The Secrets of Meditation
Meditation is defined as the act of dedicating attention to a solitary, innate activity for religious or contemplative pursuits, or of becoming serene, calm, and tranquil. Meditation is a way of coming home to the self, to awake our awareness, and to give grace a chance to permeate our thinking and action. This is the road less traveled, where there’s no competition, just unconditional love and understanding. The real payoff of a daily meditation practice is the altered characteristic(s) or personality trait(s) that arises to illustrate a better nature in the practitioner. Highly positive personality traits such as compassion, composure, equanimity, selflessness, and affection are outer signs of different brain function due to meditation.
Meditation practice isn’t about trying to throw ourselves away and become something better, it’s about befriending who we are. – Ani Pema Chodron
Types of Meditation
Meditation is a collective word for a motley crew of contemplative practices. Just as different foods provide different nutrients that nurture different organs, tissues, and cells, meditation also nurtures different cells in the body and brain.
According to the science, there are three major different types of meditation which include multiple contemplative styles:
- Controlled Focus or Focused Attention meditation
- Open Monitoring meditation
- Automatic Self-Transcending meditation
Meditation and concentration are the way to a life of serenity. – Baba Ram Dass
Controlled Focus or Focused Attention Meditation
Controlled focus meditation includes Zen, Tibetan Buddhism, Vedantic meditation, and moving meditations such as meditative walking, yoga, Qi Gong or Tai Chi that require concentration, control, or direction of the mind.
Dandapani defines this meditation as “working with the energy that flows through you”. Dandapani, a former monk, Hindu priest, entrepreneur, and international speaker, has the following to say about Controlled Focus meditation:
- Meditation is not the clearing of the mind but a singular focusing of the mind.
- In meditation it is crucial that the path and goal be clearly defined, a process and a goal. Repetition is paramount in meditation. Meditate on the same goal until you attain it.
- You must be unwavering in your focus. Concentration is a necessary ingredient in meditation. If you cannot concentrate, you cannot meditate. You practice concentration by doing one thing at a time. The mind cannot multitask, it only switches from one task to another rapidly which creates the illusion of executing multiple tasks at the same time. One of the greatest benefits of concentration, is the power of observation, the overview perspective, the view from the mountain top. Find opportunities throughout your day to practice concentration – give your spouse/child/colleague your undivided attention when speaking to them. If your attention drifts away, bring it back over and over again.
- It takes tremendous courage to know yourself. Going within yourself and looking at yourself takes courage and self-acceptance, because not all is beautiful and good inside of us. In our unconscious mind we carry many unresolved emotional experiences that are difficult to face. Meditation is a way of cleaning out the subconscious mind just like we clean our houses, bodies, cars, yards, etc.
Meditation will not carry you to another world, but it will reveal the most profound and awesome dimensions of the world in which you already live. Calmly contemplating these dimensions and bringing them into the service of compassion and kindness is the right way to make rapid gains in meditation as well as in life. – Zen Master Hsing Yun
Open Monitoring Meditation
Open monitoring meditation includes Vipassana, Zazen (seated meditation), and mindfulness where the practitioner disengages emotionally, observes and remains present in the moment without judging or reacting. This style just observes the rise and fall of the feelings, thoughts, or sensations that unfold in the practitioner’s mind and body.
Michigan State University did a study that was published in Brain Sciences on how open monitoring meditation altered brain activity to reduce errors. The researchers recruited participants who have never meditated before. Then they gave them a 20 minute open monitoring meditation exercise while their brain activity was measured through electroencephalography (EEG). The next step was to complete a computerized distraction test. Researchers know that a neural signal, called the “error positivity” appears in the EEG measurement about half a second after the brain realizes that it made a mistake. This realization is linked to conscious error recognition. The strength of this signal is stronger in meditators relative to the control subjects. It is significant to note that this increase was noted after just one 20 minute open meditation session. Although actual task performance did not show immediate improvement, the brain’s ability to detect an error was improved immediately.
