Mindfulness makes us smarter, kinder, better? Really?

Absolutely!

At a seminar we recently attended, author and neuropsychologist Rich Hanson, Ph.D., said that numerous studies have proven that mindfulness does physically change our brains, which in turn changes our entire lives – from the inside out.

And how does this happen? Through mindfulness meditation, in which practitioners learn to bring awareness to life – not only during meditation but throughout the day.

It seems that people who practice mindfulness meditation for 20 to 30 minutes most days have different brains than people who do not meditate. For example:
• Cortical tissue, the outer shell of the brain, is measurably thicker, which means your brain power is remarkably enhanced.
• There is also a measurably thicker cortex behind the foreheads of mindfulness meditators, those prefrontal regions that help regulate attention, emotion and actions.
• Mindfulness meditation also thickens the cortex in the insula, that part of the brain that helps us understand ourselves and the emotions of other people.
• And finally, there is measurably thicker cortex in the hippocampus, the part of the brain that helps us put things in perspective.

And what about those alarm bells in our brains, which are controlled in the amygdala? Mindfulness meditators have a slightly smaller amygdala, which means those alarm bells are less blaring and they are not living life assuming the worst.

These changes start right away, as soon as you begin your mindfulness meditation practice. And even better, the positive influences continue and grow as your meditation practice continues.