Effect of Heartfulness cleaning and meditation on heart rate variability

BACKGROUND: Meditation has been a key component of eastern spiritual practices. Heartfulness meditation is a unique heart based system with key practices like cleaning and meditation aided by yogic transmission. OBJECTIVE: To study the effects of Heartfulness cleaning and meditation (guided by Heartfulness trainer) on heart rate variability (HRV), blood pressure (BP) and heart rate (HR). METHODS: A total of 30 participants (21 males, 9 females; age range 19–70 years, M = 45.1 years and SD = 12.7 years) participated in the study. HRV, BP and HR were studied before, during and after the three stages of rest, cleaning and meditation. RESULTS: There was significant effect of cleaning and meditation on normalized unit of power in low-frequency band (LFnu) for the three conditions [F (2, 87) = 9.98, p < 0.01] with mean values for baseline being 70.82 ± 14.55, cleaning being 55.62 ± 15.06 and meditation being 55.17 ± 16.63. There was also a significant effect of cleaning and meditation on normalized unit of power in high-frequency band (HFnu) [F (2, 87) = 7.31, p < 0.01] with mean values for baseline being 30.86 ± 16.51, cleaning being 44.37 ± 15.06 and meditation being 44.83 ± 16.63. Significant effect of cleaning and meditation was also seen for LF/HF [F (2, 87) = 4.98, p < 0.01] with mean values for baseline being 3.45 ± 3.40, cleaning being 1.63 ± 1.30 and meditation being 1.82 ± 2.19. CONCLUSION: Heartfulness cleaning and meditation had a positive effect on sympathovagal balance.