Cut your pain in half in just one hour. A guided meditation for pain relief can deliver better results than drugs, according to new research from Wake Forest Medical Center.
Recent research quoted at The Mayo Clinic, WebMD, and Harvard strongly suggests that mindfulness meditation techniques are highly effective in reducing pain and tension.
Meditation produces powerful pain-relieving effects in the brain, according to new research published in the April 6 edition of theJournal of Neuroscience.
“This is the first study to show that only a little over an hour of meditation training can dramatically reduce both the experience of pain and pain-related brain activation,” said Fadel Zeidan, Ph.D., lead author of the study and post-doctoral research fellow at Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center.
“We found a big effect – about a 40 percent reduction in pain intensity and a 57 percent reduction in pain unpleasantness.
Meditation produced a greater reduction in pain than even morphine or other pain-relieving drugs, which typically reduce pain ratings by about 25 percent.”
The guided meditation technique for pain relief that was taught to the participants is a technique called focused attention. The participants were taught through guided meditation instructions at the start of their program, and graduated to a self-guided meditation later in the program.
Here is how The Telegraph reported on the stunning findings.
For the study, 15 healthy volunteers who had never meditated before attended four, 20-minute classes to learn a meditation technique known as focused attention.
Focused attention is a form of mindfulness meditation where people are taught to concentrate on breathing and let go of distracting thoughts and emotions.
Both before and after meditation training, study participants’ brain activity was examined using a special type of imaging called arterial spin labelling magnetic resonance imaging (ASL MRI).
This captures longer duration brain processes, such as meditation, better than a standard MRI scan of brain function.
During these scans, a pain-inducing heat device was placed on the participants’ right legs.
This device heated a small area of their skin to 120° F, a temperature that most people find painful, over a five-minute period.
The scans taken after meditation training showed that every participant’s pain ratings were reduced, with decreases ranging from 11 to 93 per cent, Dr Zeidan said.
At the same time, meditation significantly reduced brain activity in the primary somatosensory cortex, an area that is crucially involved in creating the feeling of where and how intense a painful stimulus is.
The scans taken before meditation training showed activity in this area was very high.
However, when participants were meditating during the scans, activity in this important pain-processing region could not be detected.
The research also showed that meditation increased brain activity in areas including the anterior cingulate cortex, anterior insula and the orbito-frontal cortex.
This is where the brain stores its experience of pain and comes up with coping mechanisms.
“We found a big effect – about a 40 per cent reduction in pain intensity and a 57 per cent reduction in pain unpleasantness,” said Dr Zeiden.
“Meditation produced a greater reduction in pain than even morphine or other pain-relieving drugs, which typically reduce pain ratings by about 25 per cent.”
Dr Zeidan and colleagues believe that meditation has great potential for clinical use because so little training was required to produce such dramatic pain-relieving effects.
“This study shows that meditation produces real effects in the brain and can provide an effective way for people to substantially reduce their pain without medications,” Dr Zeidan said. read the original story here
Are you interested in learning more about guided meditation for pain relief?
Please leave a comment below, and we will send you a free guided meditation that can start you on the path to reducing your pain more effectively than using drugs, without the terrible side effects.
About Jim Arthur, Senior Editor
Would love to learn more! Would like to see if the guided meditations work for my migraines.
Hi Gloria …. will get back to you soon.
I have chronic widespread pain 24/7 from Fibro and Lyme disease. I am very interested in your meditation technique.
Hi Mary … will get back to you soon… thanks for your interest…
I’ve suffered from Fibromyalgia for 10 years and would like to receive more information on this Guided Meditation. Thank you!
Coming right up Keith… thanks for your interest… will get vack to you ASAP
Please send me information on guided meditation for pain.
Thank you
Thanks for your interest Kathy… coming real soon …
please send me the guided meditation for pain, thank you!!
Coming real soon… thanks for your interest Linda
I also would like meditation for Pain. I’ve been suffering for 20 yrs.
I have MS and would really like a guided meditation for pain relief, and also a guided meditation for me because I can’t sit on floor or anywhere except bed for very long.
