1A: Meditation with Celebrities (audio)

Avery Kleinman (the1A.org, WAMU, NPR, 1/1/21 rebroadcast), Guest Host Celeste Headlee, Host Jenn White; Ananda (Dharma Buddhist Meditation), Ashley Wells,  CC Liu (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly

Can’t find a beach? Maybe meditation is the way to peace? (Nicolas Asfouri/AFP via Getty)

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Breathe in, breathe out: Why more people are meditating

Can I meditate in my car in Los Angeles?

Does it seem like everyone has picked up a meditation practice lately?

Apps like Headspace, Ten Percent Happier, and Calm report a dramatic increase in users since the beginning of social distancing.

Headspace, for example, says their download rate has doubled since mid-March, and 14 times more users are completing one of the app’s stress-calming meditations.

CELEBRITIES, too, are praising meditation as a tool to fight the stress caused by the pandemic.

Pop star Lizzo and supermodel Gisele Bundchen are urging their followers on Instagram to join them in meditating. [Rapper Sean P. Diddy Combs, basketball players Metta World Peace and Kobe Bryant...]

1A with Host Jenn White (WAMU, NPR)

Researchers have been building scientific evidence on the benefits of meditation for decades. 

Meditation helps reduce chronic pain, improve attention and focus, alleviates depression, lower blood pressure, and reduces the stress of loneliness and social isolation.

These benefits have largely been studied through in-person meditation programs, not through apps or social media.

What do we know about how and why meditation helps us? And are those benefits useful during this pandemic scare? AUDIO

• NPR.org, Apple.com, Spotify.com

GUESTS

• Amishi Jha, associate professor of psychology, director of Contemplative Neuroscience, Mindfulness Research & Practice Initiative, University of Miami
• Jay Shetty, host of "On Purpose with Jay Shetty" podcast, former monk
• Vicki Kennedy-Overfelt, certified MBSR (mindfulness based stress reduction) instructor in Salt Lake City, Utah who has had coronavirus
• Megan Jones Bell, chief science officer of Headspace