Have you ever wondered why meditation works? Or, if you are still slightly sceptical, you might be wondering why so many people are starting to meditate. What exactly is it about meditation that makes it so useful? What is going on in the body and the brain when we meditate?
Meditation works because it reverses our unhelpful habitual tendencies and replaces them with positive qualities such as focus, clarity, resilience, patience and compassion. By learning not to react and be content with the present moment, we choose our response to the world, rather than being tossed around by the vicissitudes of life.
So how does meditation work? And why does it work? Let’s take a deep dive into evolution, the physiology of the body, humanity’s unique ability to choose, and the potential for meditation to transform our lives. But first, we must understand one of our body’s most misunderstood puzzles: stress.
The Purpose of Stress
Chronic stress is said to be the plaque of the 21st century. It has been proven to contribute to many conditions including heart disease, high blood pressure, immune system issues, ulcers, diabetes, and muscle and joint pain just to name a few. But it wasn’t always like this. Stress wasn’t always the ‘bad guy’.
Stress is actually a very useful, highly-refined bodily response developed over millions of years of evolution. It is what has helped our survival as a human species and without it we probably wouldn’t exist today. In coming face to face with a predator, or a hostile person from another tribe, the stress response would flood our bodies with chemicals such as adrenaline and cortisol, supercharging our nervous systems to be ready to take action. This process allowed us to respond quickly to threats, survive another day, and pass on our genes to the next generation.
Physiology of the Stress Response
Along with all other species of animals, we have developed senses to detect inputs from our external environment. The eyes, ears, nose, tongue and feeling of touch register these inputs and send signals to the brain that something has happened. This is the purpose of consciousness – to simply recognise or cognise an internal or external experience.
Recognising that something has happened, the brain processes this sensory input firstly through the amygdala, a small almond shaped collection of cells at the base of the brain. Its job it is to look out for life threatening situations, which is why information passes through here first. It is also where emotions are given meaning and attached to associations and responses to them. Emotions such as fear and anger trigger the amygdala, as our past experiences would dictate that this usually meant that a potentially life-threatening situation was occurring.
These situations need to be processed quickly, so the amygdala can directly send distress signals to the hypothalamus, which is in charge of the autonomic nervous systems, namely:
- Sympathetic nervous system – responsible for the flight or fight response to react to perceived dangers.
- Parasympathetic nervous system – responsible for bringing the body back into balance or homeostasis (also known as rest and digest mode).
These two systems control primarily autonomous functions such as breathing, heart rate, respiration, digestion and blood pressure.
Based on past experience, if the amygdala perceives something as life-threatening it triggers the body’s survival instinct: the stress response. The sympathetic nervous system begins to pump the body with energy to either fight or flee. Adrenaline and cortisol flood the bloodstream which creates a number of physiological responses:
- The breath becomes rapid and shallow as the body tries to increase oxygen intake
- The heart rate increases to pump oxygen rich blood to the muscles
- Blood pressure increases
- The palms start to sweat as the body warms with this faster blood flow
- Extra glucose is released into the body, ready to be consumed by the muscles.
This all happens before the conscious mind is even aware of it, which is why it is so effective. In legitimate life-or-death situations, there is no time to think about what is happening, the body must just act. This is why we might be able to move out of the way of an oncoming car before we even consciously realise it. To be able to do this, the brain restricts the flow of information to the prefrontal cortex, which is responsible for thinking, planning, reasoning, problem solving, decision making and impulse control. This is simply because we do not need to use these skills in a life-or-death situation.
And therein lies the problem with this highly sophisticated human ability in today’s environment: prolonged exposure to the stress response associated with the design of this modern world and society’s expectations within it.
Stress in the modern world
Fortunately for us, today the world is a much less dangerous place. Unfortunately, these responses have been fine-tuned over millions of years of evolution, and the world is changing so fast that the evolution of the brain has not had a chance to catch up.
