Oscars 2023: The Banshees of Inisherin is a dark, poignant meditation on futility of conflict  WION

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Oscars 2023: The Banshees of Inisherin is a dark, poignant meditation on futility of conflict - WION

'65' movie review: Dinosaurs meet spaceships, mayhem meets meditation in this Adam Driver fantasy  News9 LIVE

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'65' movie review: Dinosaurs meet spaceships, mayhem meets meditation in this Adam Driver fantasy - News9 LIVE

Heres how an app is redefining the way the younger generation looks at meditation and Vedic life  The Financial Express

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Heres how an app is redefining the way the younger generation looks at meditation and Vedic life - The Financial Express

Dublin, Dec. 09, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The "Mindfulness Meditation Application Market Forecast to 2028 - COVID-19 Impact and Global Analysis By Operating System and End User" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering.

The mindfulness meditation application market size is projected to grow from US$ 533.2 million in 2022 to US$ 2,633.4 million by 2028; the mindfulness meditation application market share is estimated to grow at a CAGR of 30.5% from 2022 to 2028.

Integrating technology into meditation makes it more human-centric, increasing the adoption rates and driving the market. There are several meditation techniques currently being developed and already in use. However, the mindfulness meditation application is the most popular technology among those who meditate.

Applications can be downloaded to most smart devices such as phones, tablets, laptops, computers, and even TVs. Therefore, consumers can use meditation apps wherever they go, allowing users to meditate in a busy environment. Buddhify is a meditation and mindfulness application designed for diversity. It depends on the users and their specifications.

For example, a user can tell the app what activity they are currently doing, and the app provides a suitable meditation session for the user based on their current environment. Technologies in the form of binaural beat music and sound charts make deep delta states more accessible.

Perhaps one of the most beneficial properties that technology brings to meditation is its ability to help the user reach a meditative state faster. This is especially important for those new to meditation because it encourages users to experience meditation's benefits effectively and return to it for mental, physical, and spiritual nourishment. Hence, the rising integration of smart technologies is driving the mindfulness meditation application market.

Europe accounted for a significant share of the global mindfulness meditation application market in 2021 and is expected to grow significantly throughout the forecast period. The presence of a large number of companies providing mindfulness meditation applications in Europe is leading to an increase in competition among the leading players.

The competitive scenario includes many players, such as Flowvr, The Meditation Company, 7mind, Pop & Rest, Samten, Asana Rebel, Yocalm, DeepH, Jinglow, and Mind Hero. The growing awareness among people to combat their anxiety, get better sleep, increase their focus, manage their weight, improve their sleeping habits, and much more is augmenting the demand for meditation applications.

In addition, the COVID-19 pandemic pushed people to seek a few moments of peace through meditation. In the wake of maintaining social distancing during the pandemic, most people turned to virtual meditation to relieve themselves from fear, anxiety, and other mental and emotional distress.

The key reasons for adopting the meditation practice among European countries were that it helped reduce stress and anxiety, improve concentration and memory, and improve performance at work and school. The growing demand among the European countries for health and wellness apps has prompted app developers to introduce the latest apps in the competitive market. By the end of 2020, approximately 71,000 health and mobile fitness apps were released. Compared to 2019, the number of newly released health and wellness mobile apps increased by 13% in 2020.

As per the YPulse, 2020 data, the search for yoga and meditation apps increased by 65% between 2019 and 2020, as a large number of people sought the use of applications to manage their stress and anxiety. Thus, an increase in the number of users of meditation apps owing to growing concern about mental fitness accelerated the mindfulness meditation application market growth.

As per the research presented at ESC Acute Cardiovascular Care 2021, an online scientific congress of the European Society of Cardiology, mindfulness meditation improves the quality of life and reduces fear of activity in heart attack patients. Additionally, the launch of new apps from startups is also aiding the mindfulness meditation application market growth.

For instance, in January 2021, Escala Meditando, the meditation app in Spanish, was launched for the children's category to encourage and improve concentration in children. It also helps facilitate and develop creativity, contributes to higher academic performance, and reduces aggression and violence. Thus, upcoming launches of new products are expected to accelerate the market growth over the forecast period.

