Mindfulness Can Help Traverse Stress And Anxiety From Difficult Situations Including COVID-19
According to a study funded by the US National Institutes of Health (NIH) mindfulness meditation increases resilience to stress. This holds more importance in the current COVID-19 scenario. Mindfulness has the potential of becoming the way of life to help people achieve holistic health and wellness. This is what Petit Bambou, the leading freemium, non-religious, mindfulness app that helps people cultivate a healthy habit for their mental well-being, is out to achieve.
Times are unprecedented and the pandemic has altered things for every segment of the population around the globe including the younger children and elderly. The need of the hour is to step back and evaluate life, be kind to oneself, and ensure that the mind stays calm at all times.
Studies examining the effects of meditative therapies based on yogic principles on both stress and anxiety have demonstrated positive outcomes on anxiety. Mindfulness-based stress reduction technique is effective in the treatment of seasonal anxiety disorders, depression, and also brings about an improvement in distorted views of oneself.
Speaking about this, Benjamin Blasco, said, “Times have changed. COVID-19 has brought about a second pandemic with it --- that of mental health issues. Apart from this, the stress and strain of everyday life, uncertainty around work and careers, and the fact that children are unable to be with their peer group, have only made the situation worse. It is in these times that mindfulness and meditation can come as life savers. Not only can they calm down our minds but also ensure that we think rationally, about our future. Petit Bambou was founded to address these issues. Our India launch therefore comes at a very pertinent time and the message we aim to put forth is that ‘the time to undertake mindfulness is now’.”
Petit BamBou, created and developed in collaboration with certified experts and professionals specializing in mindfulness, meditation and psychology, has a catalogue of over 330 meditative and mindfulness exercises, organized in paths. There are mindfulness exercises specific to requirements, all of which are done under expert guidance.
With 6.6 million users worldwide, Petit BamBou is one of the most downloaded apps in the Health and Fitness category, and over 145,600 ratings in IOS with a rating of 4.5 out of 5 and 78,700 ratings in Android with an average rating of 4.5/5. The app was founded in 2014 by
Benjamin Blasco and Ludovic Dujardin, friends and web entrepreneur, with the common goal of making the practice of mindfulness meditation more accessible. The Petit BamBou Facebook page is a virtual character, cheerful and positive, embodying a wise old man, followed by 930K fans.
The meditation exercises in the app cover important topics such as sleep, stress and pain management, anxiety, relationships and work, accompanied by videos and explanatory stories to understand the cardinal principles of mindfulness meditation. The application offers free customizable sessions for duration and background music as well as tools for short meditations. All programs are usable even when the phone is in airplane mode. To clarify doubts or deepen some topics, there is an FAQs, forums and other useful contacts’ section.
The application is simple and high on usability with an immediate and easy to understand interface that embodies a zen spirit. The main menu includes a tab dedicated to the reproduction of the meditation session; one that allows access to the catalogue of available programs; the third, called “sound”, offers different musical atmospheres; and the last, linked to the personal profile, summarizes the hours of practice. The Petit BamBou App is accessible from all devices and sessions are guided from start to finish.
The different voices lend themselves completely to relaxation, the atmospheres accompany the user into the heart of nature, near the water or in the countryside. By downloading Petit BamBou, users have the possibility to subscribe to have full access to the programs. The free part gives access to a meditative path of 8 sessions called ‘Discovery’; and to the sections ‘Free Meditation’; ’Sounds’, ‘minutes.’ By subscribing, one can discover the real added value of the app. The charges are INR 249 (monthly), INR 1249 (semester), INR 1999 (yearly), and INR 7996 (lifetime).