Based on our past experience and the societal beliefs that have been ingrained in us since birth, the brain misinterprets too many things as a potential threat. The amygdala is in constant overdrive, as a typical contemporary day shows:
- The haste in driving to work quickly or catching that train or bus on time
- The pressure of that morning barrage of emails to get through
- The anxiety of that presentation or speech you have to give
- Getting that project done on time
- The tenseness of that upcoming exam, test, or social gathering
- The unease associated with constant money problems
- That persistent tension that you are not achieving enough
None of these situations are ‘life-threatening’. But we have conditioned our brains to perceive them this way. We believe if we fail that presentation, we may get fired. The fact is, you are very unlikely to completely ‘fail’ your presentation, and even if you do, you are unlikely to get fired. And even if this so-called ‘worst case’ scenario does occur, there is a good chance some new doors will be opened for you that would have never otherwise materialised. Not to mention the immense benefits associated with learning from your mistakes, which leads to genuine personal development.
Instead, we stress about the presentation, limiting the ability of our prefrontal cortex to function at its full capacity, and sabotaging ourselves. And it doesn’t stop at the presentation, but continues for multitudes of inconsequential events during the day. As a result, we are in continual ‘stress mode’, continually pumping our bodies with hormones that were designed only to be used for very short periods of time.
There is nothing inherently wrong with exposure to stress. Sometimes stress is good for us. It pushes us and helps us get through difficult situations. Where we go wrong is that:
- We are exposed to prolonged periods of stress; and
- Our relationship to stress is suboptimal.
Prolonged periods of stress
As mentioned, we tend to interpret almost everything as a threat, inducing the stress response for even the most insignificant events. We stress about money, work, relationships, exams, interviews, speeches, our social media image, what to do for our kids’ birthdays and the list goes on. And it is not just our brains that are affected negatively by prolonged exposure to stress.
When we are stressed, our brain reduces blood flow for certain bodily activities such as digestion. If you think about it, when you are in a life or death situation, the preference (of course) is that we won’t need to use the bathroom at this time. This is why extended periods of stress can sometimes lead to problems such as stomach ulcers and a weakened immune system. The body will switch off non-vital functions to a certain extent when stress hormones are circulating throughout our body. How can any of your organs function at their optimal levels if you are continually in fight or flight mode, restricting their access to nutrients, blood flow and oxygen?
The body was simply not designed to be in this state for long periods. Period.
Our relationship to stress and our body
What’s even worse than stressing about more things than we probably need to? Stressing about stress itself.
What is stress after all? If you look at it closely, stress is simply a release of chemicals in your blood stream which, to you appears an accumulation of uncomfortable physical sensations in your body. These sensations trigger you to take action against a threat, which is what they were originally designed to do.
This is how life uses the universal law of cause and effect to your advantage. These chemicals are an effect of the external stimuli, which is the cause for the physical sensations you feel in your body. These physical sensations have the effect of making you react in a certain way. In the past, this has meant survival. Today, it is very different.
We often react to stress by stressing more. We don’t like these uncomfortable physical sensations. So we get angry, frustrated or depressed that they exist and try to push them away. These emotional reactions to these sensations trigger the further release of chemicals such as cortisol in our bloodstream. This produces even more uncomfortable sensations, leading to a self-propagating chain reaction.
This is exactly how negative-thinking patterns embed themselves in our neural networks.
- It starts with a thought such as “I’m not good enough to do this”.
- This triggers a chemical flow in your body that starts as an uncomfortable tightness in the chest which may slightly restrict your breathing.
- The body tenses and the brain functions less effectively from reduced oxygen and blood flow.
- You feel heavy and cloudy and react to these physical sensations with worry and anxiety. Or you may get angry that you feel like this.
- You feel something is ‘wrong’, and this triggers further similar negative thoughts which lead to more uncomfortable sensations and the cycle goes on.