In 2020, the COVID-19 outbreak across Europe attracted strict and prolonged lockdown periods and social isolation. However, its impact on Western European countries such as Germany, France, and the UK was modest because of their robust healthcare systems. The countries in Europe experienced the worst economic and consumer spending situation owing to the pandemic in 2020.

Another factor that hampered the market growth is the implementation of lockdown in many European countries and the imposition of travel restrictions by their governments to prevent the spread of COVID-19 infection. However, in 2021, with the easing of lockdown measures, the app providers started the business with reframed strategies.

Thus, the demand from individuals for installing the apps and the need for monitoring and looking after their wellness has experienced a significant increase. As a result, the market for mindfulness meditation applications is expected to remain unaffected by the emergence of COVID-19.

The number of internet users increased significantly during the pandemic and is expected to continue to increase in the near future. Thus, the pandemic has positively affected the demand for mindfulness meditation applications, which is further expected to drive the mindfulness meditation application market.

Market Dynamics

Key Market Drivers

Key Market Restraints

Key Market Opportunities

Future Trends

Company Profiles

For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/7hj1j1

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Global Mindfulness Meditation Application Markets, 2022-2028: Increasing Focus on Personalization with Opportunities in the Incorporation of AI &...

Sound design in games is rarely given the same level of attention as graphics, but games these days really do have extraordinarily detailed and interesting soundscapes. Microsoft thinks so, anyway, and is bringing two auditory environments from Halo Infinite and Sea of Thieves to the meditation app Calm.

Its small news and in a way just a promo for the games and Calm, but its also a nice thing to see happening. I vividly remember game themes from my whole life; I wake up every day to the NES Kid Icarus title theme, and the soundtracks to games like Stardew Valley, Fez and more recently Elden Ring and Genshin Impact are in regular rotation.

If playing games is a time when you feel happy, calm and focused, perhaps the sounds of their environments could help you achieve that state at other times. (Somehow, although I raged like hell at every boss in Elden Ring, the themes of Limgrave and Altus put me at ease.)

So although Halo is a game about a futuristic super-soldier blasting aliens to hell and Sea of Thieves has you dodging cannonballs and sea beasts, these popular games have evocative environments that may very well help someone get into a mental zone conducive to meditation or just mindfulness and focus. The two games will be available to paying Calm users soon.

The crossover is just one part of a larger post on mental health over at Xbox Wire, with people talking about how games have helped them through dark times, and providing resources for people who may be going through them right now.

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Halo and Sea of Thieves ambience tracks come to Calm meditation app - TechCrunch

YOUVE NO DOUBT heard about the scientifically proven benefits of meditation. The practice has been shown to lower blood pressure, improve athletic performance, enhance relationships, and even help grow new brain cells.

All that said, youre an active guy with an active mind. You might think you dont have time to meditate. You might think you cant meditate.

But what if most things you thought you knew about meditation werent true? What if you didnt have to practice for all that long? What if you didnt have to sit to meditate?

And what if meditation was actually ... easy?

Welcome to our 30-Day Meditation Challenge, which will bust all the myths about what qualifies as meditation.

The biggest myth about meditation is that you have to quiet your mind. You cant stop thoughts. Instead, effective meditation is about creating the conditions necessary to help your mind calm and your thoughts to slow.

And you dont have to go anywhere to meditate. You can meditate right where you are while doing ordinary things you do all day long. Plus, if you already exercise, you can make meditation part of your regular fitness plan.

If you subscribe to our exclusive membership program, Men's Health MVP, you'll get exclusive access to PDFs of our top-notch guides to fitness and nutrition, including this 30-Day Meditation Challenge plan.

DOWNLOAD OUR 30-DAY MEDITATION CHALLENGE HERE

P.S.: If you become an MVP, you'll also get an exclusive members-only discount to our online shop to get much more from Mens Health.

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Nita Sweeney is a certified meditation teacher, ultrarunner, and award-winning author whose latest book is Make Every Move a Meditation.

