The Role of Proprioception in The Meditation Practice

One of the most important aspect of mind-body interventions as Yoga practices and mindfulness-based programs, consists of focusing the attention on body position and movement. This may suggest that consciously detecting proprioceptive signals arising from the body could be necessary for obtaining the benefits of meditation practices on physical and psychic health. Recent studies show that the high frequency vibration of a single group of muscles powerfully activating muscle proprioceptors, mainly the neuromuscular spindles, increases the motor and sensory abilities and enhances the capability of learning new motor task in both healthy subjects and patients. These effects could be useful in training and recovering from motor deficit since they persist for several days, likely because the strong activation of neuromuscular spindles may lead to synaptic remodeling in the sensory-motor circuits. We hypothesize that the high intense proprioceptive activation and the consequent consolidated sensorymotor effects may contribute to a higher body awareness in the meditative practices and lead to a more general improvement of cognitive functions, emotional balance and self-awareness.

Keywords: Muscle proprioception; Yoga; Mindfulness; Focal vibration; Neuromuscular spindle

Abbreviation: FV- focal vibration; LTP- long term potentiation; LTD- long term depression