Transcendental Meditation soothes addictive cravings: Musician Moby's experience
by Global Good News staff writer

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20 November 2012

At a conference on Stress, Meditation, Addictions, and Self-Recovery, Dr Norman Rosenthal endorsed Transcendental Meditation (TM) as a technique to soothe stress and calm addiction.

Dr Rosenthal, clinical professor of psychiatry at Georgetown University School of Medicine, formerly a researcher for over 20 years at the National Institute of Mental Health, and the author or coauthor of over 200 professional articles and five popular books, aimed to debunk the myth that the life of an addict is anything but repetitive and out of control.

He said that people sometimes view addicts as living glamorous and fascinating lives, but that this couldn't be further from the truth.

Addiction 'is just the repetitive feeding of the 'screaming amygdala' or the craving reward centres that can't be sated because they're being abnormally stimulated and now deprived of their substances [of abuse],' said Dr Rosenthal. He added that this cycle is not the way the brain is normally wired.

He quoted the popular electronic musician Moby, who said: 'My brain would get to a level of agitation, and one thing that was incredibly effective at diminishing the agitation was alcohol. For me, TM is an effective tool at diminishing agitation. And because it was the agitation that often led me to drink, its lack—the lack of restlessness—makes me disinclined to do so.'

American radio personality Howard Stern also experienced a change in behaviour after learning Transcendental Meditation.

'Though he had no intention of quitting smoking,' Dr Rosenthal said, 'within one month of learning Transcendental Meditation he had spontaneously ended a three-and-a-half-pack-a-day habit. The cigarettes had started to irritate him.'

Shortly after quitting, Mr Stern broke an ankle playing basketball and wondered if he would go back to smoking again.

'He didn't,' said Dr Rosenthal. 'He didn't want to smoke again.'

This is unusual, he added, because smoking 'is a very diabolical and difficult habit to break'.

See previous articles in this series:
∙ 'Transcendence treated the hole in my soul,' former longtime addict says
∙ Transcendental Meditation 'surge protector' against flood of stress hormones, helps reduce mortality, addictions
∙ Training the nervous system not to overreact: Transcendental Meditation powerful tool in addiction recovery
∙ Conference on addictions highlights 'demonstrable health benefits of Transcendental Meditation'
∙ Transcendental Meditation increases brain coherence, quiets 'alarm bells' - helps reduce addiction
∙ Expert on Transcendence describes three different kinds of meditation
∙ Meditation long used to treat addictions: Dr Norman Rosenthal
∙ Dr Norman Rosenthal addresses conference on stress, addiction, and Transcendental Meditation
∙ Using Transcendental Meditation in addiction recovery: Dr Norman Rosenthal

Copyright © 2013 Global Good News Service



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