Read this Tweet recently, which resonated with my own positive mental health experience on increasing prayer as part of many Lifestyle changes. I have waxed lyrical here about many other changes but have always hesitated to mention prayer for those wary of the 'God Squad'. Please note I respect every individual's beliefs!!
'Prayer is a considered a form of medicine, and it falls into the complimentary, alternative category. It has similar benefits to meditation. Praying increases release of dopamine.'
'Prayer can calm your nervous system, shutting down your fight or flight response. It can make you less reactive to negative emotions and less angry. Prayer elicits the relaxation response, which lowers blood pressure and other factors heightened by stress.'
Hope that helps just one of you guys 😁.
Written by
secondtry
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Why? Prayer is a very powerful act. Speaking to the God of the Universe who gave his Son to die for you so that you could go to Him as your spiritual Father. You may one day need a miracle.
One person's prayer is another person's meditation, is another person's mindfulness.Whatever calms you and gives you peace in the throws of an AF attack, go for it.
I don’t think all quack remedies or homeopathic nonsense should be on here, but I don’t complain as some folks derive benefit from them. You should do the same regarding prayer-if the mention upsets you, best to just ignore it.
I had a talk with my cardiologist regarding the role of mindfulness and positive thinking in coping with AF. He raised the same points as you and said that many of his patients use prayer successfully to cope with their AF.
He agreed with me that prayer and meditation probably trigger the same chemical and psychological responses in people. Interesting.
Now here’s a funny thing. I do meditate and consider myself to be quite spiritual in some ways but am not religious and don’t think of myself as part of any one belief system BUT when all else fails ( even meditation) when I am alone with my racing flip flopping heart in the middle of the night, I always find myself reciting the 23 Rd Psalm The Lord is my Shepherd.
Probably more common than you think. I find it reduces my anxiety by handing my future over to be decided by someone else, that also may be regarded as 'a funny thing' 🤔.
It may be a childhood resonance. I too meditate - been doing TM since my early 30s - but hymns pop into my mind if I'm very distressed. Haven't been to church since my late 20s
Went to church just Christmas & Easter for ever. Then got a DVT in leg overlooked by my GP, started daily short prayer to reduce anxiety over the unpredictability of the outcome. Next came AF more daily prayer for the same reason. Currently not going to church since Covid but belief it or not attend a Sydney (Australia) church that provides a weekly on-line Sunday service principally to benefit from a gifted priest who delivers the sermon.
Very interesting Secondtry. Like Dedeottie, I’ve never considered myself a religious person but I do meditate and sometimes, when the going gets particularly tough, will recite the 23rd psalm or the Lord’s Prayer. I always figured it was the reassuring familiarity that brought comfort but, as the article and your earlier reply mention, maybe the psychological relief of handing over control to a higher power, albeit just for a while, is what reduces my anxiety. Thank you for posting the article.
While I think anyone should be able to post/comment whatever they want on here I 100% don’t agree that you can compare prayer and meditation. One is talking to a (in my opinion) fictional entity and the other is being 100% in the moment, sitting with your senses, recognising that “you” don’t control anything and that thoughts are no different from any other of the human senses. One is also backed by science and has many different studies with proof of certain physical changes that take place in the brain and body and the other has never had any proof of any kind in the thousands of years that it has been popular, apart from human hearsay which isn’t proof at all.
Each to their own of course and everyone is free to believe what they want. I just believe that the only benefit people get from religious belief is comfort in believing that some all powerful entity is looking out for them and that they experience something akin to the placebo effect.
Meditation on the other hand is completely different and doesn’t have to be spiritual at all and the comparison of these two things puts many people off who believe that they are similar. They are not similar in the slightest and to compare the two is damaging to the practice of meditation as many people believe it to be some sort of spiritual practice. It isn’t. Some people choose to make it that way but it 100% does not have to be like that.
Christian religion is not human heresay. There are documents to prove Christian historical events. Eyewitnesses wrote it down in black and white. All the events in the bible can be proven. We think we are in control but we are not. Nothing belongs to us just merely loaned. Everything is transient. Everything belongs to God the creator of the Universe - even us who he created. We are given a choice in all things and to believe what we want. I believe in the truth.
Exactly 🤣 you’ve just ridiculed your own beliefs without even realising it. There have been thousands of gods over the years and you believe in just one more than me 🤣
No. Don’t tell me what l believe. I believe in one God only. There has never been thousands of Gods. You are talking regarding idols. I think it is you who is making a fool of himself but hey there is hope for you yet, you have thanked God. May he open your eyes to the truth and you are saved. Goodnight to you and wishing you the peace of our Lord Jesus Christ who died for you.
There were thousands of gods before your “one true god” and there will no doubt be thousands more in the future. Although that isn’t certain as many people are using their brains nowadays and realising religion is just another fictional story.
No doubt it served its purpose when we didn’t have science to explain things for us and we had to think of novel ways to explain how things to work. That purpose has run its course and religion is rapidly being picked apart.
Almost everything in the bible and every other religious book can be proven to be rubbish and most things just sound utterly ridiculous.
As I said before each to their own. If you need to find comfort in believing some otherworldly being is up in the sky looking out for your well being then so be it. For a lot of people now they realise we no longer need to live in a total fantasy world. The place in which we find ourselves is more than incredible enough without having to invent the unbelievable. You just need to open your eyes to see it.
