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The Relaxation Response Kindle Edition
In this time of quarantine and global uncertainty, it can be difficult to deal with the increased stress and anxiety. Using ancient self-care techniques rediscovered by Herbert Benson, M.D., a pioneer in mind/body medicine for health and wellness, you can relieve your stress, anxiety, and depression at home with just ten minutes a day.
Herbert Benson, M.D., first wrote about a simple, effective mind/body approach to lowering blood pressure in The Relaxation Response. When Dr. Benson introduced this approach to relieving stress over forty years ago, his book became an instant national bestseller, which has sold over six million copies. Since that time, millions of people have learned the secret—without high-priced lectures or prescription medicines. The Relaxation Response has become the classic reference recommended by most health care professionals and authorities to treat the harmful effects of stress, anxiety, depression, and high blood pressure.
Rediscovered by Dr. Benson and his colleagues in the laboratories of Harvard Medical School and its teaching hospitals, this revitalizing, therapeutic tack is now routinely recommended to treat patients suffering from stress and anxiety, including heart conditions, high blood pressure, chronic pain, insomnia, and many other physical and psychological ailments. It requires only minutes to learn, and just ten minutes of practice a day.
- LanguageEnglish
- PublisherHarperCollins e-books
- Publication dateSeptember 10, 2009
- File size1025 KB
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Review
“This is the book that started it all, demystifying meditation and ushering it into the mainstream. Dr. Benson offers a simple technique for quieting the mind--and we need it now more than ever.” — Amy Bernstein, editor of the Harvard Business Review
From the Back Cover
When Dr. Herbert Benson introduced this simple, effective, mind/body approach to relieving stress twenty-five years ag, his book became an instant national bestseller. Since that time, millions of people have learned the secret--without high-priced lectures or prescription medicines. The Relaxation Response has become the classic reference recommended by most health care professionals and authorities to treat the harmful effects of stress.
Discovered by Dr. Benson and his colleagues in the laboratories of Harvard Medical School and its teaching hospitals, this revitalizing, therapeutic approach is now routinely recommended to treat patients suffering from heart conditions, high blood pressure, chronic pain, insomnia, and many other physical ailments. It requires only minutes to learn, and just ten to twenty minutes of practice twice a day.
About the Author
Herbert Benson, M.D., was the Director Emeritus of the Benson-Henry Institute for Mind Body Medicine at Massachusetts General Hospital (BHI), and Mind Body Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School. A graduate of Wesleyan University and the Harvard Medical School, Dr. Benson authored and co-authored more than 190 scientific publications and 12 books. More than five million copies of his books have been printed in many languages.
Dr. Benson was a pioneer in mind body medicine, one of the first Western physicians to bring spirituality and healing into medicine. In his 40+ year career, he defined the relaxation response and led teaching and research into its efficacy in counteracting the harmful effects of stress. The recipient of numerous national and international awards, Dr. Benson lectured widely about mind body medicine and the BHI's work. Dr. Benson's research extended from the laboratory to the clinic to Asian field expeditions. His work served as a bridge between medicine and religion, East and West, mind and body, and belief and science.
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
An astute physician is lamenting the times:
"But the present world is a different one. Grief, calamity, and evil cause inner bitterness ... there is disobedience and rebellion ... Evil influences strike from early morning until late at night ... they injure the mind and reduce its intelligence and they also injure the muscles and the flesh."
This chronicler lived 4,600 years ago in China, even though his observations appear contemporary. Human beings have always felt subjected to stress and often seem to look longingly backward to more peaceful times. Yet with each generation, complexity and additional stress are added to our lives. The truth is that most of the persistent problems of this planet are even further from solution than when the Chinese doctor decried them. The technology of the past forty-six centuries, and especially that of the last century which was supposed to make life easier for people, often seems to intensify the stress in our day-to-day existence.
Victims of StressWhat psychological price do we pay in attempting to adjust to the knowledge that war or its imminence is with us every day? Are we proud that our scientific know-how has increased the sophistication of weapons since that time when a shepherd named David could defeat an entire army with a rock thrown from a sling? Or do we knowingly or subconsciously despair of the current nuclear weaponry that could exterminate every human being, indeed almost all life?
Most of us find that we are helpless in solving the big problems. We have some vague hope that the leaders we elect (and the experts they in turn rely on) can find the solutions. But our concern usually involves everyday difficulties. Our frustrations come about because we generally can't even solve the less earthshaking problems, such as being on time to work in a large, congested city. Indeed, the everyday demands of living make it more and more difficult to escape the increasingly adverse psychological effects that seem built into our existence. Whatever it may be-the daily commute, or the rising cost of living, or the noise and fumes of the city, or unemployment, or random violence-we find it difficult to reach a satisfactory equilibrium, and as a result we become the victims of stress.
Our rapidly changing world has necessitated many other adjustments. For example, before the women's-liberation movement had filtered so far and deep, people were married under a set of unspoken agreements that society now questions and sometimes shatters. Today, women must reexamine their own roles and life-styles against conflicting expectations and suppositions. For the older woman, the problems of reeducation and readjustment can be overwhelming. Men must also adjust to a new role that may mean more responsibility for family and household. They are being forced to view women in a new way, one that may be threatening to their accustomed role. Concurrent with and related to the movement is the change of the family structure. Mobility separates families into small nuclear units. Women raise children outside of marriage. Divorced fathers assume custody of children. All share in the impact of societal changes.