You should sit in meditation for twenty minutes a day, unless you are too busy. Then you should sit for an hour. – Zen Proverb
Automatic Self-Transcending Meditation
This category includes Vedic meditation. It comes from the Veda, a 5000-6000 year old body of knowledge about the laws of consciousness and nature from which all yoga, Ayurvedic medicine, feng shui, and acupuncture practices arise. The meditation practice was called Nishkam karma yoga meditation which when translated from Sanskrit means “union by action hardly done” or “union attained by action hardly taken”. In the west, this name was changed to Transcendental Deep Meditation and then just Transcendental Meditation (TM). This technique does not involve concentration and it’s not just an observational tool. It’s an actual tool called “automatic self-transcending” which allows the active thinking mind to experience quieter and quieter levels of thought, and then transcend thought in order to experience the Self, our own unbounded nature. This meditation gives the practitioner access to that calm, silent level of mind, pure consciousness, that is always there, but overshadowed by the noise of everyday life.
Meditation is not a way of making your mind quiet. It is a way of entering into the quiet that is already there buried under the 50,000 thoughts the average person thinks every day. – Deepak Chopra
According to Naturopathy, Nishkam Karma meditation is considered the best way to reduce stress and promote well-being. Both the Bhagavat Gita (a holy book in Hinduism) and the Chandogya Upanishad (written between 8th and 6th centuries BCE) prescribe Nishkam Karma meditation to find the truth within the self. By transcending the self, divisions and polarities are eliminated. True knowledge and the meaning of existence is thus found.
A mantra, an intentional focusing device, is used as an anchor to calm down the nervous system and mind, giving the body rest that is two to five times deeper than sleep. The word mantra can be translated from the Sanskrit as “mind vehicle”. The meditator uses the mantra to access a fourth state of consciousness that is different from being awake, sleeping, or dreaming. In this fourth state of consciousness, the left and right hemispheres of the brain are operating in unison. When the nervous system is calmed down, order is created out of the chaos of stress. The body can relax and let go of its tightly controlled hold of the emotional reactions to stressful situations.
With every breath, the old moment is lost; a new moment arrives. We exhale and we let go of the old moment. It is lost to us. In doing so, we let go of the person we used to be. We inhale and breathe in the moment that is becoming. In doing so, we welcome the person we are becoming. We repeat the process. This is meditation. This is renewal. This is life. – Lama Surya Das
The Dark Night of the Soul
Does meditation have a dark side? If we listen to all the new age gurus around, all we hear about meditation are the wonderful benefits, sunshine and roses that meditation pours over us. BUT, and it’s a big but …. they never talk about the dark night of the soul that meditators experience especially when they start a meditation practice. Don’t get me wrong, all those accolades touted about the act of meditation are well deserved and all true. Arguably the most beneficial effect of meditation is that it unstresses the body and mind, and in that action, we fall into the paradoxical catch-22 situation. In her book Stress Less, Accomplish More, author and master meditation teacher Emily Fletcher, unceremoniously says: “Meditation wrings you out like sponge, so if you have some sadness inside, you may have some sad-flavored stress coming up and out when you first start practicing. The same is true for anger, resentment, insecurity, and on through a whole host of unpleasant emotions. …. The fact is, stress can have the same flavor on the way out as it does on the way in.” If you have experienced major stress and trauma in your life which you have not yet processed emotionally, there is a good chance that meditation will shake it loose and cause a very uncomfortable experience while it pushes it up and out. The good thing is that once those emotions have been pushed up and out, they are gone forever.
Does this always happen? The short answer is no. Meditation styles such as mindfulness meditation are good at getting rid of stress in the moment, not the buried stress. Therefore, if you are stressed in this moment because of a deadline lurking over you, or your boss, colleague, or spouse is taking their stress out on you, or you feel overwhelmed in the moment, mindfulness meditation is a great way of calming down and processing the stress out of the moment. Mindfulness meditation slows down racing thoughts, allows you to let go of negative thoughts, and subsequently calms down the mind and body by practicing breathing techniques and awareness of the body and mind.
Automatic self-transcending meditation floods the body with dopamine, serotonin, DHEA, melatonin, and HGH among other neurotransmitters. These neurotransmitters make us feel both good and safe, which is why the body can relax (at long last!) and get the rest it doesn’t get during sleep. When you fall asleep, whatever you are holding in your hand will fall as the muscles of the hand relax. By that same token, when the body is able to relax deeply, those stresses and emotions that it holds onto so tightly, are allowed to bubble up to the surface and to be released. Be brave and hang in there through all the uncomfortable symptoms.
