Ethan, you reported on physiologic changes related to heart rate variability, but I have to ask if you really understand the measurements and data in the paper. I have a background in medicine and physiology, and I had to research a lot of the terminology they were using. After doing so, I was left with the thought, “So what?” My point is, people measure stuff all the time, but that doesn’t make the measurements relevant. Similarly, brain imaging studies can give an indication of what areas of the brain are being activated, but that that does not translate into a specific functional activity.

I fully support meditation and mindfulness. There are many benefits to these practices, including real physiologic benefits. When citing medical research to validate these benefits, a critical review of the studies is needed, and that can be very challenging. There’s lots of measurements and statistics out there that get published that are garbage. It’s often difficult to distinguish the junk from the gold. I’m not saying that the study you cited is garbage, but it might be.