And we don’t stop there. We start developing unhelpful habits to subdue these feelings. We try to escape these uncomfortable physical sensations by suppressing our awareness of them – we drink, smoke, watch too much Netflix, work too much, take on too many social commitments or even consume drugs – all to get away from what is actually a harmless, impermanent feeling.
The Power of Sensation
As we’ve seen, by reacting to these feelings and physical sensations, we reinforce their control over us. Repetition turns these reactions into habits.
Many studies have shown that habit formation occurs when the basal ganglia, a part of the midbrain immediately connected to the amygdala, thalamus and hippocampus, takes over the prefrontal cortex. Our responses to most stimuli are decided in this area. We create habit loops that strengthen over time and it is extremely difficult for any amount of rational prefrontal-lobe thinking to overpower that. In other words, it is very difficult for rational thought to overpower deeply ingrained habits.
You cannot tell someone who is afraid of dogs that the harmless little dog standing in front of them won’t hurt them. The rational brain won’t compute – it’s already too late. Based on some past learned experience, the amygdala has sent its fight or flight signals and uncomfortable physical sensations are popping up all over the body. The person is in a state of fear and the amygdala has this habit of stopping the brain from functioning at its full rational capacity. Emotion trumps reason.
An alcoholic knows that they should not drink and that it is doing them harm. But when the physical sensations associated with the thought of drinking become strong enough, they cannot help themselves. If you observe the situation closely, the alcoholic is not addicted to the alcohol itself, but the fact that the alcohol numbs the uncomfortable physical sensations they are experiencing (aversion) and produces pleasant sensations all over the body. The person is craving for that feeling, not the substance.
Similarly, but to a lesser extent, we are constantly thrown about by the sensations we feel on our bodies. If you observe yourself very closely, you will notice that at every moment you are experiencing some sensation on your body. They will be either pleasant, unpleasant or neutral. You will then notice that there is an impulse to act. The habit pattern of the mind is to try and get away from the unpleasant sensations (aversion) and want more of the pleasant sensations (craving). As long as there is craving and aversion within us, we can never be fully satisfied. We will always be restless and looking for something.
If you observe closely, you will notice that every action you take, ‘mood’ you are in or even your current outlook on life, will be based on the types of sensations you are feeling.
If you are feeling uncomfortable sensations, you will notice negative thoughts accompany this feeling. “What’s wrong with me?”. A mere two hours later you might start feeling ‘good’ again, and positive thoughts will accompany this: “My life is great!”. But nothing about your life has changed in those two hours! Only the sensations you are feeling on your body have changed. You are simply reacting to the sensations on your body. Why should we limit ourselves and be restricted to this behaviour pattern?
If you feel ‘stressed’ you might crave some comfort food to feel better. If you observe a heavy feeling in your chest, you might feel anxious or like a failure, and have an impulse to do some online shopping to make this feeling go away.
These sensations control almost every part of our lives, including most actions we take. We need a way to be free from the hold our sensations have over us – from the mind’s habit pattern of always craving for pleasant sensations and having aversion toward unpleasant sensations.
Enter Meditation
Why Meditation Works
By accepting and having equanimity towards the present moment, exactly as it is, we are breaking the mind’s habit pattern of craving and aversion. This is meditation. We break the cycle of cause and effect in the mind and body and in this state of balance, tensions start to naturally unwind.
In this equanimous state of mind, the body stops producing the ‘stress’ chemicals associated with the sympathetic nervous system’s fight-or-flight response. The parasympathetic nervous system’s ‘rest and digest’ mode kicks into gear, which is synonymous with a state of healing. But to do this, the body and mind must be in a state of complete contentment – not wanting anything, nor trying to push anything away. In other words, no craving or aversion.
Eventually the existing chemicals that have been flowing in the blood stream get used up and the body and mind is back in balance, also known as a state of homeostasis. They do not become a cause for further discomfort or stress. But this is only achieved when we stop adding fuel to the fire – when we stop reacting to our internal emotional states.
“Contentment and equanimity are why gratitude practices work so well – we are signalling to the mind and body that we are satisfied with what we have. So we move out of survival mode and into healing mode – a state filled with happiness, peace and goodwill.”
