Grugin 1
Shane Grugin
RC 2001-118
Professor Roller
11/2/2016
Meditation Can Change Your Brain
Many people may assume that meditation is only practiced by “hippies.” While many “hippies” do practice meditation, it can be practiced by anyone, anywhere, anytime. Meditation is receiving more and more interest from scientists because of its direct and indirect effects on the brain and on the well-being of experimental subjects. Sadly, not many people are aware of the benefits meditation beholds. Much less do they know how one goes about meditating, as evidenced by the most popular comment on Dan Harris’sYouTube video about meditation: “Is there any good video on how to meditate?” (Harris). With recent studies and many experiments focusing on meditation, it is safe to say that meditation is a powerful force. Practicing it helps one feel more connected to their environment, and there is evidence that meditation can actually change our brain structure in ways that decrease symptoms of social anxiety.
One may ask: “What exactly is meditation?” In the most basic explanation, meditation is a preventative practice that helps one to feel more connected to the present moment. Meditation is preventative by decreasing the chances of one developing serious illnesses later in life. It involves not being lost in thought, feeling overwhelmed, or undermining the importance of the present moment. Individuals with social anxiety feel disconnected from their world and their peers. Many individuals who endure this mental illness have a warped sense of reality, like they will feel forever rejected by their peers, or like they will never escape their perpetual despondency. Again, in the most anecdotal sense, “things aren’t always as they appear” (Puddicombe). Andy Puddicombe is an experienced monk who gave his testimonial to the power of meditation in a TedxTalk. He makes it very clear that “we can't change every little thing that happens to us in life, but we can change the way that we experience it.”
When I was a freshman at Appalachian State University, I endured social anxiety that seemed as if it would never end. One day, I got a group email, sent to out to all my neighbors from my resident assistant, informing us of a class called “Meditation and Mindfulness.” Personally, I am all for trying out new things, and I was in desperate need of finding new ways to cope with my anxious thoughts. As the class progressed, I learned many different ways to meditate, and even started to learn about the effects meditation can have on one’s brain, which inspired me to research this topic more in depth. The more I researched it, it almost seemed as if I had found a magical cure for any mental illness; at least, the proposed benefits made it seem like a magical cure. Due to my empathy for individuals who suffer from social anxiety, I was prompted to research the anatomical aftermath of long-term meditation practice.
To start explaining meditation in a more complex, anatomical way, I want to emphasize that severe social anxiety damages our emotional intelligence, relationships, academic/athletic performance, and limits one's potential to succeed in general. In Don Joseph Goewey’s book, The End Of Stress, he explains that when one practices a peaceful approach to life (meditation), "practice wires the algorithm for a new behavior or brain state into a part of your brain called the basal ganglia" (Goewey). The basal ganglia is the part of the brain that stores cues, patterns, and rewards. This is how we form our habits. While practicing meditation, one starts to program patterns that cue the reward of peace when one faces anxious thoughts.
However, anecdotal evidence isn’t enough to prove that meditation helps patients with social anxiety. Sara Lazar, who has a Ph.D. in Neuroscience at Harvard University, gave a TedxTalk titled "How Meditation Can Reshape Our Brains." Lazar explains how repetitive behavior leads to neuroplasticity. This means that the brain adjusts its activities in response to new situations or to changes in environment. In an experiment led by Lazar, individuals were told to juggle, despite not knowing how to juggle. The individuals’ brains were then scanned with an MRI. After being told to practice for three months, they came back and had their brains scanned again. Results indicated that brain matter changed in areas important for detecting visual stimuli and motion. Even though this study is not necessarily indicative of brain growth that specifically affects social anxiety, it still shows that even the simplest of activities can change the shape of the brain (Lazar).
To be more specific in relation to social anxiety, Lazar explains another study of hers, where with just an eight-week long stress-reduction program, there was hippocampus growth, temporoparietal junction growth, and shrinkage within the amygdala. All these discoveries represent a change in individual-environment reaction. The most astounding change in the brain is within the amygdala because it was the only structure to display a lower volume of gray matter, rather than a higher level of gray matter. The amygdala is the “fear-center” of the brain. The amygdala in social anxiety patients is often larger than individuals who do not have social anxiety. This is because many social anxiety patients have higher levels of norepinephrine and other stress hormones that trigger the fight or flight response. The fight or flight response is largely caused by the amygdala, which is the part of the brain to first send out stress signals to the hypothalamus. What meditation does is it acts alongside the parasympathetic nervous system, which is responsible for returning the body to homeostasis (Lazar).
In a book by Jo Marchant, titled Cure: A Journey Into the Science of the Mind Over Body, he explains how in a brain scan of people partaking in Zen meditation, the "default mode network" was more easily down regulated, which means that they're able to become more calm when faced with a stressful situation or being distracted (Marchant). Basically, the default mode network consists of the interrelated parts of our brain that are constantly active during our waking hours. It is the part of the brain that becomes extremely active when we are obsessing about ourselves, what our future looks like, or thinking about that huge party going on tonight. During meditation, an individual is not only able to lessen activity in the default mode network, but they are able to set a new “default mode” that helps one focus more on the present moment at all times, rather than the past or future.
