on the neuroplasticity of the brain. "People used to think that this was a lot of mystical mumbo jumbo," says psychologist Ruth Baer, of the University of Kentucky. "Now they're saying, 'Hey, we should start paying attention'."
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(Copyright Newsweek, Incorporated - 2004. Reproduced with permissionof copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited withoutpermission.)
At the age of 39, Janet Clarke discovered that she had a benign spinal tumor, which caused her unremitting back pain. Painkillers helped, but it wasn't until she took a meditation course in Lytham that Clarke discovered a powerful weapon inside her own body: her mind. Using a practice called Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR), Clarke learned to acknowledge the aching, rather than fight it. "It was about getting in touch with your body, rather than your head," she says. "Mindfulness gives you something painkillers can't- -an attitude for living your life."
With its roots in ancient Buddhist traditions, mindfulness is now gaining ground as an antidote for everything from type-A stress to depression. At the Center for Mindfulness in Medicine, Health Care and Society at the University of Massachusetts, where MBSR was developed by Jon Kabat-Zinn, 15,000 people have taken an eight-week course in the practice; hundreds more have signed up at medical clinics across the United States. Now scientists are using brain imaging and blood tests to study the biological effects of meditation. The research is capturing interest at the highest levels: the Dalai Lama is so intrigued he has joined forces with the Mind & Life Institute in Boulder, Colorado, which supports research on meditation and the mind. Next month, scientists will meet with the Dalai Lama in Dharamsala, India, for a major conference on the neuroplasticity of the brain. "People used to think that this was a lot of mystical mumbo jumbo," says psychologist Ruth Baer, of the University of Kentucky. "Now they're saying, 'Hey, we should start paying attention'."
Paying attention is the very essence of mindfulness. In 45- minute meditations, participants learn to observe the whirring thoughts of the mind and the physical sensations in the body. The guiding principle is to be present moment to moment, to be aware of what's happening, but without critique or judgment. It is not easy. Our "monkey mind," as Buddhists call the internal chaos, keeps us swinging from past regrets to future worries, leaving little time for the here and now. First attempts may provoke frustration ("I'll never be able to do this"), impatience ("When will this be over?") and even banal mental sparks ("What am I going to make for dinner?"). The goal, however, is not to reach nirvana, but to observe the cacophony in a compassionate way, to accept it as transient, "like bubbles forming in a pot of water or weather patterns in the sky," says Kabat-Zinn.
The keystone of mindfulness is daily meditation, but the practice is intended to become a way of life. At Stanford University, Philippe Goldin encourages patients battling social-anxiety disorder to take "meaningful pauses" throughout the day as a way to monitor and take charge of their fears and self-doubts. Inner control can be a potent tool in the fight against all sorts of chronic conditions. In a pilot study of 18 obese women, Jean Kristeller, director of the Center for the Study of Health, Religion and Spirituality at Indiana State University, found that mindfulness meditation, augmented with special eating meditations (slowly savoring the flavor of a piece of cheese, say), helped reduce binges from an average of four per week to one and a half.
Mindfulness takes you out of the same old patterns. You're no longer battling your mind in the boxer's ring--you're watching, with interest, from the stands. The detachment doesn't lead to passivity, but to new ways of thinking. This is especially helpful in depression, which plagues sufferers with relentless ruminations. University of Toronto psychiatry professor Zindel Segal, along with British colleagues John Teasdale at Oxford and Mark Williams at Cambridge, combines mindfulness with conventional cognitive behavioral therapy, teaching patients to observe sadness or unhappiness without judgment. In a study of patients who had recovered from a depressive episode, Segal and colleagues found that 66 percent of those who learned mindfulness remained stable (no relapse) over a year, compared with 34 percent in a control group.
The biological impact of mindfulness is the next frontier in scientific research. In a study published several years ago, Kabat- Zinn found that when patients with psoriasis listened to meditation tapes during ultraviolet-light therapy, they healed about four times faster than a control group. More recently, Kabat-Zinn and neuroscientist Richard Davidson, of the University of Wisconsin, found that after eight weeks of MBSR, a group of biotech employees showed a greater increase in activity in the left prefrontal cortex- -the region of the brain associated with a happier state of mind-- than colleagues who received no meditation training. Those with the greatest left-brain activation also mounted the most vigorous antibody assault against a flu vaccine.
There's more in the pipeline. Stanford's Goldin is taking brain images to see if mindfulness affects emotional trigger points, like the amygdala, which processes fear. And at the University of Maryland, Dr. Brian Berman is tracking inflammation levels in rheumatoid arthritis patients who study mindfulness. One of them, Dalia Isicoff, says the payoff is already clear: "I'm at peace," she says. Mind and body, together.
[Illustration]
Caption: FOCUS: Kabat-Zinn (front) at Omega at the Crossings, a Texas retreat center