How to Handle the Side Effects of Unstressing
Be gentle with yourself when you are unstressing. There is no shortcut or way around it, only through it. These symptoms are usually most intense in the first days and weeks when you start a meditation practice. During this detox period no important or life-changing decisions should be made, because of the emotional catharsis that you are experiencing.
When feelings of anger, irritation, frustration, sadness, tears, nightmares, vivid dreams, brain fog, headaches, skin rashes, or even nausea haunt you, do some exercise, walk, take a nap, take a bath or steam bath, or have a calming cup of tea to help the body with the detoxification of the stress and emotions.
Meditation makes you more resilient. You will feel emotions and feelings more intense, but you’ll be able to process them better. So, don’t stop your practice. Meditation brings you into the present moment where you can sow the seeds of the future. Once the stress has been released, it’s gone forever.
The mind only works in the present. The past or future do not exist for the mind. When you tell a child that they can have a new toy “next week”, they will ask you continuously whether it is “next week” yet.
Meditation is the exercise that keeps your mind in the present moment, the only moment that counts. Bliss and joy are only found in the now, whereas stress hangs out in your past and in your future.
The Brain on Meditation
Studies of meditators’ brains show that the density of grey matter and white matter in the prefrontal cortex are increased. Think of it as a muscle that gets exercised and enlarges, therefore is then better equipped to do its job. The white matter ensures that neurons are able to communicate faster, better and with greater integrity. The corpus callosum also increases in size, bettering the communication between the two hemispheres of the brain. The hippocampus also gains grey matter and that combined with the gains made by the prefrontal cortex, puts the brakes on the amygdala, the brain’s danger scanner and the default mode network (DMN). The DMN is the “ruminative network” where we ruminate (repetitive thoughts) about the past or future, never the present moment. On the positive side, the DMN allows us to plan and organize, but we must be beware of the ruminating negative side. The opposite of the DMN is the Task-Positive Network (TPN) which deals in the here and now present moment. This is the action network. When the TPN is active, the DMN is inactivated. To activate the TPN, focus on one thing, like your breath, a sound, a sensation, a mantra. When your mind wanders (DMN), bring it back to the present moment (TPN). This is why experienced meditators have smaller amygdalae.
Meditation strengthens the link between the intuitive and analytical areas of the brain. The anterior insula (empathetic center of the brain) is better able to communicate with the dorsomedial prefrontal cortex (dmPFC) where we process our sense of self, empathy, altruism, make morality judgments, and integrate social impressions among other functions.
Mindfulness is a waking state practice where you direct your focus. Meditation is a deep rest practice where you flood the brain with dopamine and serotonin making you feel more blissful and relaxed. Serotonin gets converted to melatonin which is essential for sleep. So increased serotonin not only makes you happy, it also ensures more melatonin for better sleep.
After just 7 hours of practicing meditation (2 weeks at 30 minutes per day), a measurable difference can be seen in the brain.
The Prefrontal Cortex – Smart and Healthy
Are you ready to “Einsteinify” your prefrontal cortex? Dr. Sara Lazar of Harvard University found (in 2005) that the prefrontal cortices of experienced meditators had more folds, neural density, and electrical activity than the average Joe. This translates to more processing power, higher IQ, effective decision making, less emotional problems (depression and anxiety), and increased willpower.
The Corpus Callosum and Communication Bridges – Otherworldly Creativity
Does your right brain know what your left brain’s doing? Thank you corpus callosum, the bundle of nerves and white matter fibers that connect the two hemispheres of the brain. In just four weeks of mindfulness meditation training, the corpus callosum and the superior longitudinal fasciculus/arcuate white matter complex (SLF/AC), the largest white matter bridge that connects the front of the brain to the back, are thicker, larger, and better connected. The SLF/AC interconnects functions such as language, memory, focus, pattern recognition, emotion, and visual-spatial abilities. White matter density also increased in the sagittal stratum and corona radiata (linked to improved emotional stability). These cognitive interconnected abilities translate to improved lateral thinking and creativity, and improved regulation of intense emotions, stress, and overall mental health, intuition, ambidexterity, coordination, musical ability, vision, and a reduction in dyslexia.
