When Joannie Parker developed breast cancer, her doctors eradicated the disease with surgery, chemotherapy and radiation. But the rigors of battling cancer left the 66-year-old Westwood woman feeling as many patients do: stressed out.
To deal with her anxiety, Parker enrolled in an eight-week meditation class at UCLA's Rhonda Fleming Mann Resource Center for Women with Cancer. During each 90-minute session, an instructor led the class through various meditative techniques, such as asking Parker and her classmates to imagine that they were sitting on a beach, with the ocean waves washing the cancer out of their bodies. Parker, who had never meditated before, believes the sessions were just as critical to her healing as the conventional medical treatment she received.
"I would walk out of those classes feeling deeply relaxed and enormously calm and whole and well," she said in a telephone interview. "It's not at all strange."
Personally, I was relieved to hear that last comment--about it not being strange. I've been something of a closet meditator for several years. To have this kind, intelligent stranger talk about the habit we share made it seem a little less, well, weird.
On most days, after breakfast, I sit quietly on a sofa for a few minutes and simply try to clear up the jumble of thoughts in my head. I might breathe deeply and concentrate on the sensation of my diaphragm moving up and down. Or I might pick a word to focus on, such as "peace" or "calm." Some mornings I slip on headphones and listen to that CD of the chanting monks that was a hit a few years ago.
I can't say why, but meditating acts like a desk organizer for my brain, clearing away much of the clutter. It also provides a boost of mental energy unlike anything I could get from a double espresso or a hit of ginkgo biloba.
I've never mentioned any of this to my golf buddies. But who knows, maybe they're doing it too. After all, about 10 million American adults--or one in eight--meditate regularly, according to statistics in the Journal of the American Medical Assn. That's nearly twice as many as a decade ago.
What's more, some very successful people have gone public with their embrace of this ancient practice. It's no surprise that actor and celebrity-Buddhist Richard Gere is on the list. But how about St. Louis Cardinal slugger Mark McGwire? There's also Monsanto Corp. Chief Executive Robert Shapiro, who meditates twice a day and has led meditation retreats for top executives of the giant chemical company.