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The Men's Health 30-Day Meditation Challenge to Beat Stress - Men's Health

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MEDITATION: Some Advent thoughts | Religion | djournal.com - Northeast Mississippi Daily Journal

Wisconsin volleyball celebrates national championship, beats Marquette

The Wisconsin women's volleyball team unveiled its championship banner and handed the players their rings before defeating Marquette in the home opener at UW Field House.

Mark Stewart, Wochit

MADISON The significance of the moment wasnt lost on Chad McGehee.

Wisconsins volleyball team was playing in the NCAA tournament a few years ago. It was the night before a match and the team was going through its final preparations, getting its last film study and some final points from the coaches.

Then, Badgers coach Kelly Sheffield gave him the floor.

The first time he did it three or four years ago and I remember feeling hes giving me the keys to his Ferrari, McGehee said. This is precious. You just dont let anybody get into the head space of your elite athletes the night before competition. So, I felt very fortunate to have that opportunity.

With four straight Big Ten championships, three straight Final Four appearances (and a fourth trip in a row still possible), the defending national champion is setting the standard for the UW athletic department these days.

The players and coaches are on the front line of that success. Behind them is a support team with the usual staffers: the trainer, a director of strength and conditioning, a nutritionist.

And then there is McGehee. As UW's Director of Meditation training, he helps the players keep their minds focused by integrating meditation into the teams training.

Few athletic departments have leaned into meditation to develop mindfulness like Wisconsin has and perhaps no team within the department has woven the process into its day-to-day operation as much as volleyball.

It has become essential.

More:Wisconsin volleyball team sweeps TCU to advance to its 10th straight Sweet 16 in the 2022 NCAA Tournament

More:Marquette and Wisconsin will play first volleyball match at Fiserv Forum next September

What weve come to realize is that its not just about training the body, its also equally about training the mind and how youre intentionally going about reps, senior Danielle Hart said. What youre doing physically, if you have the power of the mind behind it, you can enhance that skill or that rep.

This season the practice helped the Badgers (27-3) earn a top-four seed overall for the NCAA Tournament and advance to the Sweet 16 this week. UW will play Big Ten rival Penn State (26-7) at approximately 4:30 p.m. Thursday at the UW Field House. A win puts the Badgers in the regional final against Pittsburgh or Florida for a spot in the Final Four at 7 p.m. Saturday.

To be mindful is to give something your full attention and not let your mind wander. It is to be relaxed.

This time of year is a test of that for the Badgers. There is the attention and pressure of the tournament. How do you handle the pre-game jitters? How do you shake off a bad point or avoid getting too caught up in success? How do you balance the most important time of the season with the most important time of the semester?

Consider mindfulness, strength and conditioning for the mind.

No elite athlete would ever take the field of competition without training their bodies, yet all the time we talk about the importance of the mental game yet we dont set aside time to train for it, McGehee said.

Thats not true for Wisconsin. Last summer Kevin Schultz, the team's director of Olympic strength and conditioning, gave 30 minutes per week of his time with the team to McGehee for work on mindfulness meditation.

During the season it's common for McGehee to come to practice and meet with the team as it faces unique challenges. He spoke to the group about handling the hoopla of the NCAA championship banner reveal and ring ceremony and then taking the floor minutes later against Marquette. He talked to the team before its match with Florida at the Kohl Center in September. Those were special dates on the schedule, but something special doesn't have to be going on for him to visit the team.

We want to give our players tools on the court and off the court and so from an on-the-court perspective how can you quiet your mind when youre in the eye of the hurricane, Sheffield said. How can you quiet your mind when everything else around you is nuts, crazy. How do you quiet your mind and get yourself into a place where you can perform at your best.

McGehee is a trail blazer. In March 2020, he was named UW's Director of Meditation Training, and according to UW, was the first full-time meditation specialist dedicated to a college athletic department.

His work with the athletic department started a year earlier after he ran a training for retired NFL players on campus at the Center for Healthy Minds. Athletic director Chris McIntosh, then the deputy AD, and Ross Kolodzieg, an assistant football coach, were there and asked McGehee would he be interested in working with the university's student athletes.

At around the same time, Sheffield was looking for a way to help his players calm themselves and McIntosh directed him to the Center for Healthy Minds and McGehee. He has been working with the volleyball team since 2019 and help the lay the ground work for him to eventually join the athletic department.

