Mental Silence

Prior to 2006, the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine defined meditation as “a conscious mental process that induces a set of integrated physiological changes termed the relaxation response”. The NCCAM reviewed its definition of meditation to include a new central feature: “In meditation, a person learns to focus his attention and suspend the stream of thoughts that normally occupy the mind”. This definition is more in line with the traditional eastern understanding of meditation as inner silence.Some recent studies have used this definition of meditation to compare the experience of mental silence with simple relaxation and found some significant physiological differences between the two.