Meditation and mindfulness drastically lengthen your life

[FryingMan]

…and I don't mean in the dates on the epitaph (although living with drastically reduced stress probably does in fact extend life in calendar years). I mean, why does time pass so sloooowly as a child, and zip by in the blink of an eye as an adult? I believe it's all due to *paying attention*. As a child, we haven't learned to tune out life, people, and the world, but as an adult we gradually over the years install more and more filters and focus on fewer and fewer things. Like in the Adam Sandler movie "Click" where he eventually fast forwards over his entire life, and he learns a powerful lesson about the beauty and preciousness of appreciating each and every "now." That's the wonderful thing about mindfulness and meditation, learning to focus on each "now" and experiencing it fully. Also, that's the beauty of dream recall, so many funny/interesting/bizarre/ moments we live through every single night, and most people just forget it all, what a tragedy!

[mimihigurashi]

I must say, that's very true. I noticed that during days when I remained mindful the majority of the time, those days felt really long. In the evening, I could not believe only a day had passed, it felt like a few, due to being present. Life does fly by most people, because somewhat ironically, they're too lost in it to notice it.

[JustASimpleGuy]

Also, that's the beauty of dream recall, so many funny/interesting/bizarre/ moments we live through every single night, and most people just forget it all, what a tragedy! Hahah, yes! I went fishing last night on a lake in the Adirondacks on a warm and sunny summer day. Caught a large mouth bass too!

[kaylen]

As adults we live very habitually,in thought and action,this makes time go by fast,the more new things we think and do the longer and slower our lives seem. Also the more we break up our routines the more we remember,which also makes life seem longer,someone who does and thinks the same thing every day will have hardly any memories which makes that persons life very short no matter the age,,,

[JustASimpleGuy]

I think it's also how much of the Now we perceive and are aware of, as opposed to being caught up in thoughts and emotions of things that have passed and things yet to come, and of how things should or shouldn't be as opposed to how things just are. Awareness is a somewhat limited capacity, and the less one trains awareness the less capacity one is capable of utilizing. So having awareness swimming around in places other than the Now certainly detracts from the rich experience life has to offer.

[StephL]

I was looking forward to statistics which show that meditation actually prolongs the epitaph lifespan - pretty sure it can do that. But great topic you bring here instead, FM - I need to get it up again.

[JustASimpleGuy]

I was looking forward to statistics which show that meditation actually prolongs the epitaph lifespan - pretty sure it can do that. But great topic you bring here instead, FM - I need to get it up again. I don't have statistics and I'm not sure there's been a proper long-term scientific study to prove it. But if one considers the negative health effects of stress (look up epigenetics) combined with the ability of meditation to greatly reduce negative affective reaction to stress, one can reasonable draw a conclusion meditation can prolong one's life.

[TravisE]

I never thought of it that way. I've always simply assumed that for some reason we just perceive longer spans of time relative to the length of our current lifetime, so that a year, for instance, feels shorter as we've lived more year-long units. Or something like that. I should continue practicing this stuff, since this time-constantly-speeding-up thing gets a bit scary sometimes! Also, that's the beauty of dream recall, so many funny/interesting/bizarre/ moments we live through every single night, and most people just forget it all, what a tragedy! Indeed. Dreams are sort of like a TV where there's always something good on every channel, without the commercial crap. HD? Hah, get with the times, we're talking better-than-VR here. All for free while you're getting rested!

[Zoth]

I was looking forward to statistics which show that meditation actually prolongs the epitaph lifespan - pretty sure it can do that. But great topic you bring here instead, FM - I need to get it up again. I believe such claims come mostly from this study, related to the maintenance of telomere length. Still, it's like you said: judging from the effects of stress on our overall health, a practice like meditation/mindfulness, which has such big impact on areas of the brain like the amygdala (shown to have reduced grey matter in the brains of expert meditators) or even in the levels of cortisol, it's pretty much a given that it would have this sort of positive impact on the long-term ^^