I think its common for athletes who havent been around it to question its value, Hart said. I think what was cool and what really grabbed the teams attention was in one of the first meetings he showed actual statistics that showed how quickly peoples heart rate got back to normal after something caught them off guard.

That study showed that individuals who practiced mindfulness were able to return to their resting heart rate after being caught off guard faster than someone who did not practice it.

Sophomore Sarah Franklin and junior Caroline Crawford, transfers new to the program this year, had never done mindfulness meditation before getting to Wisconsin but quickly found it beneficial.

Junior Devyn Robinson, initially a skeptic, has used it to help with social anxiety and the night before the national championship last year, she used it to help her get to sleep. Hart sometimes journals as part of her mindfulness exercises and during a match might wipe her feet to help her move on from one play to the next.

That ability to lock in and focus can pay off in major ways.

In the fifth set of the national final with Nebraska, the Badgers had the unique experience of clinching the title twice. The first time it scored match point, a replay review overturned the call. The call added to a furious comeback the Cornhuskers were making, but rather than dwell on a tough call, UW refocused and won the title.

It is the kind of adversity that could face the Badgers this week as they go for their fourth straight Final Four appearance.

They had to reset from the highest of highs - they had just won the first national championship in program history to 'Oh we have to take the floor again', McGehee recalled. Emotions all over the place. Thoughts racing through the mind. The athletes talked how they found ways to use this training in that moment, to be aware of it, not suppress it, not run from it.

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Strength and conditioning for the mind: Meditation helps Wisconsin volleyball focus on NCAA tournament run - Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Meditation practitioners and teachers know that mindfulness is all about present-moment awareness.

I have been teaching mindfulness to students since 2016 to calm behaviors, transition from one activity to another and to be more aware of the body in space and thoughts in the mind. The overarching idea is that with the awareness skill of mindfulness, students who struggle to pay attention or who are anxious in school could notice where their focus is and manage themselves more effectively. The following are but a couple of the many scientific studies showing how mindfulness helps improve focus and attention.

According toneuroscientistDr. Amishi Jha, author of "Peak Mind: Find Your Focus, Own Your Attention, Invest 12 Minutes a Day" and professor of psychology at the University of Miami, the neuroplasticity of the human brain is at the heart of why mindfulness helps with focus. Attention is your super power. Attention regulates how you perceive your life, think your thoughts, feel your feelings, enjoy your memories and daydream about the future. Dr. Jha and her team taught people with high-stress jobs how to place attention where it matters most using mindfulness. What we gain from mindfulness [is] the capacity to keep our attention where we need it, in the form we need it Mindfulness training does indeed have a dose-response effect, which means the more you practice, the more you benefit.

Another article, entitled "Your Childs Brain on Mindful Meditation," published in ADDitude, an online magazine for ADHD, explained the results of a Harvard study in which some areas of the brain, including areas related to emotion regulation, grew during an 8-week mindfulness program. And studies involving both imaging and patterns of activation in the brain have shown alterations correlating with greater emotional control, wellbeing and happiness.

Since I have been guiding and practicing meditation with adults and children, most self-report that they feel more in tune with what is going on around them, in their body and in their mind. As they learn to sit in silence and notice what is going on inside and around them, they realize how meditation benefits their life.

Please note that meditation is not a mental health or emotional therapy. Meditation is, however, an effective supplemental practice that can help generate peace of mind and self-control. The key to a successful practice is time and repetition. To reap the greatest benefit, meditation should be a daily activity of at least 10 minutes, and according to Jhas study, the optimal amount of time is at least 12 minutes per day.

This month's short practice is inspired by Dr. Amishi Jhas "STOP practice," in which we "Stop what we are doing for a moment, Take a breath, Observe whats happening in and around us, and then Proceed with greater focus and intention."

When you notice you are losing focus, whether in class or in a meeting, try this practice and invite your child(ren) to try it with you. By practicing this regularly, children will be able to do it on their own at school.

