Surgeons Who Play Video Games May Be Better at Surgery

Meditation Sessions Catch on With People of Various Faiths and Backgrounds in Maine

By JOHN RICHARDSON Staff Writer

Paul Nakroshis taps three times on a bowl-shaped chime called a "rin gong," filling the small room with a pure ringing tone.

Then, except for the sound of traffic passing by outside, the room falls silent as Nakroshis sits, straight and still as a statue, and opens his mind.

An empty room in the middle of the University of Southern Maine campus, at lunch hour, may seem a difficult place to practice Buddhist meditation. But, as a growing number of Mainers are discovering, temples and remote monasteries are not necessary.

"Every part of our life is practice," said Nakroshis.

Nakroshis organizes a small zazenkai, a zen Buddhist retreat, that gathers twice a week in a room provided by the Interfaith Chaplain's Office. A handful of faculty and staff, and sometimes students, sit and meditate together.

There are similar informal sitting groups around the state. While meditation is silent and individual, the gatherings are a way to give each other support and discipline. And, after sitting, the groups also typically read and discuss parts of the Dharma, the Buddhist teachings.

Dr Thorsten Barnhofer attaches sensors to Dr Catherine Crane's head to monitor brain activity

Patients suffering from depression are being invited to chill out like Buddhist monks to prevent them from committing suicide.

Psychologists at Oxford University have started meditation and yoga classes for people in severely low moods, to see if it can help lift their emotions and stop their condition progressing to a point of self-harm.

The ancient relaxation techniques, similar to those used by Buddhist monks for hundreds of years, have already proved helpful at stopping patients prone to clinical depression from having relapses. Now researchers at the university's department of psychiatry, led by Prof Mark Williams and Dr Thorsten Barnhofer, want to find out whether the therapies are successful among people already feeling down.