MANTRA LOWERS BLOOD PRESSURE

MANTRA LOWERS BLOOD PRESSURE

Religiously active people appear to reap particularly strong health benefits from lower stress levels, say Duke University researchers. The study authors theorize that religious activity helps to lower blood pressure by reducing stress and anxiety in people's lives. High blood pressure has been linked not just with stress but also anxiety and repressed hostility, they point out. Religious practices, on the other hand, go together with a greater sense of well-being, higher life satisfaction, lower anxiety and better coping ability.

Prayers and religious reading in particular have a calming effect that works to lower stress. According to Herbert Bension, M.D., a professor at Harvard Medical School and author of popular book, `The Relaxation Response', repeating words during prayer and then using that repetition to quell anxious thoughts – produces a peaceful, tranquil state of mind. The peaceful state, for which Dr. Benson coined the phrase "the relaxation response", helps to counter the physical effects of stress.

"There is a fight or fight response that people have to stress." Dr. Benson explains, "When elicited, it increases the secretion of adrenaline and other stress hormones into your body. Those hormones lead to anxiety, depression, anger, high blood pressure, heartarrhythmia, and insomnia among other ills. But repetitive prayer, such as occurs with going through the Catholic rosary of davening (a swaying, standing kind of prayer used in Orthodox Judaism) or repeating the words `Om' or `Allah' can elicit the relaxationresponse – and that, in turn, "evokes physiological changes in the body, slowing or lowering metabolism, blood pressure, heart rate, and breathing," he says.

Brain imaging studies have demonstrated that certain parts of the brain – in particular, those areas under the control of the `auronomic nervous system' – are activated by mind-body techniques. The automatic nervous system regulates digestion, heart rate, and other processes that require no conscious thought. Benson has traced the relaxation response to the release of `nitric oxide', a molecule that plays a role in many neurological and immunological processes.

(Courtesy: Health & Nutrition – October 2001)