The Parietal Lobe – Sense of Self & Loneliness
Our brains are set up to help us survive. Therefore, the brain’s wiring leans towards negativity, because survival is dangerous work. As social animals, we need our tribe to aid in our survival. Loneliness, then, can be detrimental to our health. When we feel lonely, the parietal lobe becomes “overheated” as it obsesses over the past and worries about the future. As a consequence, our immune system falters, anxiety and depression become more prevalent, physical and mental health decline, self-esteem, empathy, and compassion take a nosedive, and the individual feels disconnected from the whole.
Dr. Andrew Newberg, a scientist at the University of Pennsylvania, studied the brains of Tibetan monks while they were meditating. As expected, their frontal lobes were lit up and active. What was not expected was that their parietal lobes were de-activated, cool, and calm. The parietal lobe is considered to be “third-dimensional” and the seat of our sense of self. When it is activated, our sense of self as an individual, separate from others, is prevalent. This is what causes us to feel isolated, separate, and lonely. When we meditate and de-activate the parietal lobe, we experience a sense of no-self and oneness with everything around us. This loss of self also erases the past and its obsessions and the future and its worries and anxieties, and what is left is the present moment.
The result is a feeling of connectedness and oneness with all. We become more empathetic and compassionate with ourselves and everyone around us. Self-esteem soars as we feel more comfortable and happier with ourselves. Social anxiety and loneliness diminish as we live more in the present moment, not leaving much time to obsess about the past or worry about the future.
The Temporoparietal Junction (TPJ) – IQ vs EQ
The temporoparietal junction (TPJ) is found where the temporal and parietal lobes meet, specifically the inferior parietal lobule and the caudal (back) part of the superior temporal sulcus. The TPJ receives input from the thalamus (senses), limbic system (emotions), somatosensory system (sensory), visual, and auditory systems. The TPJ is considered the emotional intelligence (EQ) control center of the brain.
In 2016 researchers (Yang et al) studied the brains of thirteen subjects before and after they completed mindfulness training which lasted six weeks. The volume of the TPJ in all the subjects increased and depression and anxiety was reduced. Strengthening the TPJ results in more emotional balance, self-awareness, empathy, adaptability, conscientiousness, motivation, etc.
The Hippocampus – Memory Center; Shrinkage = Depression
The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines the hippocampus as follows: a curved elongated ridge that extends over the floor of the descending horn of each lateral ventricle of the brain, that consists of gray matter covered on the ventricular surface with white matter, and that is involved in forming, storing, and processing memory. The hippocampi, then, are critical to learning and memory.
Neuroscientist, Dr. Sara Lazar and colleagues from Harvard University, who have studied the meditating brain extensively, found that meditation increases the “hippocampal cortical thickness”, and that experience is cumulative.
However, the longer a patient is depressed, the more the hippocampi shrink. This was the conclusion of a study by Sheline et al, 1999 from the University of Washington Medical School who did MRI scans of 48 clinically depressed women. A study done in 2008 and published in the Neuroimage Journal reported that the left and right hippocampi of participants had significantly grown in neural thickness, density, and overall size after only 8 weeks of meditation. Therefore, meditation reversed the damage done by depression and secured the brain against future occurrences. The hippocampi are involved in cognitive and emotional processing which is why emotions are so important when learning something new. Both these domains suffer consequences in patients with major depressive disorder (MDD). The hippocampi are densely innervated by serotonergic fibers with the majority of 5-HT receptor subtypes expressed here. In other words, serotonin, the “happy” neurotransmitter, plays a big role in functioning of the hippocampi.
Meditation’s benefits on the hippocampi include: Neurogenesis; improved memory, learning, spatial navigation, mental GPS (grid cells—neurons that fire in a triangular pattern and help keep track of navigational cues); and increased serotonin. A reduction in hippocampal cortical thickness can cause the following: Depression; hyperactivity; amnesia; Alzheimer’s disease.
The Anterior Insula – Compassion
The insulae are involved in consciousness (self-awareness, perception, cognitive functioning), emotion (compassion, empathy, interpersonal experiences), and the regulation of homeostasis (motor control).