If religious types stuck to just worshipping their fantasy friends of whatever name it wouldn't be so bad but they don't. They try and make laws according to what they think the fantasy friends want so as to force everybody to behave in accordance. Shouting about "God's will".
Prayer or Meditation. What does it matter? As long as it works to alleviate anxiety and calm your mind? People can have many different coping strategies, whatever works best for you.
Very good point. I often wonder why people are at pains to differentiate between for example medication and a placebo......as long as it works for you don't change it!
It matters because they are nothing alike and comparing meditation to prayer puts many people off trying meditation as they see it as some sort of religious/spiritual practice which it doesn’t have to be. Many people who would have benefitted greatly from meditation never go for it for this reason.
I compare the effects of meditation with the effects of prayer, Elli86. Both affect the body's reactions - breathing, pulse and psychology. I don't think it matters why someone prays or meditates - the outcomes are similar, which is what matters.
Not sure where the data from your last sentence comes from but it sounds rather speculative.
I am part of the data 🤣 I wasn’t interested in meditation for this exact reason. I had the misconception that it was spiritual. It doesn’t have to be. If you meditate then you only have to see some peoples faces when you tell them you practice it to know that there is a total misunderstanding in the wider public as to what meditation really is.
I agree that meditation has an 'image' which is rather unfortunate. Interestingly, I have a Druid friend who was asked to leave a church because she was meditating which it was felt was inappropriate. There's a contradiction!
I have used mindfulness successfully as a help in some of the most stressful times of my life, including with AF. My Christian friends when in similar circumstances, use prayer in the same way.
Very interesting perspective and I see your point. It would be a real shame if people who really want to avoid anything “spiritual”, were to be put off meditation because as you rightly say, you can meditate perfectly well without and being totally in the moment , has huge advantages. Speaking from a totally personal viewpoint however, meditation is not just that one aspect. The apps that I use in addition to my courses include a section with something to meditate on or about and these invariably involve the thought that we are all interconnected , with each other/ nature/the universe. That we are part of something magnificent. It is this aspect that helps to make it special for me. I recently used pure mindfulness to get me through an ablation during which I was neither sedated or had pain relief so I completely commend being in the moment but for me there is also something more . I hope that makes some sense, it is often hard to put these things into words. X
Don't think people's religious beliefs are relevant to this forum. I personally believe religion is another form of male control, used as an excuse for all manner of right wing violence, abuse, robbery and rape. So not here please.
Don’t read it if you don’t like it. It’s really not that difficult. Why do people not understand this? If your ego is too fragile to handle a difference in opinion then don’t read it.
🤣 Read my comment before you talk rubbish! People are free to say whatever they like. It literally has nothing to do with you. If you’re too sensitive to handle it then don’t read it. Find yourself a safe corner to hide in instead.
I think because I was defending the ops freedom of speech he has done what many people do these days and assumed I must be on their “side”. Seems many people can’t understand that you can completely disagree with something being said but still respect their freedom to be able to express it 🤣
Seems silencing people due to our own sensitivities is easier than discussion nowadays. Ridiculous.
That's because people like me have refrained from explaining in detail why it's playing Russian Roulette to keep getting them! The link to Prof Dalgeish's article on the Conservative woman site posted yesterday ought to-be a real eye-openerfir the keen beans. There was nothing in it that I had not read elsewhere but it was all rolled upnicely into one article.
Yes that might have something to do with it 🤣 but also the usual brain dead’s who think there are no grey areas in the world and everyone is one camp or the other hadn’t responded until now 🤣 she brings so much joy to the world that one 🙄 probably get closed down now.
I just scroll on when I see her moniker! Can't be bothered going through all the posts to find out what she said. What beats me is there are still people here who think they are getting the jabs to protect others! It's been known since summer 21 that they don't prevent transmission . Plus all the people who've had all the jabs going, still have caught covid and felt rotten but dutifully line up for more.
That was very a worrying article - same happened with the statin and cholesterol issue. Speak out against the official line and career gone, ridiculed and demonised.
Even more worrying as Dalgleish was actually pro vaccine to start off with and has radically changed his mind in the light of emerging evidence. He was even quoted in an article in the DM in 21 encouraging young people to get vaccinated. He does say now that he was misquoted and the D M refused to correct. A Japanese study has just emerged on heart damage due to the mRNA vaccines. It can be found on Igor Chudov's substack- if you are feeling brave. I worry all the time for daughter and my sister who have had 4 mRNA jabs. I have read several articles about how the production of the vaccines is not well controlled and this is leading to difference in toxicity of batches due to various contamination which might partly account for the vast discrepancy in reactions to the jabs.
Totally. I have read so much stuff about different vaccine batches, results covered up and definitions of causes of injury/death. Sad world. I am not anti-vax but each has to be considered on a risk/benefit basis and I for one will be very selective in the future.
The contamination over the allowed levels by DNA plasmids is particularly bad as apparently that could lead to incorporation into the genome - that we were told was impossible.
Call it prayer, meditation, yogic breathing, Gregorian chant, mindfulness, etc, it's all great for mental health and relaxation. Personally, I always fall asleep if I try to meditate but I find playing my piano very relaxing as I can't worry while doing that (except about how badly I play - Self taught ! 😲)
~Thank you for having the courage to post your thoughts.
Meditate daily, my spiritual paradigm broad - encompass everyone from all walks of life.
Having been an Interdenominational Hospital Chaplain it's amazing that when the chips are down we all need someone to connect to somewhere. I've never given advice (unless asked) I just sit with the person at their lowest ebb and just be...
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