How are these anxieties and stresses affecting us? The presence of mental stress as a part of modem living has been the subject of a number of books, most of which concentrate on the psychology of stress. We will consider stress from a somewhat different perspective, for our concern is not only the psychology but also the physiology of stress. We will explore what happens to you internally under stressful situations and how stress physically undermines your health. This will be done by examining the relation between your emotional reactions and what they may cost you in hypertension, heart attacks, strokes, and other diseases. We will then point out what you can do about the effects of stress. We will show how, by your personal adoption of a simple psychological technique, you can improve your physical and mental well-being.The Hidden Epidemic
We are in the midst of an epidemic, one that is all too prevalent in the United States and other industrial nations. The name of this epidemic is hypertension, the medical term for high blood pressure. Hypertension predisposes one to the diseases of atherosclerosis (hardening of the arteries), heart attacks, and strokes. These diseases of the heart and brain account for more than 50 percent of the deaths each year in the United States. Therefore, it is not surprising that various degrees of hypertension are present in 15 to 33 percent of the adult population. Although this epidemic is not infectious in nature, it may be even more insidious, simply because its manifestations do not affect large numbers at the same time and because we are not generally aware that the disease is slowly developing within us. Throughout its course there are few, if any, symptoms. Yet each day we see it strike without warning, cutting short by decades the lives of our friends and loved ones. According to carefully compiled Government vital statistics, the diseases resulting from this epidemic account for an average of two deaths every minute in the United States alone. Put another way, that is nearly one million out of two million deaths a year. Translate this statistic into your own personal experience-the loss of a friend who leaves young children, the premature death of a father about to enjoy his retirement years. You are a fortunate Individual if you have not personally experienced the ravages of this epidemic.
High blood pressure, heart attacks, and strokes have markedly increased, not only afflicting a growing percentage of the population but steadily finding their way into younger age groups. The late Dr. Samuel A. Levine, an eminent American cardiologist, pointed out in 1963 that in families he had treated for many years, sons suffered...
Product details
- ASIN : B002OMZTTO
- Publisher : HarperCollins e-books; Updated & Expanded ed. edition (September 10, 2009)
- Publication date : September 10, 2009
- Language : English
- File size : 1025 KB
- Text-to-Speech : Enabled
- Screen Reader : Supported
- Enhanced typesetting : Enabled
- X-Ray : Enabled
- Word Wise : Enabled
- Sticky notes : On Kindle Scribe
- Print length : 243 pages
- Best Sellers Rank: #207,841 in Kindle Store (See Top 100 in Kindle Store)
- #55 in High Blood Pressure
- #126 in Alternative Medicine Healing
- #200 in Stress Management (Kindle Store)
- Customer Reviews:
About the authors
Discover more of the author’s books, see similar authors, read author blogs and more
Herbert Benson, M.D., is the Director Emeritus of the Benson-Henry Institute for Mind Body Medicine at Massachusetts General Hospital (BHI), and Mind Body Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School. A graduate of Wesleyan University and the Harvard Medical School, Dr. Benson is the author or co-author of more than 190 scientific publications and 12 books. More than five million copies of his books have been printed in many languages.
Dr. Benson is a pioneer in mind body medicine, one of the first Western physicians to bring spirituality and healing into medicine. In his 40+ year career, he has defined the relaxation response and continues to lead teaching and research into its efficacy in counteracting the harmful effects of stress. The recipient of numerous national and international awards, Dr. Benson lectures widely about mind body medicine and the BHI's work. His expertise is frequently sought by national and international news media, and he appears in scores of newspapers, magazines, and television programs each year. Dr. Benson's research extends from the laboratory to the clinic to Asian field expeditions. His work serves as a bridge between medicine and religion, East and West, mind and body, and belief and science.
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I rediscovered the book from a completely different angle recently while exploring Zen meditation resources. It came up with a number of other books while searching here on Amazon. It was so well rated, that I bought another copy and was reintroduced to the concepts as a much different person 40-years older!
The concepts still ring true and work great. If you'd like to explore a Western take on an Eastern philosophy--take a look at The Relaxation Response.
Before we get into it, you should be aware that the entire Relaxation Response method is available online, for free. Benson himself explains it, step by step, in multiple YouTube videos and online articles; the book doesn't offer any "secret techniques" or addons to the relaxation response. It seems to me that the author wants the world to know about the Relaxation Response, with how easily available the technique is.
The ease and accessiblity of the Relaxation Response, which consits of entering a "neutral" state of mind and silently repeating a word or phrase for fifteen or twenty minutes, is a double-edged sword. The method is described twice, in the intro and in a later chapter, and even the longform explanation takes about five pages. The rest of the book is a breakdown of stress, a discussion of how the Relaxation Response was studied, and a comparison of world religions and how they all, in one way or another, use the Relaxation Response. Even with all the padding, the book is barely 200 pages. In other words -- the method is great, but the book itself isn't very important.
One wishes there were more books like The Relaxation Response. It's refreshing to read a "self-help" book that gives you an easy, actionable method, and does it without any mysticism or jargon. The book is realistic, and doesn't try to sell you a pie-in-the-sky. The book itself, however, doesn't feel necessary in the 2020s, considering the Relaxation Response method is available online, for free. If you've already learned the Relaxation Response, the book doesn't give you anything new.