Indexing (document details)
People:
Clarke, Janet, Kabat-Zinn, Jon
Author(s):
Claudia Kalb, With Clint Witchalls in London
Section:
Cover Story: Mindfulness
Publication title:
Newsweek. (International ed.). New York: Oct 4, 2004. pg. 52
Source type:
Periodical
ISSN:
01637053
ProQuest document ID:
702121681
Text Word Count
853
Document URL:
http://proquest.umi.com/pqdweb?did=702121681&sid=2&Fmt=3&clientId=19371&RQT=309&VName=PQD

how to make new friends

How to make new friends
Danielle Groen. Chatelaine. (English edition). Toronto: Feb 2008. Vol. 81, Iss. 2; pg. 35, 1 pgs

Abstract (Summary)
Join in "We form lasting friendships with people who are similar to us," Fehr maintains. seek out an environment where you're likely to find someone who shares your interests: a yoga studio, a cooking class or an athletic team is a good place to start. Not having a strong social network, on the other hand, has been linked to irregular sleep patterns, lack of physical activity and even failure to use a seat belt.
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Full Text (454 words)
Copyright Rogers Publishing Limited Feb 2008
[Headnote]
Too busy for a social life? Here's how to meet people - and why it's important for your health.
Step forward
Not surprisingly, a familiar face strikes us as a friendly face. "It's the exposure effect," explains Beverley Fehr, a psychology professor at the University of Winnipeg. "When you see someone every morning at a coffee shop, you're no longer a stranger." Her advice is to go slow: Begin on a superficial level, and as you disclose more about yourself, see whether the person responds in kind. "By sending out those feelers," Fehr says, "you aren't risking too much."
Work it out
Your office is a gold mine of potential friends. "Be curious and ask questions," suggests the Vancouver life coach Laura North. "People are always looking for a place to tell their stories." You'll discover you have more in common with your colleagues than you thought. Try a small gesture of kindness, like buying a co-worker a cup of coffee; that'll show your interest in moving toward a friendship. As Fehr says, "It's an act of closeness. Friends don't keep count of who owes whom a few dollars."
Join in
"We form lasting friendships with people who are similar to us," Fehr maintains. seek out an environment where you're likely to find someone who shares your interests: a yoga studio, a cooking class or an athletic team is a good place to start. Susan Clarke, the executive director of a counselling agency in Saint John, N.B., called Family Plus/Life Solutions, says, "When you see the same people every week, it becomes more natural to talk to them - and then more natural to ask if they want to grab lunch."
Help others...
Clarke, who has lived in five cities over the last eight years, elected to get involved in her community. "Volunteering took maybe four hours out of my week," she says. "But everyone was working toward the common good, and in that egoless environment, it was easy to meet people." Best of all, making friends is a fringe benefit to feeling good about your own contribution.
...and yourself
The benefits keep coming: Friendships are an important part of physical health, particularly for women. Studies have linked social-support networks to improved heart function, a stronger immune system and better eating habits. Women with close friends are also more likely to seek medical attention and undergo routine exams. Not having a strong social network, on the other hand, has been linked to irregular sleep patterns, lack of physical activity and even failure to use a seat belt. So get out there, meet some new people and, please, buckle up.
MORE ONLINE
Read more tips on making friends at www.chatelaine. com/friends.
[Sidebar]
TRY SMALL KIND GESTURES.

