All from meditation. Nobody took psychedelics.

Meditation may push the brain into something resembling a psychedelic state.

 Researchers studied 20 people before and after a seven-day meditation retreat using brain scans, blood tests, and questionnaires.

 The default mode network saw a decrease in activity following the retreat. This is the system associated with self-focused thinking that is also disrupted by psychedelics.

 Researchers also observed a more integrated whole-brain state, while participants reported significantly stronger mystical-type experiences.

 After that, things got weird. When scientists exposed neurons in a dish to participants' post-retreat blood plasma, the cells grew longer neurites - potentially pointing towards biological changes associated with neuroplasticity.

 Blood markers also suggested changes in metabolism, immune signalling, and endogenous opioid levels.

 All from meditation.  Nobody took psychedelics.

 But this was a tiny observational study with no control group, so it cannot prove meditation caused these changes.  Joe Dispenza, a co-author, also runs the retreats' business. Still, the overlap suggests that psychedelics and intensive meditation access some of the same biological states through completely different routes.


    Writer: Binod Kumar Simkhada
 binodkumarsimkhada315@gmail.com

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Join ME to Explore Something New.

Likendin is world's largest professional networking platform.

Rabies-infected dog bites can be fatal, if not vaccinated on time.