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Meditation offers practitioners powerful benefits, yet many people are confused as to what exactly those benefits are. In a nutshell, meditation focuses attention in a deliberate manner, taking you from a state of noisy mental chatter to calm and quiet inner peace. And isn’t that something most of us could use?
There are so many reasons why people experience stress and anxiety. It could be due to health problems, work problems, finances, or relationship challenges. It can be from one situation in your life or a mix of many. While the variables are different from one person to the next, the thing that is the same for everyone is that stress and anxiety are not going to just go away. We will all continue to face situations and challenges that cause us to worry. However, yoga can help you learn how to reduce those feelings of stress and find serenity in your life, even in the midst of difficult times.
Colleges around the country are experiencing an increasing problem with the mental health of their students. The number of students seeking counseling while in college has increased over the years. In fact, a study by The American College Health Association found that the majority of students had experienced “overwhelming anxiety”. The study also showed that 40 percent of college students admitted they had experienced such high levels of anxiety in the prior year that it was difficult to function. Those are alarming statistics. It’s important to pinpoint where this increase in mental health challenges is coming from. While there are several different reasons one of them is the struggle with perfectionism.
College students are vulnerable to a wide variety of mental health challenges, and there is no one inoculation against any of these possible experiences. Clinical conditions such as depression, anxiety, insomnia, and even panic are common experiences for college students due to the many new stressors and pressures that come with the new academic and relational college experiences. Less serious levels of stress and anxiety can still cause students distress and functional difficulties in sleep, time management, school performance, social interactions, and decision-making. Additionally, the new freedom that the college experience brings for many students also comes with some negative decisional consequences and tough learning experiences.
The transition to college is an exciting time for students and families. Whether going directly from a senior year in high school or from a “gap” year, students are looking forward with intense anticipation to all of the mysteries and wonders of college life as they’ve come to understand it: meeting new people, a profoundly new degree of independence, exciting new surroundings, studies that may one day connect to a career, and a symbolic point of entry into their adult lives. The rites of passage associated with a senior year of high school in particular lend significant buildup to the college transition.