If you think about it, everything in the universe is governed by the law of cause and effect. You see it in nature, in your interactions with people and even in technology. If this happens, then that happens. And as we’ve seen, every effect is a cause for something else. Just like the interaction of the mind and body during the stress response. You may refer to this as the butterfly effect. You cannot escape it. Or can you?
This does not mean that all our actions are predetermined. In fact, it’s the opposite. While some people’s habitual behaviour can be generally predictable, we all still have the unique ability to choose our response to any given situation. Let’s see how this process works in the brain.
What Happens in Your Brain When You Meditate
Meditation is the process of self-observation. As we observe ourselves in an objective manner, we are effectively changing the actual connections between neurons in the brain. This acceptance of and non-reaction to the present moment actually prevents the repetition of old unhelpful neural connections or ‘habit patterns’, which then slowly get unwound and with enough practice, can completely disappear.
Our brains open up and become pliable and flexible, just like when we were children, giving us (albeit slowly) that sense of awe about the world again. Relying less on deeply ingrained unconscious habit patterns, the brain goes into learning mode and has the space to create new connections between neurons, also known as synapses. We start replacing our old unhelpful reactive habit patterns with the skills that we are practicing in meditation – focus, patience, diligence, resilience and loving-kindness. Just like when we go to the gym to train our muscles, we are training these qualities in the mind.
This has been proven in various studies which show that the hippocampus, which is responsible for learning, memories, spatial orientation and the regulation of emotion, increases in size with meditation practice. Alongside this, the brain volume associated with the amygdala, decreases in size, making one less reactive to their environment.
Another study that looked at those who practiced self-observation meditation, showed that extensive practice slowed down and prevented age-related thinning of the frontal cortex that otherwise contributes to the formation of memories. The study found that meditators aged 40-50 years old had similar amounts of grey matter in their cortex as healthy 20-30 year olds.
The Cycle of Suffering
To understand why meditation works, we also need to look at the way we process our environment.
As we’ve already partly seen in the stress response, most of our interaction with our moment-to-moment reality can be characterised as follows:
- Internal and external stimuli are processed by the five senses by consciousness, which simply cognises that an event has occurred. The mind can also be categorised as a sense – for example, it cognises that a thought has occurred.
- Perception recognises the data and, based on previous stored experience and neural pathways, labels or categorises it to give it an evaluation – positive or negative. There is an initial release of chemicals into the body to prepare it respond to the input if necessary.
- Sensations arise in the body, either pleasant or unpleasant, based on how the input is perceived. Sometimes the sensations can be neutral – meaning that the input has not been evaluated into a category by perception. Then liking or disliking occurs:
- If the sensation is pleasant, the mind wants to prolong and intensify the experience, trying to hold onto it as long as possible.
- If the sensation in unpleasant, the mind wants to stop it and push it away.
- Sensation is usually always followed by an impulse to act. Reaction occurs only when the feeble impulse of liking or disliking turns into stronger craving or aversion towards particular sensations in the body. When we react by longing for more pleasant sensations and trying to push away unpleasant sensations, we create further activity in the body and mind, which are the cause for a further release of chemicals throughout the body.
- This cycle leads to suffering – always craving for pleasant experiences and having aversion towards unpleasant experiences. Unless this habit pattern of the mind is broken, we will never be content.
This whole process occurs so quickly that we often don’t even notice. However, if we observe carefully, we can witness this habit pattern of the mind. Let’s say you hear the words “we need to talk”. Cognition recognises that a sound has occurred. Your perception interprets these words as ‘bad’, and immediately, unpleasant sensations fill your entire body. Reaction takes place almost instantly, as you start disliking these sensations, strengthening them by trying to figure out what is wrong. If the conversation doesn’t occur until later, you start obsessing over the situation and possibly even trying to subdue any unpleasant sensations through various suppression strategies.