Indexing (document details)
Subjects:
Social life & customs, Interpersonal communication, Friendship
Author(s):
Danielle Groen
Document types:
Feature
Document features:
Photographs
Section:
HEALTH FIX
Publication title:
Chatelaine. (English edition). Toronto: Feb 2008. Vol. 81, Iss. 2; pg. 35, 1 pgs
Source type:
Periodical
ISSN:
00091995
ProQuest document ID:
1420043941
Text Word Count
454
Document URL:
http://proquest.umi.com/pqdweb?did=1420043941&sid=7&Fmt=3&clientId=19371&RQT=309&VName=PQD

FROM RESEARCH TO PRACTICE; Mindfulness Goes Mainstream

FROM RESEARCH TO PRACTICE; Mindfulness Goes Mainstream
Jay Lebow. Psychotherapy Networker. Washington: Sep/Oct 2005. Vol. 29, Iss. 5

Abstract (Summary)
In one of the most remarkable partnerships in the history of research, Richard Davidson, a neuroscientist at the University of Wisconsin, collaborated with the Dalai Lama on an astonishingly innovative piece of research investigating long-term meditation's effects on the mind and brain. For this project, the Dalai Lama sent eight monks to Davidson's laboratory. Each one had meditated for between 10,000 and 40,000 hours over the preceding 15 to 40 years.
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Full Text (1950 words)
Copyright Psychotherapy Networker, Inc. Sep/Oct 2005
FROM RESEARCH TO PRACTICE
BY JAY LEBOW
Mindfulness Goes Mainstream
Research is proving the value of awareness practices
It's hard to believe that just 20 years ago meditation was still widely considered something practiced only by Zen students, Yoga adepts, and New Age esoterics in Birkenstocks. True, in the '70s, a few outlander physicians, led by Herbert Benson, began studying the power of meditation to evoke a "relaxation response," which lowered blood pressure and alleviated stress. But for a long time, the scientific community considered the healing potential of meditation to be about as credible as that of faith healing and exorcism.
Since the early '90s, however, the idea that meditation might have a real, empirically measurable, impact on mental and physical health has become almost boringly mainstream. Dozens of research studies have now demonstrated that meditation can reduce anxiety, stress, blood pressure, chronic pain, insomnia, post-traumatic stress disorder symptoms, substance abuse, and health care visits. It also seems to enhance the immune system, increase longevity, and improve the quality of life. Who knows? We may soon discover that meditation cures baldness, removes warts, and sharpens math skills.
But until the last few years, relatively few credentialed, respectable, standard-issue psychotherapists seemed to have discovered meditation for themselves or for their clients. Hovering for years around the fringy edges of mental health care, it's only now beginning to enter the mainstream of psychotherapy practice. More and more workshops and conferences seem to have "mindfulness" or "meditation" in their titles, and increasing numbers of therapists are teaching their clients to sit quietly and follow their breath.
In spite of increasing support for meditation among practitioners and much anecdotal evidence that it works well for different clients in a variety of circumstances, formal research on the value of incorporating it into the clinical practice of psychotherapy has been sparse. Perhaps the philosophy of detachment, which is often seen to accompany meditation traditions, conflicts with the goal of endless improvement and progress, which characterizes Western science and, probably, most psychotherapy models. After all, the byword for most psychotherapies has been "change," rather than "acceptance."
Also the research community may be constrained by an inability to think outside the box. The most stultifying research box of all is the self-defeating assumption that there must already be some empirical evidence showing the value of an intervention before there can be more exploration of its value as an intervention!
In the case of meditation, this assumption is indeed myopic, since there's a growing body of research demonstrating the extraordinary power of mindfulness practice to affect the way the mind works. Granted, much of this research hasn't been done in the area of psychotherapy per se, but some studies have shown that meditation has such an astonishing impact on the mind and brain that even the most hard-nosed psychotherapy researcher should be impressed.
In one of the most remarkable partnerships in the history of research, Richard Davidson, a neuroscientist at the University of Wisconsin, collaborated with the Dalai Lama on an astonishingly innovative piece of research investigating long-term meditation's effects on the mind and brain. For this project, the Dalai Lama sent eight monks to Davidson's laboratory. Each one had meditated for between 10,000 and 40,000 hours over the preceding 15 to 40 years. In a randomized design, comparing the brain waves of these monks to those of novice meditators, Davidson and his colleagues found that the monks had substantially higher levels of gamma brain waves--brain activity indicating higher levels of consciousness--than the novices. The monks' brain waves were better organized and coordinated. Their brain activity was highest in the left prefrontal cortex, the area of the brain that's been associated with happiness. Furthermore, these differences in brain function continued even when the monks weren't meditating, indicating that the years of mindfulness practice had fundamentally changed how their brains operated. And like other dose-response effects, the monks who'd meditated the longest showed these effects the most.
