{"id":230828,"date":"2026-02-07T17:09:49","date_gmt":"2026-02-07T23:09:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2026\/02\/meditation-can-reshape-your-brain-activity-study-reveals"},"modified":"2026-02-07T17:09:49","modified_gmt":"2026-02-07T23:09:49","slug":"meditation-can-reshape-your-brain-activity-study-reveals","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2026\/02\/meditation-can-reshape-your-brain-activity-study-reveals","title":{"rendered":"Meditation Can Reshape Your Brain Activity, Study Reveals"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a class=\"aligncenter blog-photo\" href=\"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog.images\/meditation-can-reshape-your-brain-activity-study-reveals2.jpg\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Meditation may <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sciencealert.com\/psychologists-figure-out-three-ways-to-clear-your-head-of-new-thoughts\">calm the mind<\/a>, but a recent study suggests it can also reshape brain activity by profoundly altering brain dynamics and increasing neural connections \u2013 somewhat similar to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sciencealert.com\/psilocybin-breaks-depressive-cycles-by-rewiring-the-brain-study-suggests\">psychedelic substances<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>As a result, meditation may help practitioners achieve a hypothesized state known as \u201cbrain criticality\u201d, in which neural connections are <a href=\"https:\/\/www.quantamagazine.org\/a-physical-theory-for-when-the-brain-performs-best-20230131\/\">neither too weak nor too strong<\/a>, but at an optimal level for mental agility and function.<\/p>\n<p>In the study, led by neurophysiologist Annalisa Pascarella of the Italian National Research Council, researchers used <a href=\"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1038\/s41596-025-01295-w\">high-resolution brain scans<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sciencealert.com\/new-approach-to-machine-learning-could-make-chaos-more-predictable https:\/\/www.sciencealert.com\/new-approach-to-machine-learning-could-make-chaos-more-predictable\">machine learning<\/a> to examine how meditation can alter brain activity to achieve an equilibrium between neural chaos and order.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Meditation may calm the mind, but a recent study suggests it can also reshape brain activity by profoundly altering brain dynamics and increasing neural connections \u2013 somewhat similar to psychedelic substances. As a result, meditation may help practitioners achieve a hypothesized state known as \u201cbrain criticality\u201d, in which neural connections are neither too weak nor [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":396,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-230828","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-robotics-ai"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/230828","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/396"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=230828"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/230828\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=230828"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=230828"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=230828"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}