Showing results for "Wellness" in Atheism

For thousands of years, religion has woven its way through societies and people as if it were part and parcel to that society or person. In large measure it was left unexplained and unchallenged, it simply existed. Those who attempted to challenge and expose religion were often persecuted, excommunicated, shunned, or even executed. It could be fatal to explain that which the church, priest, or imam said was unexplainable. Before the germ, viral, and parasite theory of disease, physicians had no tools to understand disease and its propagation.

Religion was once the primary way to understand human behavior. This was certainly true when the book Alcoholics Anonymous was written in 1939. But, we have learned much over the past 80 years. Common Sense Recovery began as the journal of a long-standing member of AA, during a time in his life when he was struggling to reconcile the religious language of Alcoholics Anonymous with his new-found atheism and scientific understanding of addiction and the recovery process.

Neuroscience finds that spontaneous acts of mindfulness decrease stress, depression and anxiety, increasing overall well-being. But studies also show that purposeful mindfulness techniques, such as vipassana or mindfulness meditation, are even more powerful. Mindfulness meditation re-wires the brain in a way that decreases physical pain and psychological suffering.

Atheist Meditation Atheist Spirituality is a guide and memoir that shows how spirituality and meditation can be practiced without faith in God(s), gurus, or the supernatural. Techniques such as mindfulness and vipassana meditation have been practiced for thousands of years; are corroborated by reason, psychology, and neuroscience; and help develop a sense of compassion, charity, and the pursuit of meaning and knowledge.