Other major areas of research on meditation and mindfulness are more directly related to psychotherapy. Some studies have looked at the value of training in mindfulness techniques for increasing happiness and reducing levels of distress and psychopathology. The best known is a series of studies by Jon Kabat-Zinn of the University of Massachusetts Medical Center, who developed and evaluated a program for increasing mindfulness called Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR). Developed originally as a means of allaying chronic pain, MBSR is an 8- to 10-week course that includes an intensive, full-day mindfulness session. Following the course, participants practice mindfulness for at least 45 minutes per day, six days a week. Another prominent feature of MBSR training is teaching participants to observe their emotions, sensations, and cognitions--even the unpleasant and painful ones--calmly, dispassionately, and nonjudgmentally.
Kabat-Zinn's research has shown that MBSR significantly decreases pain and the number of medical symptoms reported, and reduces psychological distress in participants. Similar findings have emerged in studies that he and his colleagues have done on the impact of MBSR on generalized anxiety disorder and depression.
But what does it mean to be "mindful" or to do research on "mindfulness"? How do you take this deeply private, elusive experience and make it the focus of research aimed at studying how it can become part of replicable psychotherapy treatments? Rather than analyzing what's perhaps unanalyzable, researchers studying mindfulness have focused on two of its core features: remaining in the moment and developing one's ability to accept what's occurring. In this form, mindfulness practice is consciously and purposely initiated, but allows experience to unfold without evaluation or criticism.
Flowing from such a focus, researchers have developed the means for assessing mindfulness. One of these is the Mindfulness Attention Awareness Scale, developed by Kirk Brown and Richard Ryan of University of Rochester. Another is the Kentucky Inventory of Mindfulness Skills, developed by Ruth Baer, Gregory Smith, and Kristen Allen of the University of Kentucky. Such scales track clients' self-reports of their mindful experiences, such as their ability to remain nonjudgmental. Although such brain technologies as MRIs and EEGs, as utilized in the Davidson research assessing the monks' brains, show promise for tracking levels of mindfulness, research on the extent to which mindfulness is present remains principally the product of self-reports.
Particularly promising, as well as unexpected, is a surge in research on mindfulness conducted by clinicians practicing cognitive-behaviorial therapy (CBT)--a group of researcher/practitioners who often seem to dismiss all techniques outside of their usual methodologies. Now a growing number of the most prominent CBT researchers have become convinced of the value of mindfulness practices and have come to see them as consistent with and complementary to CBT.
This may not be as strange at it appears at first. CBT therapists have always employed relaxation and imagery techniques that overlap with mindfulness practice. Both CBT and mindfulness share a focus on directing awareness to one's inner processes and to how we automatically react to situations and get carried away by our feelings. Furthermore, several of the leaders in the CBT movement, such as Steve Hayes of the University of Nevada and Andrew Christenson of UCLA, have written and spoken extensively about the need for self-acceptance and acceptance of others as a feature effective change.
A variant of Kabat-Zinn's MBSR is currently being developed by John Teasdale and his colleagues in Cambridge, England. Called Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy (MBCT), it's been shown to help reduce recidivism in depression. Teasdale and his colleagues have developed an eight-week course to help depressed people acquire a sense of detachment from the thought patterns that trigger their depression. MBCT incorporates simple breathing meditations and yoga stretches to help participants become more aware of the present moment. Teasdale and his colleagues have documented a relapse rate of 37 percent in depressed patients who'd had a major depressive disorder and received this intervention, as opposed to a rate of 66 percent among those who didn't receive this special treatment. The difference in relapse rate was even greater in those who'd had three or more previous episodes of depression.