Lets say you are in a meeting or classroom and you notice your mind wandering or your body getting jittery. First thing is to acknowledge that you have lost attention to what is going on. You cant remember the last thing the speaker or the teacher said, or what you were doing, maybe. The first step in mindfulness is simply noticing that attention has been lost.

When we notice this, we bring our attention to a mindfulness anchor commonly the breath. We take one to three deep breaths, intentionally noting the air coming in and going out the body at the nose, the chest or the belly. Counting these breaths is also a worthwhile practice to bring attention to the moment.

After inviting a few calming breaths, we bring our attention to the body. Where are the feet right now? Where are my hands? Where am I sitting right now? Bring awareness to any feelings in the body. Then, notice the head balanced on top of the shoulders and, if comfortable, take a few seconds to close the eyes and to quickly scan the body for any sensations.

Finally, with the enhanced present moment awareness this short practice has generated, we make the choice to come back to what is going on right now and what we should be doing: listening to a speaker or teacher or working on a project or assignment. We can bring renewed focus and clarity to what we are doing and feel more productive and aware.

This practice can be done anytime we want or anytime we notice ourselves drifting off task. In time, mindfulness of what is going on right now and what needs to be happening will hone the brains focus and attention systems.

Anne-Marie Emanuelli is the founder and Creative Director at Mindful Frontiers LLC, an education-based mindfulness meditation center offering workshops, classes and coaching for children, families, individuals and classrooms. For more information please visit mindfulfrontiers.net.

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Mindfulness, meditation can help focus the brain on tasks at hand - taosnews

Meditation can have adverse effects.* Just look at the above image of Bodhidharma does his face give you the impression that theres nothing adverse going on here?

Now if youve practiced meditation in any form (with the possible exception of soaking-in-a-hot-tub zazen) for more than about ten minutes, youll know this is true. You will almost certainly have had some uncomfortable sensations of a psychological and/or physical nature pass through, if only an itch that you couldnt scratch. This, in fact, is the first noble truth of the buddhadharma the truth of itching, more commonly known as the truth of suffering. Meditation is a reality zone.

Yet, reading through a contemporary organizations website on the topic, I get the impression that only now have they alone noticed that meditation can be a powerful practice and unless one is careful, it can cause (or be related to) adverse effects.

This is not new information. More on that below from one of classical source, the great meditation master Zhiyi (538-597). But for now, just this teaser:

One must know well the methods for employing the inward mind during sitting meditation to treat disorders. If someday one activates a disorder, it may not simply be a matter of developing an obstruction to practice of the Path. It may be that one has to even contemplate the loss of this one great life.

Wow!

Reminds me of the time when I was a new Zen priest and asked Katagiri Rshi if it was okay for me to move during zazen. It is better that you die, he said.

So it is indeed true that intensive meditation practice (something more than an hour a day) is simply not appropriate for some folks. And doing intensive retreats (more than six hours or so of daily sitting meditation for a week or more) is likewise not appropriate for some. Granted, not so many people these days are doing such intensive practice.

Still, intensive practice can cause (or at least be related to) a range of intense symptoms, some of which can be long-lasting and can impair functioning. These can include dysphoria, paranoia, dissociation, delusions, and parasomnias. Therefore, if you are doing intensive practice or plan to do such, it is important how to know how to work with symptoms that can lead to adverse effects.

For other symptoms, check out the list of 59 categories of meditation-related experiences that can be distressing or associated with impairment in functioning at Cheetah House. Meditation practice, after all, is a serious endeavor and in recent years some organizations like Cheetah House have worked to raise awareness about such things in what had been the one-sidedly glowing and naive world of secular mindfulness. Kudos to them for so doing. Its as if a balanced view of the risks involved just wasnt good for business.

While acknowledging the contributions groups like Cheetah House are making, in my view, it is also important to recognize that many of the 59 symptoms they list are completely normal, fleeting states of life, let alone of meditation practice. Some of those symptoms that might lead to adverse effects include irritability, positive affect, change in worldview, clarity, mental stillness, breathing changes, pain, and change in self-other or self-world boundaries. Many of the 59 symptoms look like they are pathologizing the fruits of the path and/or normal human experience while using quasi-scientific language to lend credibility (and scareiness) to their efforts. Unfortunate.

