Mind question.

Matamoros

From a Psychological point of view, what is happening when we Meditate? Also, I have read a book called ' The Power of Now ' and was intrigued by the effect that it had on me for a day or two. The feeling is of connectedness with the World and peacefulness, like being in ' the zone ' as described by athletes who describe the feeling when performing with great focus.

Any thoughts would be appreciated.

rollie

look up seligman, positive psychology, also there is a good article....but for the life of me i cant find it. i'll check my files at home...try doing a google scholar search, you'll find lots of information there

rollie

oh and "the zone" is referred to as "flow" in some positive psychology circles

Matamoros

For your help with that question.

John

I think there have been some good imaging studies done on people while they meditate. Someone mentioned them to me recently, I'll ask them do they have the references.

Boxman

So would you recommend the book?..or has its impact worn off?

JuliusCaesar

there's been a hell of a lot of research on Mindfulness Meditation if that's any use to you; check out Univ Bangor Wales, Jon Kabat Zinn, Tony Bates in the Irish Times, Acceptance & Commitment Therapy etc etc

Matamoros

Thank you for your suggestions on how I might find an answer to my question.
As Rollie suggested, I checked out Seligman and that took me of into loads of interesting areas. Boxman, I would recommend that anyone should read ' The Power of Now ' as the some of the ideas although not new, were new to me. I must say at this point that I am very much a layman and have not studied Psychology in any way. To some people, it may seem to be another wishy washy self help book but all I can tell you is that it did have some effect on me.
Thanks also to Julius Caesar for your help, March has passed now, I hope you made it through ok. ##groans##

Scigaithris

You may also want to review introspection in relation to meditation? The early (historical/psychology) works of Wilhelm Wundt and Karl Jung may be of interest? More recently, B.A. Wallace (2005) in Balancing the Mind delineates meditation stages and ties them to introspection.

rollie

A bit late but i found that article:

Walsh, R. & Shapiro, S. (2006) The Meeting of Meditative Disciplines and Western Psychology: A Mutually Enriching Dialogue. American Psychologist. Vol. 61, No. 3, 227-239

You can find it on psycharticles or one of those e-librarys

snorlax

here's a good reference for "Flow "

Csikszentmihalyi, M. (2000). The contribution of flow to positive psychology: Scientific essays in honor of Martin E. P. Seligman. In J. E. Gillham, (Ed.), The science of optimism and hope. (pp. 387-395). Philadelphia: Templeton Foundation Press.