What is happening within our brains? Science of meditation part II
findings from the books Science of meditation and Altered traits by Daniel Goldman and Richard Davidson
Continuing from the part I of this article, the authors expertly reveal in the book what we can learn from a one-of-a-kind data pool that includes world-class meditators. The remarkable findings show how meditation can cultivate qualities such as selflessness, equanimity, love and compassion, and redesign our neural circuitry for the better.
Let us look at it in detail under the below categories
The undisturbed mind
is romanticised in all spiritual traditions. What does it signify at the brain level? Amygdala, the brain’s radar for threat triggers the brain’s freeze-flight or-flight response resulting in a stream of hormones like cortisol and adrenaline that equip us to act under any stressful situations. While this design has helped us survive in reaction to confronting a predator; our modern life stressors are mostly psychological (mostly thoughts about our family problems, difficult boss, and so on) which have a detrimental impact on our health. Consequently when something worries or upsets us, our mind fixates over and over to that thing, as the amygdala rivets our…
