Did you know that there is a way to train your attention, feel more emotionally regulated, and generally feel less stressed? And it only takes a few minutes a day. It costs nothing, and it’s something you can do with your kids too. It’s meditation, and it’s something that you can easily learn even if you are not a spiritual person.

In this episode I’m going to cover how to meditate, so that if you’re a beginner you can feel comfortable getting started, and what actually happens when you meditate. Listen out for the amazing info about why it’s ok for your mind to wander!

I’ll also cover the brain science on what happens when you’re meditating, and some of the benefits to cognition and emotions that have been found in the research.

If you want to dive into further with meditation, try the following options. They’re not sponsors, but they’re great resources!

Find out more about the basics of meditation from expert Tara Brach: https://www.tarabrach.com/howtomeditate/

There are many mediation apps, but I can personally recommend these to get started: Insight Timer, Smiling Mind.

Papers mentioned in the episode:

Bostock, S., Crosswell, A. D., Prather, A. A., & Steptoe, A. (2019). Mindfulness on-the-go: Effects of a mindfulness meditation app on work stress and well-being. Journal of occupational health psychology, 24(1), 127.

Hasenkamp, W., Wilson-Mendenhall, C. D., Duncan, E., & Barsalou, L. W. (2012). Mind wandering and attention during focused meditation: a fine-grained temporal analysis of fluctuating cognitive states. Neuroimage, 59(1), 750-760.

Norris, C. J., Creem, D., Hendler, R., & Kober, H. (2018). Brief mindfulness meditation improves attention in novices: Evidence from ERPs and moderation by neuroticism. Frontiers in human neuroscience, 12, 277779.

Stapleton, P., Dispenza, J., Douglas, A., Dao, V., Kewin, S., Le Sech, K., & Vasudevan, A. (2024). “Let's keep calm and breathe”—A mindfulness meditation program in school and its effects on children's behavior and emotional awareness: An Australian pilot study. Psychology in the Schools, 61, 3679–3698.

Tang, Y. Y., Hölzel, B. K., & Posner, M. I. (2015). The neuroscience of mindfulness meditation. Nature reviews neuroscience, 16(4), 213-225.

Tang, R., Friston, K. J., & Tang, Y. Y. (2020). Brief mindfulness meditation induces gray matter changes in a brain hub. Neural plasticity, 2020(1), 8830005.

Tsai, S. Y., Jaiswal, S., Chang, C. F., Liang, W. K., Muggleton, N. G., & Juan, C. H. (2018). Meditation effects on the control of involuntary contingent reorienting revealed with electroencephalographic and behavioral evidence. Frontiers in integrative neuroscience, 12, 17.

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