To dig into an even deeper level than MRI scans, it is important to discuss the neurotransmitters that function within these brain structures, which can modulate anxiety. One neurotransmitter called gamma-aminobutyric acid, or GABA, has been found to impact the intensity of anxiety. GABA limits nerve transmission and also inhibits nervous activity. “Studies have demonstrated a negative correlation between GABA activity and anxiety” (Krishnakumar). What this means is that more GABA receptors functioning correctly is correlated with decreased anxiety. Krishnakumar also explains that patients with anxiety have “particularly decreased GABA activity in the hippocampus…” (Krishnakumar). As previously stated, meditation has been found on multiple occasions to increase the mass of the hippocampus. It is thought that if meditation can increase the mass of the hippocampus, as well as other brain structures, then there will be more GABA available to regulate anxiety.
The neurotransmitter dopamine, is more commonly associated with anxiety and is related to reward-motivated behavior. Research shows that “people with generalized social phobia tended to have lower dopamine levels than healthy subjects” (Krishnakumar). In a study examining the effects of Yoga-Nidra meditation, it was concluded that participants indeed had an increase in dopamine. Due to the decreased function of executive controls in meditation, there was a “65% increase in endogenous dopamine release” (Krishnakumar).
One neurotransmitter that largely affects anxiety is called norepinephrine. Individuals who suffer from social anxiety, or any form of anxiety, typically showcase higher levels of norepinephrine than individuals who do not have an anxiety disorder. There was a study done that compared norepinephrine levels of heart-failure patients who meditated daily, versus norepinephrine levels in individuals who did not. It was determined that the heart-failure patients who meditated daily had lower levels of norepinephrine in their blood samples than the patients who did not meditate. A heart failure patient is certainly not the same as somebody with an anxiety disorder. However, these three neurotransmitters just discussed offer evidence that meditation can affect the amount of these neurotransmitters; in turn, individuals with social anxiety will benefit. This research is not definitive proof, but it suggests that meditation can hugely impact an individual suffering from an anxiety disorder (Krishnakumar).
With most research being focused on strictly neurological analyses, meditation can be understood from a more psychotherapeutic approach. Meditation can be considered a humanistic or existential approach that connects one to the present moment. This is an approach taken by therapists and counselors to help their patients understand their place in the world, not warped by their negative thought processes. In Neuroscience for Counselors and Therapists, Chad Luke explains that “one of the hallmarks of the humanistic-existential force of psychotherapy involves the idea of holism, connection, and integration” (Luke). These three things are the exact same things that meditation will help an individual accomplish — with practice, of course. Considering individuals who are constantly anxious, or whose “sympathetic nervous system is hypoactive…”, this awareness of self and feeling of connectedness “promotes balance in understanding the world” (Luke). An individual with social anxiety has a warped view of how the world views them. They instead believe that the world is constantly judging them, laughing at them, and that they are making a fool of themselves. This is not true, and meditation helps one begin understanding reality. This does not mean meditation is a replacement for therapy. What this means is that meditation can be seen as a tool that offers complementary support to psychotherapeutic services. Perhaps someone may not even have to see a counselor because they started to practice meditation.
Due to the influx of recent information, experiments, and studies surrounding meditation, it is slowly gaining steam as a legitimate mental health resource. Meditation is not religious. It is not strictly for “hippies,” as the popular stereotype likes to misconstrue the facts about meditation. Indeed, meditation can literally change your brain. Hopefully, meditation practice will one day become as normal as brushing your teeth or eating your veggies. It may seem as if this paper makes meditation out to be something that will send somebody into a “cosmic ooze,” where there will never be another worry in the world (Harris). The truth is that meditation can really help people navigate the sadness and anxiety of the world with a little more ease.
Annotated Bibliography
Goewey, Don Joseph. The End Of Stress. Beyond Words Publishing, 2014. Print.
In this book, Don Joseph Goewey writes about how stress damages our emotional
intelligence, relationships, academic/athletic performance, and limits one's potential to
succeed in general. Goewey explains that when one practices a peaceful approach to life
(aka meditation), "practice wires the algorithm for a new behavior or brain state into a
part of your brain called the basal ganglia." The basal ganglia stores cues, patterns, and
rewards which is how we form our habits. While practicing meditation, one starts to
program patterns that cue the reward of peace when one faces stress. Don Goewey has
managed the department of psychiatry at Stanford Medical School,and has directed a
regional emergency medical services system, so this source is reliable. He also writes for
the Huffington Post, and has been on CNN, NPR, and the Today Show. I plan to use this
information to show that with repetition and practice at quieting one’s mind, it gradually
becomes easier to quiet the mind.
