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I read an interesting article about brain function and meditation. The article asked the question: Is the human brain capable of internally causing change to its structure and function without the use of external tools. If so, to what extent? They gave the example, if a piano player practices her arpeggios day after day then her brain begins to change so every time her index finger reaches for an arpeggio, the middle finger automatically follows and involuntarily plays at the same time. The brain was “re-wired” in a sense, so even when the piano player is not at the piano, her brain still correlates movement of the index finger with simultaneous movement of the middle finger. Her external actions caused a developmental alteration of the brain, producing new physical effects. Our input-output and box system fits nicely with this example. The input is practicing the piano, which leads to the change in brain structure development, which releases a changed physical output.

Scientists then asked, with the Tibetan Buddhist monks in mind, if your brain could change structure without an external input like practicing the piano. Could just sitting, meditating, and thinking alter brain structure? A study was held where scientists ran an fMRI on both a group of Buddhists Monks and a group of volunteers with jobs and families who said they meditated for about 40 minutes a day. In the group of moderate daily mediators, there were signs that showed evidence of increased grey matter in stimulated parts of the brain. It was mostly the right hemisphere that was affected, and more specifically the regions of the brain associated with attention: the main focus of meditation. When they ran the study on the monks, the change in brain structure was enormous. The change was, “of a sort that has never been reported before in the neuroscience literature.” (Science Journal)

Is meditation a form of “exercise” for our brain? To what degree are we capable of ‘conditioning’ our brains and what physical effects does this have our bodies? Where is this power of change coming from if there is no material, external influences? How can the mere act of thinking or meditating physically change our bodies, and how does this relate to our box, I-function, input-output system?