Actually, perception and sensation are so interrelated that perception often occurs both before and after sensation. But the resulting effect is exactly the same.
You may, for example, be experiencing an unpleasant emotion, for whatever reason, which is producing feelings of heaviness and lethargy. Perception kicks in and interprets these physical sensations to mean that things are not working and that you are inadequate. You feel an impulse and react with frustration, anger or even sadness, becoming the cause for further feelings of lethargy, which you again react to with aversion. This process eventually saps all our energy. We refer to it as the cycle of suffering.
The cycle of suffering also applies to pleasant sensations. We may buy a new toy and feel great…for a little while. We may finish a task or accomplish something and feel amazing…for a little while. When those sensations disappear, we become unhappy again. If we become attached and try to hold on to these sensations as long as possible, this simply creates more suffering when they inevitably fade away. All sensations are temporary, even positive ones. We can still learn to enjoy their existence, without becoming attached to them.
It is also important to know that if no evaluation is given to an input, the sensation can also be neutral. The sensation will remain neutral as long as it is not evaluated. However, we often evaluate neutral sensations as ‘boring’, and react in the typical ways we do to boredom – with aversion – and try to find some entertainment. To see this, you just have to look at any group of people almost anywhere and see what proportion of them are spending their time scrolling through their phones.
The Path Out of Suffering
However, from the diagram, you can see that there is hope. There is a point in the chain where you can break the cycle of suffering.
- Consciousness is always there, so you cannot stop registering inputs. Even if you stopped all of your senses, your mind will still cognise internal phenomena. And it is obviously not possible to destroy all the objects in the world!
- Perception also cannot be stopped – liking and disliking occur automatically based on our past experiences – this is stored deep in the subconscious and cannot be changed by conscious thinking or rationalisation – only through experience.
- You cannot stop sensations from occurring. However, our most common method of trying to find peace is by supressing sensations through distractions or intoxicants, or expressing them through repeating our unhelpful habit patterns (such as yelling at someone or getting into a fight).
- Reaction – this is the point where you have control over what happens next. When you feel an impulse to react, you choose whether you react and strengthen your current habit pattern – or short-circuit that unskilful neural pathway to create a totally new way of living.
In most of us, the reacting part of the mind has become strong and the cognising part has become weak. We continuously react to our inputs instead of just trying to see them for what they really are, without evaluation or judgment. We can train ourselves to simply cognise again, without placing an evaluation on, and reacting to, every single experience we encounter.
The point where we choose our reaction to both our environment and resulting impulses is the point where we can reverse this process. The key link that can interrupt this process of cause and effect, its hold over us, and provide us a way out of suffering.
Cause, Effect and Meditation
All the benefits associated with meditation stem from its power in breaking this cycle of cause and effect. At the heart of meditation is the ability to observe the process of what is happening in this moment (i.e. reality) and not reacting to it. When we don’t react to our momentary circumstances, we transcend beyond the law of cause and effect. And, as far as we know, only we are capable of this – no other animal can do this. When you observe all other species of animals, they are bound to, and simply products of, their environment.
This is why a human being can be put in almost any situation and still have the ability to choose their response to that situation. It is how we have been able to excel beyond pain and make it to where we are today. Perseverance in the face of hardship.
This is what Viktor Frankl was talking about when he said:
“Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms—to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.”
After spending 3 years in various concentration camps including Auschwitz, Frankl realised that despite being subject to some of the harshest conditions on earth, he could find meaning in his suffering, and freedom from it, by simply choosing how he responded to the suffering. If he could do this in a concentration camp, where death was constantly around the corner, it could be done anywhere.
Frankl believed when we can no longer change a situation, we are forced to change ourselves. Most of us eventually realise, some later rather than sooner, that no matter how much we try to manipulate the world around us, we have very little control over most of our circumstances. And if we think we do, life always has a very good way of eventually smacking us right in the face to prove this to us.