Harris, Dan. “Hack Your Brain’s Default Mode with Meditation.” YouTube, uploaded by
Big Think, 19 August 2014,
This video summarizes the effects of the default mode system. The default mode system
is a complex system of interrelated brain areas that become active during waking hours.
Meditation allows individuals to restructure their default mode system in a way that
allows them to focus more on the present moment, rather than the past or the future.
Harris proposes that meditation will one day be a normal practice in everyone’s daily
lives. This source is reliable because Dan Harris is an ABC News correspondent, and he
is also a meditator himself. I plan to use this source as a basis to explain what the default
mode network is.
Krishnakumar, Divya, and Shanmugamurthy Lakshmanan. “Meditation and Yoga can
Modulate Brain Mechanisms that affect Behavior and Anxiety-A Modern Scientific
Perspective.” Ancient Science, vol. 2, no. 1, 2015, pp. 13-19.
This review examines the psychological effects of meditation, and the role of
neurotransmitters that modulate anxiety, as well as studies that use EEG and fMRI
imaging to examine activity in the brain during meditation. This source talks about how
meditation and yoga are receiving more and more interest from scientists from its direct
and indirect effects on the brain and on the well-being of experimental subjects. This
source is good information because, not only does it talk about specific brain structures
related to anxiety, but it goes one step deeper and talks about the neurotransmitters that
can affect anxiety as well. This source was retrieved in the database for the National
Center of Biotechnology Information. Divya Krishnakumar majored in Cognitive Science
and specializes in Neuroscience from UC San Diego. Dr. Shanmugamurthy Lakshmanan
is aresearch scientist at Wellman Center for Photomedicine at Harvard Medical School.
Both of these authors are credible and reliable.
Lazar, Sara. "How Meditation Can Reshape Our Brains.” YouTube, uploaded by TedxTalks, 23
January 2012,
In this TedxTalk titled "How Meditation Can Reshape Our Brains," Lazar explains how repetitive behavior (in this case, meditation), leads to neuroplasticity. That means neurons change the ways in which they communicate. In an experiment led by Lazar, individuals were told to juggle, despite not knowing how to juggle. The individuals’ brains were then scanned with an MRI. After being told to practice for three months, they came back and had their brains scanned again. Results indicated that brain matter changed in areas important for detecting visual stimuli and motion. Lazar then explained that with just an eight-week long stress-reduction program, there was hippocampus growth, tempo-parietal junction growth, and shrinkage within the amygdala. All these discoveries represent a change in individual-environment reaction. Overall, her goal was to inform the audience that meditation can literally change one's brain. This source will help me establish my thesis at the beginning of my research paper. Sara Lazar has her Ph.D. in the Neuroscience of Yoga and Meditation from Harvard University. Therefore, she is a very reliable source.
Luke, Chad. Neuroscience for Counselors and Therapists: Integrating the Sciences of Mind
and Brain. Sage, 2016. Print.
Chad Luke addresses multiple approaches to helping patients overcome and express their feelings related to anxiety. Luke explains the different structures and functions of the human brain, and how the brain is influenced by biology, one's environment, and one's experiences. For the sake of meditation and mindfulness, it was helpful to read about the humanistic-existential treatment of anxiety because this is the approach that focuses on connecting patients to "where they are, when they are, and with whom they are," helping them feel more connected with everything around them. All in all, the author's purpose for writing this book is to inform aspiring therapists and counselors about different methods and neuroscientific approaches to treating patients suffering from anxiety, depression, stress, and addiction. Luke is not biased in the slightest. He is extremely objective, and Luke makes sure to mention many different perspectives of treatments, while simultaneously remaining objective about those specific topics. Also, this book is published by SAGE Publications, which is a scholarly source. This information is useful because it describes how a therapist can help a patient in similar ways meditation can.
Marchant, Jo. Cure: A Journey Into the Science of the Mind Over Body. Crown Publishers. 2016. Print.
In Cure, Jo Marchant talks about how one can change their brain with meditation. For this reason, meditation has become very popular, mainly because research points to the fact that meditation may have astounding effects on many diseases ranging from cancer, AIDS, multiple sclerosis, to depression and anxiety. The most important information from this source explains how in a brain scan of people doing Zen meditation, the "default mode network" was more easily down regulated, which means that they're able to become more calm when faced with a stressful situation or distraction. Also, in a study done by Sara Lazar, people who took an eight-week MBSR (mindfulness-based stress-reduction) course had "increased gray matter in areas involved in learning, memory, and emotion regulation, including the hippocampus." These people also reported feeling less stressed, and the amygdala showed reduced density in gray matter. Lastly, this source offered plenty of counterarguments by critics of meditation that can help me further explain my thesis; therefore, this information can help me explain meditation is a viable way of improving one's quality of life.