Ive personally experienced many of the 59 symptoms during intensive meditation retreats as well as daily practice and I only occasionally get locked in the Bodhidharma scowl.

From what Ive seen in my forty-five + years in the meditation realm, the incidence of the above and other symptoms at a level of intensity and duration that significantly impairs functioning is really quite low, although such things do occur. And because they do occur, if even infrequently, it is a bad idea for anyone who isnt in a teacher-student relationship to engage in intensive meditation practice.

By that problematic little word teacher, in this context, Im referring to someone who

If you are looking for such a person, it is best to inquire directly about a prospective teachers training. To become this kind of teacher, it is necessary to have done your own intensive meditation practice for years and to have studied buddhadharma literature so that you have resources to help people beyond your own limited personal experiences.Dont assume that the teacher at your local dharma shop is such a person. Many people are now authorized as teachers with little actual training. Check out their credentials. Ask questions.

In addition, for a student working with a teacher, it is necessary to be forthcoming about your mental and physical health history, what you are experiencing in your current practice, and to follow the teachers instructions (or if you change your mind about working with someone, find another teacher).

In my view, sometimes an adjustment is called for, but most often, experiences are just passing through and the important thing is to turn upstream into the perceptual field and illuminate the karmic consciousness that is creating the symptom.The symptoms when worked through skillfully, have the possibility to be the field of awakening.

Speaking of awakening, if one is determined to get to the root of this one great life, to realize great awakening, then, rest assured, there will be some difficulties, and probably some serious difficulties. Indeed, following major shifts in practice, many people are not-so-functional for a while. In our hyper-functional culture, this might sound horrifying, but in the received tradition, its just part of the landscape.

Indeed, it is because our functionality might not be at its peak for a while that the sacred fetus period of training came to be. After a definitive awakening, a teacher might assign some years of quiet, hermit-like living, while the person deepens and clarifies their realization. In the past, this style of training was often recommended to people prior to their appearing in the world as teachers. Dgen is one such teacher who did this practice, as is Wansong (see Going Through the Mysterys One Hundred Questions, p. 17-18).

In addition to finding a skilled teacher, given that difficulties, even serious adverse effects, may well arise in intensive training, it would be wise for students considering such to do some intention-searching and cost-benefit analysis. Some of the questions such a person might ask:

In conclusion, some adverse effects may happen as a result of meditation practice. Clear intention and working with a competent teacher are the best ways to avoid and/or work with adverse effects when they occur.

__________________

From Zhiys The Essentials of Buddhist Meditation, pp. 59-60:

What is meant by making adjustments? Now, to draw upon familiar subjects as analogies for this dharma, it is just as when a common potter wishes to create various sorts of vessels. They must first skillfully make adjustments in the clay such that it is neither too sti nor too soft. Afterwards they may move to the potters wheel. It is also like playing the lute. One should first make adjustments to the strings, properly setting their tension. Then one may proceed to play, producing all sorts of marvelous melodies. When the practitioner cultivates the mind, it is just the same. One must make skillful adjustments in five dierent matters (food, sleep, body, breath, mind) and must make those adjustments appropriately. Then samdhi will develop easily. If there is some factor which has not been properly adjusted, then there will be all sorts of obstructive diculties and it will be hard for roots of goodness to develop.

And from Zhiyis The Essentials of Buddhist Meditation, p. 111:

Now, as for the dharma of sitting in dhyna absorption, if one is able to skillfully apply the mind, then the four hundred and four kinds of disorders will naturally be cured. If, however, one fails in the correct placement of the mind, then the four hundred and four kinds of disorders may arise on that very account. For these reasons, whether one is engaged in practice oneself, or whether one is teaching others, one must become skilled in recognizing the causes of disorders. One must know well the methods for employing the inward mind during sitting meditation to treat disorders. If someday one activates a disorder, it may not simply be a matter of developing an obstruction to practice of the Path. It may be that one has to even contemplate the loss of this one great life.

* Tetsugan Sensei contributed even more than usual to this essay.

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On the Adverse Effects of Meditation | Dosho Port - Patheos