Mindfulness promotes health and wellbeing- a review

Abstract

Health and wellbeing are necessary elements to increase and maintain person’s productivity and satisfaction with life. Wellbeing is not just an absence of illness. It contains different factors of an individual’s physical, psychological and social health. Pollard and Davidson (2001) define wellbeing as “a state of successful performance across the life course integrating physical, cognitive and social emotional function” and health is defined by the WHO (1978): “Health is the state of complete physical, mental, social and spiritual well- being, and not merely an absence of disease or infirmity”. Practicing mindfulness serves the best way of dealing with stress, low mood, depression, anxiety that can sometimes disturb our health, performance, and quality of life. Mindfulness is just about paying attention to what’s happening here and now with a non-judgemental attitude. Jon Kobat Zinn (1979) defines mindfulness as paying attention in the present momentand nonjudgmentally. Mindfulness helps interrupt habits of getting lost in thoughts, about the future or past, which creates stress and disturbs everyday life. Research evidence shows that mindfulness can be an effective tool in the dealing many mental and physical health issues, as well as generally improving our performance, relationships, and well-being. Mindfulness training has tremendous power in improving our health.  The present research is an attempt to review different studies related to mindfulness and its impact on health and wellbeing. Review revealed that mindfulness meditation offers powerful health and wellbeing benefits.