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MAGAZINE

Effective Personal Meditation

written by

LARISSA KISNER

"Your biochemistry, thought processes and perceptions of situations can be adapted by commanding your breath."

Excerpted from a 2020 article fro Alpha Magazine.

...You are just recycling the dirt over and over again. In the 1970’s at Harvard University, Herbert Bensen was studying Type A and Type B personality types and heart attacks. He published a short, easy read called “The Relaxation Response” that details his experiences with patients who were CEO’s of New York companies who would return after open heart sur- gery with a second heart attack even though their diet and medications were adapted because they were consuming stress on a daily basis. Dr. Bensen discovered that meditation created a reduction in the biochemical stress reaction in his patients. He began prescribing meditation, mantras, deep breathing, and other mindfulness interventions to his patients with much success.

When I first learned about deep breathing exercises as a trauma therapist 20 years ago, I literally rolled my eyes. In my mind, I thought, okay, I”m going to take an abuse survivor with night terrors and anxiety and she’s just going to breathe her way into a zen state. Alright? It was laughable to me. I began to experiment and practice these techniques for group therapy sessions and began to apply them to my driving upset. If someone were driving too slow for me, instead of driving my car up into their back seat; I began to breathe through the situations. I discovered that the more I practiced the skills, the quicker I would resort to them and also the quicker I could reduce my blood pressure, anxious feelings, and negative thought patterns. You practice when you are calm and use it when you being to feel the pressure.


There is a tool online, in apps, and among professional therapists that measures YOUR personal stress reactions on a scale. See, what stresses you out might not blimp on my radar. Stress is personal. And coping is not as simple as telling you to relax which is more likely to upset you. As the stress is personal, so are the coping mechanisms with the type of mindfulness you might find engaging. For future articles, we can explore these techniques in more depth.

The deep breathing is where all of the mindfulness activities begin their focus. There are also apps to help you regulate your breathing in a controlled manner. Bensen published that focusing on positive thought and breathing, reset your biorhythms which were studied in depth during the 70’s. Your biochemistry, thought processes and perceptions of situations can be adapted by commanding your breath. You should always seek a doctor’s advice especially if you expe- rience a diagnosis or symptoms of asthma or any breathing difficulties. These activities are gentle and are not meant as physical exercise.

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