Translated from La Repubblica, Rome, Italy, March 10, 2005

Anti-Stress Mind Training

When we hear about the word "mantra", we usually refer to mystical or magical concepts. Actually, the term derives from the sanskrit “mananat trayate”, that simply means “mind training”. One method of meditation from the Indian tradition consists of the mental repetition of one particular syllable (or mantra) in order to reach various stages of relaxation and internalization up to bliss. How is it possible? The results of scientific researches on meditation demonstrate that the mind can act directly on the physiology and that stress can be eliminated from the nervous system, either through the body with Hatha yoga, and through the mind, with meditation. “The nervous system and the brain continuosly produce electrical signals and are crossed by them ”, professor Fabrizio Coppola says, researcher of physics and astrophysics and author of the book “The secret of the universe” (L'Età dell'Acquario). “Brain waves beta, alpha, theta, delta, as shown by EEG analysis, are electric oscillations at low voltage and frequency, up to around 30 Hertz. It's obvious that any thought, involuntary or voluntary, consists, from a physical standpoint, of electrical impulses - a set of vibrations and waves of electrical nature, that can modify the EEG activity and, consequently, can produce effects on the physiology -. Moreover, it is obvious that, by repeating a determined thought in a systematic way, even more remarkable consequences can be obtained on brain activity and on the nervous system”.

Coppola explains: “In this view, stress and the tensions are comparable to a kind of disorder that is contained in the nervous system. In physics this would be called a background noise". He adds: “The mantra introduces specific oscillations in the nervous system, that are capable to massage it internally and re-model it."