“Over the past 20 years, meditation and mindfulness-based programs have become increasingly important to Westerners. Doctors are embracing meditation not because they think it’s hip or cool but because scientific studies are beginning to show that it works, particularly for stress-related conditions.”

WebWire

In Praise of Idleness

Oliver Burkeman Is Busy Oliver Burkeman asks if the solution to busyness is not to work harder and organise ourselves but to indulge in a little idleness.
Indirectly explains why meditation works & helps people get more done

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b07v33l6

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2017/aug/29/david-morgan-obituary

“David Morgan, who has died aged 83, was an investment banker who rose through the ranks to become chairman of M&G Group. But he was also a man with a spiritual side, and had a long association with Transcendental Meditation as practised by the Indian teacher Maharishi Mahesh Yogi.”

Even when angry, Perry’s words are often delivered with a measured, Zen-like calm, something she ascribes partly to a new maturity (“I left my 20s, I’ve embraced and surrendered to my 30s, and I love it. I wouldn’t go back at all”) and partly to her passion for transcendental meditation. “TM changed my life,” she says. “I studied it five years ago in India during my wedding [to Brand], and it was an incredible thing that I received from that time. Some people get very nervous about the spiritual connotations of things, but TM is very medical and scientific. This [she prods at her mobile] is the new form of sugar. It’s the new dopamine, the new stimulant, and everybody has 20 minutes once a day to turn it off and meditate. When I do it, I can feel the cobwebs lifting and can feel this halo. I think that TM is a beautiful way to find real stillness. You should do it.”

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2017/jun/11/katy-perry-interview-witness-album-glastonbury