{"id":133183,"date":"2024-10-11T14:51:38","date_gmt":"2024-10-11T18:51:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/?p=133183"},"modified":"2026-04-28T14:32:16","modified_gmt":"2026-04-28T18:32:16","slug":"effects-of-long-term-meditation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/effects-of-long-term-meditation\/","title":{"rendered":"Mingyur Rinpoche&#8217;s Brain: The Effects of Long-Term Meditation"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>What does long-term <a href=\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/eckhart-tolle-meditation-mindfulness\/\">meditation<\/a> do to your brain? Can it really change <a href=\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/your-genius\/\">who you are<\/a> as a person?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Yogi Mingyur Rinpoche&#8217;s brain scans reveal fascinating insights into the effects of long-term meditation. Scientists have found evidence of increased brain activity, improved <a href=\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/dr-amen-brain-health\/\">brain health<\/a>, and enhanced emotional regulation in meditation masters.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Keep reading to discover how a dedicated <a href=\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/meditation-practice\/\">meditation practice<\/a> can lead to profound changes in your mental and emotional states.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<!--more-->\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-the-effects-of-long-term-meditation\">The Effects of Long-Term Meditation<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>In the book <em>Altered Traits, <\/em>psychologists Daniel Goleman and Richard Davidson discuss the longitudinal research they performed on living masters of meditation. Much of their data on the effects of long-term meditation comes from studies of the brain of Tibetan yogi Mingyur Rinpoche. Mingyur Rinpoche began meditating at nine years old and hails from a lineage of teachers and masters of Tibetan Buddhism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>(Shortform note: Mingyur Rinpoche is also the author of five books as well as the <a href=\"https:\/\/tergar.org\/about-2\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">head teacher of Tergar<\/a>, a community that teaches meditation practices to both secular and Buddhist students. <a href=\"https:\/\/tergar.org\/about-2\/tergar-lineage\/nyingma\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Mingyur Rinpoche comes from the Nyingma<\/a>, or \u201cAncient School,\u201d lineage of Buddhism that originated in the eighth and ninth centuries when Tibetan kings began inviting Buddhist practitioners and scholars to Tibet.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The authors\u2019 lab studied Mingyur Rinpoche\u2019s brain with electroencephalographic (EEG) and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) technologies. EEG measures brain activity across time, whereas fMRI measures it across the three-dimensional space of the brain. With these variables, scientists can locate brain activity in time and space. The results of three studies of Mingyur Rinpoche\u2019s brain\u2014in 2002, 2010, and 2016\u2014include:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>When instructed to meditate on compassion, he was able to generate huge surges of brain activity in the areas that correspond to such positive emotions. The authors measured spikes of 700% to 800% in activity compared to resting levels.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>According to anatomical measures of brain health on standard distribution established by neuroscientists, Rinpoche\u2019s brain fell in the 99th percentile for men of his age (41 years at the time). That is, his brain was as fit as that of a typical 33-year-old man.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>(Shortform note: While there doesn\u2019t seem to have been any further research conducted on Mingyur Rinpoche since the authors\u2019 reports in the book, the master <a href=\"https:\/\/www2.buddhistdoor.net\/news\/yongey-mingyur-rinpoche-science-shows-meditation-can-improve-our-quality-of-life\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">continues to advocate widely for the benefits of meditation<\/a> and the importance of studying it scientifically. He recommends starting with <a href=\"https:\/\/timesofindia.indiatimes.com\/city\/bengaluru\/science-has-proved-that-meditation-can-improve-quality-of-life-buddhist-master\/articleshow\/58200304.cms\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">five minutes of meditation daily for 30 days<\/a>, beyond which he suggests you\u2019ll feel greater control over your impulses. He also argues that meditation changes the \u201cset point\u201d of your happiness. A set point is a balance that your body and mind work to maintain, such as your weight, which <a href=\"https:\/\/shortform.com\/app\/book\/the-obesity-code\/1-page-summary#fat-storage-depends-on-your-set-weight\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">you can lower by fasting<\/a>. If meditation is like fasting from impulsivity, it might lower the set point of your happiness so that you need less to feel good.)