Melatonin – The Most Powerful Drug from Within By Kevin W Chen

A woman in her eighties was suffering from rectal cancer for years. Unfortunately, she was fighting what was believed to be a losing the battle. The cancer had reached an advanced stage and spread to her lungs and head. The doctors claimed that she did not have long to live. That was when the woman’s children interfered. They gave their mother tapes on meditation and relaxation, and the mother began to practice meditation while in the hospital. A couple of weeks later, x rays revealed that the cancer that spread to the lungs was no longer there and all that remained was a small lump of cancerous tissue within her rectum. Today her cancer is in remission.

For years researchers have been pent up in their labs sweating over test tubes and lab benches in search of the miracle drug that could produce the miraculous results experienced by that eighty-year- old woman. However, for thousands of years now Eastern cultures have had the answer that scientists today are losing so much sleep over. That answer is meditation. Meditation has been shown to slow the aging process, prevent heart disease, stroke, and cancer, as well as reverse cancer and heart disease in extreme cases. Despite these known facts, Western culture has not been able to fully accept meditation as an efficient treatment because the one factor that links the mental practice of meditation to the physiological effects that it produces remained a secret; until now that is. That factor is called melatonin.

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Melatonin is a neuro-hormone produced by a small gland at the base of the brain called the pineal gland. The main function of melatonin is to regulate the circadian cycle, which keeps humans asleep at night and awake during the day. The production of melatonin is normally stimulated by darkness and inhibited by sunlight therefore causing melatonin to be at its highest levels very early in the morning when darkness begins to fade.

Melatonin is also known to be the link in the communication between the pineal gland and the immune system. Melatonin receptors have been located in lymphoid glands, which are responsible for the immune response, as well as on immune cells themselves. The presence of melatonin stimulates the development and function of the immune system thereby making melatonin indirectly responsible for warding off disease. Most importantly, melatonin has been discovered to be a powerful antioxidant.

Antioxidants are a class of chemicals that work to counteract the effects of oxidation. Cellular respiration produces by-products that further react with tissues of the body in the process called oxidation. The by-products of oxidation, free radicals, can continue to react further with body tissues to produce harmful effects. Antioxidants, such as melatonin, work to stop the free radical chain reaction by neutralizing the free radicals. This in turn keeps the harmful effects of free radical damage at bay. Some of the effects of free radical damage are aging, cancer, Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease, stroke, and heart disease. Since melatonin prevents free radical damage, many have considered it the miracle drug with alarming effects especially with cancer and aging prevention. Like any other hormone within our bodies, melatonin exists in a balance such that if that balance is disrupted disease may occur. Since research in melatonin is fairly new, concrete cause and effect relationships between melatonin and certain diseases have not been determined; however, strong correlations between melatonin and certain diseases have been established.

Abnormally low melatonin levels have been speculated to lead to a number of different conditions. Depression, anxiety, night eating syndrome, and insomnia are some stipulations of low melatonin levels. Melatonin exhibits a strong effect on the reproductive system. Normally it fights to suppress the activity of the reproductive system; therefore, when melatonin occurs in low levels the reproductive system is hyperactive. This can lead to premenstrual syndrome, and breast and endometrial cancer in women. In men, this may lead to prostatitis, which is inflammation of the prostate. Abnormally high melatonin levels, on the other hand, do not have as many detrimental effects. As aforementioned, melatonin keeps the activity of the reproductive system in check. Too much melatonin, therefore suppresses reproductive activity. In males this lowers the sperm count. In females, this causes menstrual irregularities. Abnormally high levels of melatonin also seem to correlate with those who suffer from nocturnal asthma. A study was conducted on patients with nocturnal asthma. The melatonin levels of the asthma sufferers were significantly higher than normal patients.