The Value of Our Suffering
It is true that from the moment we are born, to the moment we die, we are subject to pain and suffering. From the growing anxiety associated with puberty, to our first relationship ending, our loved ones passing away, our possessions breaking or disappearing, and even the disease and impairment that comes with old age, the only constant in our lives is change. While all these situations involve some level of pain, they don’t have to involve suffering.
These events only have power over us because of the effects they produce on our bodies, namely the sensation we feel and our attachment to those sensations. We often describe this as ‘pain’ or ‘painful experiences’. We turn pain into suffering because we don’t like it and try to push it away. As we’ve seen, this act of aversion begins the chain reaction of suffering by activating our body’s survival mechanisms.
Instead of suffering, we can transmute this pain into experiential wisdom. By changing our relationship with our physical pain, which is deeply interlinked to our mental pain, we can learn to observe all these experiences objectively. When we learn not to react with craving or aversion towards pleasant or unpleasant sensations, we become free from their power over us.
“Pain is inevitable. Suffering is optional.”
It reminds me of one time when I was walking from the train station to my car after work. I had had a fairly stressful day and all of a sudden, one of the cars near me had its alarm go off. It was a high-pitched shrieking sound. I immediately noticed anger and annoyance rise up inside me, and along with this, a burning sensation in the base of my chest flowing up to the front of my neck. I had already been meditating for a couple of years so I was starting to get the hang of self-observation in these kinds of situations. I carefully and objectively observed these weird uncomfortable sensations in my chest and neck.
In that moment, I realised that I was not reacting to the sound of the alarm, but to the uncomfortable physical sensations in my body. The moment I realised and saw this for what it was, those sensations suddenly disappeared and along with that all my frustration simply melted away. The sound continued exactly as it was, echoing through the street, but I was completely at peace. Seeing that truth, I then understood what true wisdom really was.
The Importance of Experience in Meditation
The real benefit of meditation is the experiential wisdom gained through active observation of the unfolding of life within oneself. When you meditate you are witnessing the internal bodily processes and reactions within yourself and thereby experiencing it. Experience of how reality actually unfolds transforms your beliefs into real wisdom.
Just as you can’t learn to ride a bike by reading about it, you can’t make progress in meditation unless you actually practice it. It is the actual experience of meditation that changes you.
The difference in the situation above was that I actually experienced this truth rather than intellectualising it. Instead of actively thinking “I’m not really reacting to this sound…“, I went inside and actually witnessed this process. When the mind sees something with clarity, its underlying beliefs and perceptions adapt and change. This can’t be done by reading about or discussing something. Just as you would only truly know how salt tastes when you actually taste it on your tongue, and not from reading about it or hearing about it from someone else. This process is true experiential wisdom.
Meditation is about getting comfortable in your own skin
Once we stop reacting to the physical and mental discomfort that our environment produces in us, we diminish its influence over our actions. Then we start acting rather than reacting. This is how we create the life that we want. Rather than letting our environment and circumstances dictate where we go, we take back power over our life.
Therefore, we can say that meditation is ultimately about getting comfortable in our own skin. It’s a process of self-observation. A journey of self-discovery, where we experience the truth of the nature of reality within ourselves. All the great philosophers, sages and saints of the past have always given similar advice:
“Know thyself”
And there’s a very good reason for this. Only when we truly know ourselves do we get our power back. Master your relationship with your mind and body, and you will easily master the universe around you. You will be able to persevere beyond any obstacle or hardship.
Conclusion
The ups and downs of life will always be there. Wherever we go we are bound to face difficulty and hardship. While our path will sometimes be smooth, sometimes it will be full of prickly thorns. Why not learn how to put on shoes on and walk straight over it with ease? Meditation is your trusty pair of shoes for the journey of life.
So next time you begin to feel agitated or restless, look inside to see what you are really reacting to. Are you reacting to the situation? Or to the uncomfortable physical sensations inside you? See what happens when you just let go and fully embrace being alive in that moment, exactly as it is. You never know what you may learn.