Trying to quit alcohol? Here's good news for you. According to a latest study, just 11 minutes of mindfulness strategies, which includes a combination of meditation, body awareness and yoga may help you start reducing alcohol consumption. Lead author Sunjeev Kamboj, from University College, London said, "We found that a very brief, simple exercise in mindfulness can help drinkers cut back, and the benefits can be seen quite quickly,"
So what is mindfulness and how does it help? Mindfulness is a mental state achieved by focusing on one's awareness on the present and calmly acknowledging and accepting one's feelings, thoughts, and bodily sensations. Mindfulness teaches a heightened awareness of one's feelings and bodily sensations, so that they pay attention to cravings instead of suppressing them. Mindfulness is emerging to be one of the most popular therapeutic techniques.
In the course of the study and planned strategies, participants were able to tolerate the cravings to drink as temporary events without needing to act on them. "Practising mindfulness can make a person more aware of their tendency to respond reflexively to urges. By being more aware of their cravings, we think, the study participants were able to bring intention back into the equation, instead of automatically reaching for the drink when they feel a craving," Kamboj added.
In the study, after an 11-minute training session and reinforcement to continue practising mindfulness, heavy drinkers drank less over the next week than people who were taught relaxation techniques.
The findings revealed, that the group which practiced mindfulness drank 9.3 fewer units of alcohol (roughly equivalent to three pints of beer) in the following week compared to the week preceding the study, while there was no significant reduction in alcohol consumption among those who had learned relaxation techniques.
Researchers are hopeful that mindfulness could help to reduce drinking before more severe problems and recurrent drinking patterns develop. The study was published in the International Journal of Neuropsychopharmacology.
(Inputs from IANS)