Because the benefits of melatonin have been discovered there has suddenly been an increase in the use of melatonin supplements. Melatonin supplements have been theorized to produce those known advantageous effects of melatonin such as regulating the sleep cycle and cancer and aging prevention. In some cases this is true. Several studies have been conducted and proved that melatonin supplements are indeed useful for regulating sleep. Because of this some doctors suggest melatonin for syndromes such as jet-lag syndrome, delayed sleep phase syndrome, and insomnia in the blind, elderly, and night-shift workers. On the other hand, melatonin supplements have not been observed to produce the more serious effects of cancer and aging prevention. Some studies have even shown how exogenous melatonin, which is melatonin not produced from within i.e. supplements, may have some detrimental effects.

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In one experiment, some men were given melatonin supplements for a two-month period while the other half of the male subjects was given a placebo. The men that were given the melatonin were discovered to have much lower sperm counts than those men that were given the placebo. Other studies have shown that melatonin supplements can also cause menstrual irregularities, reduced libido, and anorexia. Because of these negative effects, melatonin supplements are not the answer to reaping the benefits that melatonin is known to produce.

Despite the disparaging news that melatonin supplements are not the way to reap the benefits of melatonin, there is still hope since melatonin is known to produce its advantageous effects when its levels are raised endogenously, meaning being produced naturally from one’s own pineal gland. Numerous studies have shown that one of the ways to raise endogenous melatonin levels is through meditation.

Meditation raises endogenous melatonin to safe, beneficial levels. At the University of Massachusetts Medical Center, Dr. Massion and colleagues conducted a study in order to observe the relationship between meditation and melatonin levels. The objective of the study was to test the hypothesis that meditation on a regular basis correlates with an increase of melatonin levels within the body. The melatonin levels of eight women who practiced meditation on a regular basis were detected from 12-hour overnight samples of urine, while the melatonin levels of eight women who did not meditate were also detected from 12-hour overnight samples of urine.

The results of the study were that those women who meditated regularly had consistently higher melatonin levels than those women who did not meditate on a regular basis. This led to the conclusion that meditation significantly increased endogenous melatonin levels. Another well-known study of meditation and melatonin was conducted in Australia by Dr. Tooley and colleagues. The purpose of the study was to determine whether meditation could influence plasma melatonin levels. The melatonin levels of experienced meditators were measured at night after a period of meditation.

The melatonin levels of those same meditators at the same time in the night but without a period of meditation were measured. The results of this study were as follows: on the nights of meditation, melatonin levels were significantly higher than the nights without meditation. These two studies are just a few of those conducted that all conclude that meditation indeed raises melatonin levels. Dr. Singh reported the results of his study of relationship between meditation and melatonin. Among the cancer patients who meditated regularly, melatonin level has been increased significantly, and some of them reported complete cancer remission. He also cited the laboratory studies that verified the anti-cancer characteristics of melatonin in mice.

Many scientists have not really accepted meditation as a method of disease prevention and treatment because the exact mechanism of how meditation actually raises melatonin is unknown. What is known, however, is that meditation does in fact raise melatonin levels allowing for a multitude of beneficial results. Increased endogenous melatonin levels prevent disease by activating the immune system, prevent cancer and aging through its antioxidant properties, and regulate the sleep cycle. Melatonin is that miracle drug that scientists are continuing to search for in their labs. So what are you waiting for? Meditate and release melatonin, the most powerful drug from within.

I would like to throw one more light in correspondence to the melatonin research. When humans started elevating to higher level in the meditation then the melatonin secretion increases which also checks the reproductive system as mentioned in the below research. This means if we can establish a society where spiritual practise can be done easily without any worry of the requirement of basic necessities then population problem of the world will automatically resolved. So this is how the spiritual practise plays a very important role in the definition of socio economic philosophy. No probs scientists, economists and researcher will learn their own lessons in the due course of time and mine or anyone else’s words are not going to make much difference.

There are so much of solutions for the society hidden in the philosophy but to understand that people will have to expand their knowledgebase and start doing the research rather than confining themselves just to a monotonous process.

Just to get the glimpse you can refer a very small book of FAQ “Few Problems Solved” by Shri P R Sarkar. So if someone has the appetite to learn the science beyond everything then they’ll have to put effort to do study and research. I can just give recommendation and it’s the choice of others whether they feel any value in the same.