I suffer idiopathic intracraneal hipertension and suffer horrible headaches and back and neck spasms. Extremely interested in a guided meditation for pain management. Currently taking, oxycodone and hydrocodone, looking for a holistic alternative. thanks!
Hi Monica… the meditation we will send you soon is not a complete treatment for your serious condition. But it will help a bit, and every bit helps… right? We’ll be getting back to you ASAP
We will make sure you are among the first to get our new guided meditation series… which includes some pain relief guided meditations….
I suffer from migrain headaches and would like to receive a guided meditation for pain releif. thanks
Just as soon as it’s ready Sue… which is verrry soon.
please send me a guided meditation
You’re on the list Mel…
I am interested in learning more about this pain reduction method to help me lessen the pain of my urinary tract endometriosis.
You’re on the list… will let you know soon Heide
Sooooo excited to see this. I’ve been using meditation to relieve pain, but I’m interested in learning your technique.
I am very interested in your guided meditation for myself and my mother. Thank you.
I get muscle spasms from stress and wearing the wrong kind of shoes. I have started wearing different shoes to cure that part of it. Having a singular focus and being able to block out the stress that leads to this problem would be great!
Hi, I’d like to have one as well. I am having a lot of stress which leads to body intensity which leads to pain. : (
thanks for sharing..
Hi Sashi –
Anything that gets worse with stress, gets better with meditation.
I will put you down for a copy of the guided meditation too!
Hi Sorry, Jim, could you send it to this email? thanks.
Yes….. I will send you notice of where to download it via this email. Thanks for commenting.
I am desperately in search of natural pain relieving methods.
I have some post chemo artheritis and bone pain. I would love it if you could please send me information on meditation for pain relief.
Thank you!
Hi Andy … yes, I will put you on the list… you will be among the first to know…. in the meantime, just to “warm your brain up” I suggest signing up for the free guided meditation series … there is a form at the top of the right sidebar on every page… enter your email for instant download.
It is NOT a pain meditation… but it is a tremendously effective meditation on love, compassion, self acceptance.. self love.
And we an all do with a little of that from time to time.. .eh?
–Jim
For 17 years I’ve tried to continue functioning with 24/7 Myofascial Pain Syndrome and Fibromyalgia. At age 70 I would truly be grateful if I could spend the rest of my life without that pain. I would greatly appreciate a guided meditation for pain.
I would love to find out more about this for migraines
Coming soon Scott… before Labor day for sure….
Jim
It would be wonderful if more pain management clinics taught meditation.
Hi, my pain management clinic at Good Samaritan in Portland, OR does! It is something that is research supported and really works. I’ve fallen out of the habit and now regret it because my pain is worse and I’m suffering. I’m going to get back to doing my mindfullness meditation techniques at least twice daily to help myself do better. Good luck to you.
am so tired of taking meds for chronic pain relief. Id love some help – thanks
i would like to have a copy please. also a copy for the meditation for chronic fatique as well. any method to help me be more energetic and get rid of the pain at my lower back caused by lumbar disc hernia will be so appreciated. thanks
Hi, I would love to have my husband try this. Thank you!
Hi Tammy — cool!
Let me know how things went for you guys….
–Jim
I would like to learn more about guided meditation for pain. Thank you so much!
I have MS and also work with people with fibromyalgia and chronic fatigue. I’m so glad I found you and eager to experience your meditations. Thank you.
I have chronic kidney disease since having my ureter crushed by accident in a surgery in that area. Though I have partial kidney function on the injured side and the ureter was reconnected, I still experience intense flank pain day and night. I used to use a Mindfullness Meditation for Pain Relief C.D. and now can’t find it. I hope connecting with some new guided meditations can help me. I feel I don’t have much of a life with this chronic pain, I’m limited in what I can do. Looking forward to receiving and using a new guided meditation.
I am out of work after being kicked in the abdomen by a client with spastic cerebral palsy. My history if fibromyalgia and nack & back injuries has complicated my recovery andno pain killers are effective enough to make the pain go away! Hoping meditation will help…
Hi Jim,
I would love to know more as mediation for chronic pain as this may well help my osteoarthritis clients.
Looking forward to reading your guide!
Sophie