What Happens in Your Brain When You Meditate

Meditation yields a surprising number of health benefits, including stress reduction, improved attention, better memory, and even increased.

There are different ways to meditate, and since it’s such a personal practice, there are probably more than any of us know about. There are a couple that is usually focused on heavily in scientific research, though The other type of meditation that’s often used in research is open-monitoring meditation.

What Happens in Your Brain When You Meditate

This is where things get really interesting. Using modern technology like FMRI scans; scientists have developed a more thorough understanding of what’s taking place in our brains when we meditate. The overall difference is that our brains stop processing information as actively as they normally would. We start to show a decrease in beta waves,   which indicate that our brains are processing information, even after a single 20-minute meditation session if we’ve never tried it before.P

In the image below you can see how the beta waves (shown in bright colors on the left) are dramatically reduced during meditation (on the right).P

Frontal lobe

This is the most highly evolved part of the brain, responsible for reasoning, planning, emotions and self-conscious awareness. During meditation, the frontal cortex tends to go offline.

Parietal lobe
This part of the brain processes sensory information about the surrounding world, orienting you in time and space. During meditation, activity in the parietal lobe slows down.

Thalamus
The gatekeeper for the senses, this organ focuses your attention by funneling some sensory data deeper into the brain and stopping other signals in their tracks. Meditation reduces the flow of incoming information to a trickle.

Reticular formation
As the brain’s sentry, this structure receives incoming stimuli and puts the brain on alert, ready to respond. Meditating dials back the arousal signal.