Much of the research around meditation and mindfulness has serious flaws
As somebody with clinical anxiety, I have been prescribed CBT and Mindfulness on the NHS, I think this piece misses several key points.<p>For one thing, NICE (the UK NGO responsible for analysing evidence and making recommendations on the efficacy of treatments and their cost effectiveness) and an all-party Parliamentary group found signifcant evidence to recommend Mindfulness as a treatment for anxiety and mild depression along with traditional cognitive-behavioural therapy and SSRIs.<p>Secondly, mindfulness feels, to me, closely related to CBT, a tried and true therapy. It appears to be very closely related to CBT in what it helps to control: intrusive thoughts. The increased focus on meditation is why it&#x27;s more effective for anxiety and mild depression.<p>It&#x27;s most certainly NOT recommended for serious cases of clinical depression. As often, selected application of evidence and over-generalisation is the problem here.<p>Mindfulness can help with a range of relatively-minor mental health issues, and it can also help prevent relapses in those that have recovered. For those of us who have been helped that&#x27;s really not something to diminish.<p>It&#x27;s not that there&#x27;s no evidence for its effectiveness at all. There is.<p>(Disclosure: Mindfulness helped my anxiety a lot. I believe it to be more than placebo, but then I would, wouldn&#x27;t I?)