Lee Josie R, Canby Nicholas K, Cooper David J, Lindahl Jared R, Britton Willoughby B
Department of Psychiatry and Human Behavior, Warren Alpert Medical School, Brown University, Providence, RI, United States.
Department of Religious Studies, Brown University, Providence, RI, United States.
Front Nutr. 2025 Oct 23;12:1651167. doi: 10.3389/fnut.2025.1651167. eCollection 2025.
Recent research has documented a range of challenging, distressing, or impairing experiences that can result from Buddhist meditation practices (Lindahl et al.). The present study investigates the impact of dietary changes on the trajectories of Western Buddhist meditators who reported meditation-related challenges.
Interviews were conducted with 68 Western Buddhist meditators and 33 meditation experts (teachers and clinicians).
Thematic analysis resulted in the following observations: (1) dietary restrictions could be a risk factor for the development of meditation-related challenges; (2) a loss of appetite or lack of eating was often an exacerbating factor and diagnostic indicator of more severe distress when meditation-related challenges were already occurring; and (3) diet-related remedies, such as eating "heavy" foods and meat, were often described as helpful and associated with "grounding" effects for meditators-in-distress.
This study highlights the importance of considering diet-related factors as both risk factors and remedies for meditation-related challenges and suggests possible implications for research and practice.
近期研究记录了一系列可能因佛教冥想练习而产生的具有挑战性、令人痛苦或造成损害的经历（林达尔等人）。本研究调查饮食变化对报告有与冥想相关挑战的西方佛教冥想者轨迹的影响。
对68名西方佛教冥想者和33名冥想专家（教师和临床医生）进行了访谈。
主题分析得出以下观察结果：（1）饮食限制可能是与冥想相关挑战发展的一个风险因素；（2）食欲不振或饮食不足往往是一个加剧因素，也是当与冥想相关的挑战已经出现时更严重痛苦的诊断指标；（3）与饮食相关的补救措施，如食用“油腻”食物和肉类，通常被描述为有帮助的，并且与处于痛苦中的冥想者的“稳定情绪”效果相关。
本研究强调了将与饮食相关的因素既视为与冥想相关挑战的风险因素又视为补救措施的重要性，并提出了对研究和实践的可能影响。