In another example of the potential uses of meditation in the treatment of a difficult population, Alan Marlatt of the University of Washington examined the impact of Vipassana meditation on prisoners' behavior. In this experiment, groups of minimum-security prisoners in Washington State either participated in a 10-day course of meditation or received standard treatment. He found that even in this highly recidivist population, participating in this program instead in treatment as usual resulted in reduced levels of arrest, alcoholism, and drug use. For example, alcohol use in the meditation group decreased from 50 days out of the previous 90 to 10.
We're also beginning to see mindfulness practice incorporated into multimethod approaches intended for clients with problems that are notoriously resistant to treatment. Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT), for example, originally developed by Marsha Linehan of the University of Washington for clients with borderline personality disorder, incorporates mindfulness training as part of a complex treatment strategy. In DBT, clients are taught to observe their own emotions, for instance, to help them learn to calm down and detach themselves from their own inner turmoil. The mindfulness component of DBT is more flexible and less demanding than that of some other approaches, to avoid the difficulty that borderline clients often have with rigid structures and high performance expectations. The DBT program encourages clients to become comfortable with meditation techniques in a nondemanding environment, so they can experience its soothing effects and learn to increase mindfulness practice gradually. DBT has been the subject of several successful clinical trials. It is now the most widely circulated treatment for borderline personality disorder.
Enough research on the efficacy of mindfulness practice has been done in recent years that a metanalysis of these studies recently appeared in Clinical Psychology In that analysis, Ruth Baer assessed the impact of mindfulness practice on the kinds of problems most frequently encountered in psychotherapy, such as depression and anxiety. She found a mean effect size of 0.74 in mindfulness treatments, meaning that 74 percent of those in the groups receiving mindfulness training did better than those receiving another treatment or no treatment. This is a statistically "large" effect for these interventions. Baer also found that mindfulness treatments are highly acceptable to clients: 85 percent of participants complete these programs.
So where is this research taking us? It seems clear that the research has already demonstrated how powerful mindfulness techniques can be in the treatment of pain, anxiety, depression, and more complex problems, like borderline personality disorder. Basic questions still remain, however, about the most useful ways to incorporate these techniques into psychotherapy (particularly, how and when they should be integrated with other techniques) and for which clients these methods are most useful.
Furthermore, as Sona Dimidjian and Marsha Linehan of the University of Washington have pointed out, research has so far only focused on the secular types of mindfulness, leaving unexplored the role that spirituality plays in traditional mindfulness traditions. That raises the question to what extent, if at all, are the beneficial aspects of mindfulness connected to the spiritual or religious meanings ascribed to such practices by traditional cultures? For now, however, research has revealed that there is real value in helping therapists learn mindfulness skills and teach them to their clients.
Resources
Follette, Victoria, Steven Hayes, and Marsha Linehan. Mindfulness and Acceptance. New York: Guilford, 2004.
Germer, Christopher, Ronald Siegel, and Paul Fulton. Mindfulness and Psychotherapy. Washington, D.C.: APA Books, 2005.
Jay Lebow, Ph.D., is a contributing editor to the Psychotherapy Networker, clinical professor at Northwestern University, and senior therapist and research consultant at the Family Institute at Northwestern University. Contact: j-lebow@northwestern.edu. Letters to the Editor about this department may be e-mailed to letters@psychnetworker.org.
Indexing (document details)
People:
Davidson, Richard, Kabat-Zinn, Jon, Baer, Ruth, Teasdale, John
Author(s):
Jay Lebow
Publication title:
Psychotherapy Networker. Washington: Sep/Oct 2005. Vol. 29, Iss. 5
Source type:
Periodical
ISSN:
1535573X
ProQuest document ID:
903441091
Text Word Count
1950
Document URL:
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If thou art pained by any external thing, it is not this that disturbs thee, but thy own judgment about it. And it is in thy power to wipe out this judgment now. (trans. George Long)

A cucumber is bitter. Throw it away. There are briars in the road. Turn aside from them. This is enough. Do not add, "And why were such things made in the world?" (trans. George Long)Let opinion be taken away, and no man will think himself wronged. If no man shall think himself wronged, then is there no more any such thing as wrong. (trans. Meric Casaubon)(...)

As for others whose lives are not so ordered, he reminds himself constantly of the characters they exhibit daily and nightly at home and abroad , and of the sort of society they frequent; and the approval of such men, who do not even stand well in their own eyes has no value for him. (trans. Maxwell Staniforth)