According to a UCLA Medical School study, the right anterior dorsal insula lights up in meditators while they are meditating. A study using voxel-based morphometry and MRI scans on Vipassana meditators (insight meditation into the true nature of reality of the Buddhist tradition), found that the insulae, and specifically the right anterior insula, to be thicker in meditators, specifically that it has more grey matter.
Benefits of a more developed right anterior insula include:
- Compassion, empathy, kindness, happiness;
- High-level consciousness, connectedness, self-awareness, fulfillment;
- Homeostasis, motor control, immunity, and longevity.
- A reduction in the following conditions are also seen: Depression, anxiety, fear, anger; chronic pain; and addiction.
Meditation can help us embrace our worries, our fear, our anger; and that is very healing. We let our own natural capacity of healing do the work. – Thich Nhat Hanh
The Amygdala – The Fear Center
The amygdalae (one in each hemisphere) are the seat of intense emotion, specifically all the shades of fear needed to keep us safe. For simplicity, the amygdalae are usually referred to in the singular, amygdala. The amygdalae is important in modulating the emotions and behavior. When it comes to the amygdalae, size matters, and the smaller the amygdalae, the less activity, and that’s a good thing. Soldiers or trauma victims with PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome) have enlarged amygdalae.
A study at Massachusetts General Hospital (2011) scanned the brains of 51 adults using fMRI before and after eight weeks of mindfulness meditation training. Researchers found a decrease in size, volume, and electrical activity of the amygdalae. Subjects also reported less anxiety, worry, fear, stress, addiction, anger, and depression.
Sleep and Meditation
Has the sandman lost your address and unfriended you of late? Insomnia and sleep deprivation are very debilitating and wreak havoc on the body and brain. Driving while chronically sleep deprived has been compared to drunk driving! A well rested body and brain equate to clear thinking, productivity, longevity, strong immunity, energy, and weight maintenance.
Stress is released from the body and mind in the form of thoughts, because stress originates in the brain. If we are under a lot of stress, the brain has to release the stress in the form of racing thoughts (which usually accompanies insomnia), nightmares or night terrors, or vivid dreams, all of which reduce restful, rejuvenating sleep.
Sleep and meditation are two sides of the same coin. Both are forms of rest, but they are different kinds of rest. For the sake of survival, the body and the brain cannot enjoy deep rejuvenating rest at the same time. If the house starts burning around you or the new baby starts crying using a certain pitch, your body can jump into survival mode before your brain even knows what you’re doing. When a potentially dangerous sound or smell wakes you from a deep sleep, your body is ready to pounce even though your brain is foggy and disoriented. Therefore, when sleeping, the brain gets to rest and process all the events and stresses of the day while the body stands guard. When meditating, the brain is on guard while the body gets rest at the level of two to five times that of sleep. This is why it is impossible to clear the mind when meditating, because the brain is not anesthetized during meditation, it is on guard and releasing stress in the form of thoughts. The reason why you feel so rejuvenated and energetic after meditating, is because the body was able to rest.
If the body is rested, it can guard the brain during sleep, and that’s why meditation helps with insomnia. The guard has to be awake in order to guard. Also, researchers at Rutgers University found that meditators boosted their melatonin levels on average by 98% and some even up to 300% of previous levels. Researchers from Harvard and Stanford Universities found that meditation built a big pons (a band of nerve fibers in the brainstem that link the medulla oblongata, thalamus, lobes in the midbrain and the cerebrum). The pons regulates the change from inhalation to exhalation, sleep paralysis, and may generate dreams. So, meditation is your sandman after all!
Nap or Meditate?
The best time to meditate is NOT when the brain is tired. It’s better for the brain to take a nap when it has worked hard so that the information can be consolidated and processed. Meditation gives the body rest, not the brain. Edison took naps during the day to gain insights into his inventions. The sewing mechanism solution for the sewing machine came in a dream. The downside of meditation, which is actually it’s upside, is that it releases stress and its accompanying emotions such as anger, irritation, sadness, etc. Meditation consciously brings you into your body and out of your mind so that you can release the stress and emotions stuck in the body.