&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-trait-changes-in-meditation-masters\">Trait Changes in Meditation Masters<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>The authors say that data collection and analysis of meditation masters is ongoing. They\u2019ve worked thus far with twenty-one meditation masters\u2014yogis with thousands of hours of lifetime practice\u2014and the data are promising. In general,<strong> the effects of long-term meditation do appear to include genuine altered traits<\/strong>. The resting states of the brains of these yogis displayed complex, highly developed gamma wave activity. In other words, initial brain scans suggest that these yogis genuinely do live in states of tranquility, bliss, and presence that characterize nirvana, as Buddhist tradition claims.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>(Shortform note: The gamma wave scans that the authors describe hint at a potentially valid scientific basis for enlightenment\u2014and in <em>Stealing Fire<\/em>, Stephen Kotler and Jamie Wheal <a href=\"https:\/\/shortform.com\/app\/book\/stealing-fire\/1-page-summary#advancements-in-neuroscience\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">report similar findings from other studies on Tibetan monks<\/a>. These monks appeared to have a distinct mix of neurochemicals at play in their brains when in deep meditation. While the neurochemical signature of resting consciousness is a mix of norepinephrine and cortisol, the advanced meditators had higher levels of dopamine, endorphins, and serotonin.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Several other findings further support the conclusion that meditation masters do experience profound, tranquil states. Studies on the yogis\u2019 brains found that, while at rest, they exhibited extraordinary responses related to:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Pain: <\/strong>The yogis\u2019 brains exhibited an effortless response to pain. They demonstrated neither the anticipatory anxiety nor the lingering stress that normal people feel\u2014instead, they appeared to experience pain as it came and to not stress over it at all.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Focus: <\/strong>The yogis\u2019 brains could effortlessly deploy different functions of attention<em>. <\/em>They easily switched the objects of their attention, showed sustained attention, and demonstrated deep focus.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Compassion:<\/strong> The yogis\u2019 brains showed a stronger connection to the nervous system circuitry of their hearts. This connection manifested as an extraordinarily strong neural response that primed the body for altruistic behavior in the face of suffering.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>All of this suggests that altered traits are real and that <strong>the ordinary mode of consciousness that we take as a fixed fact of life isn\u2019t set in stone.<\/strong> Lifelong training in meditation, the data suggest, genuinely changes your brain. And, in doing so, it can transform your subjective experience of life and reality, the quality of your conscious awareness, and the behaviors that flow from that more enlightened way of being.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-table\"><table><tbody><tr><td><strong>Altered Traits Demonstrate How Malleable We Are<\/strong><br><br>These meditation-induced trait effects reveal that the brain is far more malleable than we once believed. Only decades ago, the view was that many of our traits and behaviors <a href=\"https:\/\/www.britannica.com\/topic\/biological-determinism\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">were more or less genetically predetermined<\/a> and that they solidified in early development. While <a href=\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/hub\/science\/what-is-neuroplasticity-and-how-does-it-work\/\">neuroplasticity<\/a> was accepted in basic sensory and motor domains, the idea of radically altered traits has seemed far-fetched until recently.<br><br>Today, these deep transformations exhibited by the yogis give legs to the emerging scientific appreciation for just how open and reprogrammable the brain remains throughout life. Given committed practice, even our most entrenched mental patterns can be changed.<br><br>This means that, if we can establish ways of training these capacities\u2014even at a basic level\u2014in a wider range of people, the potential for human goodness may expand greatly. Put another way, the remarkable brains of these yogis may suggest that human nature can\u2019t be understood as simply as \u201cpeople are fundamentally good or bad,\u201d but that it\u2019s something over which we have a good deal of influence.<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>What does long-term meditation do to your brain? Can it really change who you are as a person? Yogi Mingyur Rinpoche&#8217;s brain scans reveal fascinating insights into the effects of long-term meditation. Scientists have found evidence of increased brain activity, improved brain health, and enhanced emotional regulation in meditation masters. Keep reading to discover how a dedicated meditation practice can lead to profound changes in your mental and emotional states.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":133192,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,160,6],"tags":[1628],"class_list":["post-133183","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-psychology","category-science","category-spiritual","tag-altered-traits","","tg-column-two"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v24.3 (Yoast SEO v24.3) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Mingyur Rinpoche&#039;s Brain: The Effects of Long-Term Meditation - Shortform Books<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Much of the data on the effects of long-term meditation comes from a study of the brain of Tibetan yogi Mingyur Rinpoche. 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