It’s a surprise outcry for a very popular practice: mindfulness meditation. In a letter written on January 18 for the attention of the Minister of National Education, about fifteen associations – including the Human Rights League – and teachers’ unions, the parents’ federation ( FCPE) and the association for the fight against sectarian aberrations Unadfi expressed concern about its experimentation in schools. Since 2015, 23,000 children have participated in programs integrating it, according to the association for meditation in education (AME), and that personalities like Gaël le Bohec, LREM deputy for Ille-et-Vilaine, are campaigning for its generalization.
On the side of his defenders, they praise the benefits of calm and attention that his regular practice would bring. On the other hand, we are alarmed by possible spiritual and religious deviations, or even medical contraindications. But this concern is not limited to children. Applications, coach, youtube videos… If mindfulness meditation is all the rage outside the school setting, the fact remains that it must be practiced correctly. Because in adults too, it may be questionable.
Trend in large groups
A priori, nothing in the discipline seems to be able to do harm. In a very schematic way, mindfulness meditation consists above all of focusing your attention on a part of your body, or on your breathing, and concentrating on your sensations. In a word, to be present. Despite its Buddhist roots, practitioners of this discipline claim today that it is entirely secular. And for good reason: mindfulness meditation appeared in the United States more than thirty-five years ago. A professor of medicine emeritus at the University of Massachusetts, doctor of molecular biology, Jon Kabat-Zinn, is the origin of the concept and its corollaries, the MBSR (mindfulness-based stress reduction) and MBCT (mindfulness therapy) program. cognitive based on mindfulness). The latter was first used with the aim of reducing the stress of staff and patients in hospitals, before expanding to many other sectors.
In recent years, mindfulness meditation has become widely democratized. Large companies, like the maif or the group Casino, offer it to their employees. Applications on the subject of are also multiplied, from the American Headspace to the French Petit BamBou. On the Amazon site, more than 2000 references are offered when you type “mindfulness meditation”. And the antennas of Radio France are not left out, they which offer, through the intermediary of the house psychiatrist Christophe André, several small modules to practice it. The practice has even interfered at the highest level of the State: in June 2019, Jérôme Salomon, Director General of Health, led a conference on mindfulness meditation in the premises of the Ministry of Health, as reported at the time the chained duck.
diligent practice
The subject of multiple scientific studies, meditation appears to be, for the general public as well as for caregivers, a good way to manage stress and suffering. “MBSR-type programs are a support, which should allow everyone to have a better emotional lifestyle, says Yann Mikaeloff, University Professor-Hospital Practitioner and Neuropediatrician at the Paris-Saclay Faculty of Medicine. tool that should help to make decisions based on choices and not on the outburst of emotions.” Anxious to break away from the New Age image attached to meditative practice, the specialists of the MBSR method insist on its scientific foundations and its links with neurosciences.
In Lyon, for example, a team of researchers led by Antoine Lutz, Inserm research director at the Lyon Neuroscience Research Center and head of the ERC Brain and Mindfulness research project, is observing the consequences of a very diligent practice of meditation. “Thanks to imaging work on the brains of Buddhist monks like Matthieu Ricard, we have been able to demonstrate that intensive meditation exercises can support attention and improve brain alertness,” he reported in an interview. granted to the site from the University of Lyon.
Negative effect
The practice, however, is not only beneficial. However, it took time to realize this: until 2015, the majority of studies on the practice of meditation did not study its adverse effects, according to a report drawn up in 2018 by around fifteen researchers in the review Perspective on Psychological Science. To inventory these adverse effects, a team of researchers from the University of Coventry, in the United Kingdom, examined more than 80 studies related to the practice of meditation, some of which listed at least one adverse effect.
Published in September 2020, these indicated that 8% of the 6,700 people who took up meditation experienced an adverse negative effect. “In more recent studies, we generally oscillate between 5 and 10%”, specifies Dr. Miguel Farias, who led the one carried out at the University of Coventry. In general, meditation is therefore not recommended for individuals in the midst of a depressive episode, or suffering from psychotic disorders. “This tool may be useful in the stressed general population, but may be counterproductive for patients with a ‘disorganized’ mind”, points out Pierre-Michel Llorca, professor of psychiatry at Clermont-Auvergne University and head of the psychiatry department B at Clermont-Ferrand University Hospital. This technique can be complicated for patients who have difficulty understanding their sensations.
An unsupervised practice
But these problems with meditation don’t just show up in patients with mental illnesses. “We usually find an increase in anxiety in people affected by the practice, even if they did not necessarily have a problem before starting it,” warns Dr. Miguel Farias. Meditation, for example, can sometimes bring great trauma to the surface, without the person necessarily having them in mind before indulging in it. “This is why, in the MBSR and MBCT program, we supervise this practice, defends Yann Mikaeloff. We take care to carry out an individual interview with each person who wants to register. This questionnaire allows us to know what their expectations are, and allows us to find possible contraindications.” In this case, people are invited to come back later, explains the doctor.
A precaution that all meditation coaches, or even mindfulness apps, are far from taking. “I have very little confidence in the ability of these companies to assess the potential harm they can do to certain people,” worries Miguel Farias. “We are not talking about caregivers, but about coaches, or even software. This practice is actually only poorly supervised, and can cause real problems, worries Professor Bruno Falissard, child psychiatrist and professor of public health at the Paris-Sud Faculty of Medicine. Nothing can do good all the time, to everyone.” In order to avoid any negative effects, specialists therefore recommend that you obtain information before practicing meditation.
Front door
But it can be difficult to navigate the jungle of meditation coaches. Especially since to the potential side effects can be added the risk of sectarian aberrations. Serge Blisko, former president of Miviludes, regularly warned of the possibility of mental control in the event of practice supervised by people armed with bad intentions.
“The number of reports concerning the field of health, well-being and personal development has increased very sharply in recent years. The practice of mindfulness meditation therefore constitutes an interesting angle of attack for sectarian entrepreneurs. since it arouses a lot of interest. We received nearly twenty reports, between 2018 and 2020″, analyzes the prefect Christian Gravel, president of Miviludes, who adds: “All practices aimed at a large public can be to prove to be gateways for movements of a sectarian nature”. To avoid them, only one solution: get informed… Even if the practice may seem innocuous.