Health and Meditation
When we meditate and give that extra time to the body to rest and unstress, the brain can dedicate its time to rest and rebuild the immune system. Meditation gives the body rest that is two to five times deeper than sleep, therefore, with so much rest going around, the body can heal at the cellular level. Your mitochondria will be thanking you!
The stress hormones adrenaline and cortisol are both highly acidic. Combine that with the typical Western go-go-go lifestyle and sugar, grain-filled, junk food diet, and our bodies become a heated, inflamed, exhausted pressure cooker ready to explode with illness. Ninety percent of doctor’s visits are due to stress-related illness. If it is caused by stress, meditation can help, whether it’s insomnia, adrenal fatigue, migraines, pain, depression, anxiety, digestive problems, even infertility and blood pressure.
Sex and Meditation
Why does meditation lead to better sex? If women’s levels of cortisol are too high, they become physically incapable of orgasm. If men have too much adrenaline, they become incapable of erection. When a man is in a fight or flight situation (loads of adrenaline), the penis actually contracts in order to protect itself from possible injury. Meditation reduces cortisol and adrenaline and floods the brain with dopamine and serotonin (bliss chemicals). When you start meditating, it increases activity in the mirror neurons. Mirror neurons fire when one acts and when one observes someone else executing the same action. Mirror neurons are also why the porn industry is so lucrative. Seeing someone else’s pleasure provokes pleasure in us. It makes you feel as if you’re engaged in something even though you’re just watching it. This will make you better able to read your partner’s body language and seeing him/her have pleasure will increase your sense of pleasure, making you more generous.
How To Start
I am not a meditation teacher, but here are some tips to keep in mind when you get started with a meditation practice:
The meditative path begins by focusing the mind on one point of attention such as the breath. This brings the mind into the body as the meditator follows the breath into and out of the body. For the beginner meditator, this is a wonky tango between full out concentration on the breath and a hopscotching mind. Don’t become discouraged by the monkey mind, just continue coming back to the breath. This is the repetition that Dandapani refers to. By the way, those thoughts that constantly bubble up to break your concentration, are actually the daily stresses being released from the mind.
Steven Kotler recommends to get into the gap between a thought and its corresponding emotion. There exists a tiny gap between the moment a thought arises and an emotion that gets attached to the thought. Once the emotion gets attached to the thought, the thought has been energized and it is close to impossible to stop the thought. Using mindfulness and/or meditation, you can get into that gap and learn to separate the two. Mindfulness, meditation, breath work, box-breathing (as used by the navy seals) can all be applied here. This separation of thought and emotion can be achieved in as little as 4 days of training for 20 minutes a day. Focus on your breath and if you mind starts to wonder, pull it back by refocusing on the breath. The ideal time span for meditation is 20 minutes a day, but the minimum seems to be 11 minutes.
Emily Fletcher of Ziva Meditation recommends the following body position when meditating:
- Spine straight and supported.
- Head free and unsupported.
- Hips slightly higher than knees for a better flow of energy.
- Tongue tip resting behind front teeth in the top of the mouth. This is a universal energetic connection.
- Feet flat on the floor or legs comfortably crossed and supported by pillows (if necessary) if sitting on the floor.
- Hands resting comfortably on knees or interlaced in the lap
Touch your inner space, which is nothingness, as silent and empty as the sky; it is your inner sky. Once you settle down in your inner sky, you have come home, and a great maturity arises in your actions, in your behavior. Then whatever you do has grace in it. Then whatever you do is a poetry in itself. You live poetry; your walking becomes dancing, your silence becomes music. – Osho
Conclusion
The benefits of meditation are multiple and far-reaching. From stress with its accompanying cortisol, blood pressure, insomnia, pain, depression, and anxiety to better self-esteem, attention, memory, sleep, emotional control, and mood. Meditation does for your body what sleep does for your brain. Dandapani says that meditation is having an appointment with yourself and your own energy. Emily Fletcher says that we don’t meditate to become good at meditation, we meditate to become good at life. So, make a 20 minute commitment to yourself at least once a day, first thing in the morning, to clean out those cobwebs and make space for that calm, emotionally mature, creative, smart, spacious you to come out and play. You owe it to yourself!
Want to know more
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