A growing body of research shows that meditation does just that, by reducing heart rate and blood pressure, improving immune function and decreasing stress-hormone levels. The problem is that getting most people to do something like that is difficult. Koch was one of those skeptics. When he first started meditating, he felt fidgety and his mind jumped around, flitting from thought to thought. I look forward to it now.
Meditation takes practice and it's the process of practicing that makes it so helpful.
It's to make a shift from thinking and planning to just being. As he points out in his book, we let our minds stress us out by replaying negative conversations, hashing over worrisome scenarios and creating inner dramas based on events of the past or the future. Such constant mind chatter not only raises the level of stress hormones in the body, but also distracts us from enjoying the present moment. You don't have to be a Buddhist, or a subscriber to any kind of thought system, to appreciate that insight. As Bodian points are, there are dozens of ways to meditate.