Richie Davidson’s talk at Google is rather boring but his findings are important. Meditation is not some weakling activity. It is critical for top performance and for brain workouts. Since the brain is plastic or maliable, we need to approach improving ourselves through neoroscience.

In the future, we will treat mental exercise as just as critical as physical exercise. Mental exercise will make cultures that adopt healthy minds the optimised ones that shape all of humanity.

Neuroplasticity:

the brain is built to change in response to experience. It is clear that the intentional deployment of mental strategies can transform our cognitive and emotional self. The Newtonian conception of genetics is that you have a set ability and that is it. That you can’t change your brain….this is false.  Through purely mental practices, you can change the way your brain and body perform tasks. Can we voluntarilty enhance compassion? Yes, of course we can. Meditation makes you feel better and be so full of joy.

The Anterior Insula:

It’s part of the brain that contains a topical map of the body. So this region communicated to the different parts of the body. The meditative pros can actually communicate to their body parts.

Temporoparietal Junction:

the ability to adapt another persons perspective and those who are advanced meditators have a more developed TPJ:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temporoparietal_junction

Dictator Game:

Training your brain to process thoughts and allow thoughts to enter and exit your mind without issue is highly powerful. A mindfulness trained person actually has better performing brain power + cellular structure. The rest is detail….