Should We Make Time For Meditation?

By Author: Steven Johnson
Total Articles: 494
Comment this article

There is always a point where science collides with belief systems and sparks fly. Looking around the US right now, the continuing confrontation over the teaching of evolution is a classic example. At a slightly lower level of intensity is the continuing conflict between the "hard science" doctors and those who are persuaded that there are alternative approaches to treatment with equally good outcomes. Take acupuncture as an example. This comes out of nearly two thousand years of medical experience in China. Even though some of the Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) methods have been displaced in favor of Western methods, the healthcare service in many Asian and ASEAN countries continues to rely on acupuncture as an effective treatment for a range of different problems. Putting TCM to one side, there are also major claims made for different forms of meditation. Some are explicitly rooted in religions. Others are directly adapted to the management of pain. Unfortunately, the Enlightenment and the adoption of the scientific method by Western doctors leads them to a quick dismissal of everything not backed up by their science. ...
... Even when shown perfectly respectable research proving some of the claims for "unscientific" methods, they still refuse to even consider them. Their prejudices are deep-seated.

In the case of meditation, there is a growing body of Western-based research using the scientific method which shows excellent outcomes when people suffering from chronic pain are taught how to meditate. In essence, the point is to change the attitude of people towards their pain. Put another way: the level of intensity of the pain stays the same but the people change their emotional reaction to it. At some level, this represents a form of intellectual distraction. People are trained how to disconnect themselves from the pain and to search for ways to live their lives without worrying about it. Too often, people allow the pain to dominate their every waking moments. They fear the pain will always be there and this becomes a self-fulfilling prophesy that blights their lives. Avoiding this fear and focussing instead on positive ways to cope with the reality of the pain allows people to rebuild their daily lives and to function more effectively.

There is an old saying: give a starving man a fish and he eats well that night, but teach him how to fish and he can eat well every night. Teaching people how to meditate is the latter. It gives them a path to follow for the rest of their lives. For some there is a problem. It's not a quick fix. rather it relies on them to invest time and effort into solving their own problems. At first, there may be a place for painkillers and tramadol is probably the best for relieving moderate to severe pain. But as people begin to feel the benefit flowing from this new discipline for the mind, the need for drugs will diminish. The ideal is to live without the help of any drug. If your private health insurance includes meditation for pain management, get an early appointment. If you have some savings, it is a good investment. Otherwise, buy tramadol. It will give you relief while the healthcare service catches up with the best research.