Lumosity Brain Training

Um and what we found is that those who had they were then given the chance to cause punishment to this person. And I don't I won't go into it all, but they thought there was a way for them to cause this person pain. The people who didn't meditate were willing to cause this guy a good amount of pain. Now, it didn't actually happen, of course, but they thought it would. Um, those who had meditated refused to cause him any pain. They still said what he did was wrong, and they'd want to talk to him and tell him what he did was wrong. But they thought that creating more pain and suffering was not the way to go about it. And so for us, you know, right here was evidence that these practices make you kinder, make you more compassionate. The other way, what does it save you from in terms of stress? This isn't my work, but there's a lot of work on prayer. And so when people pray, especially if you're reciting formal prayers, not so much if you're just having a conversation with God, but if you're saying the rosary or you're reciting, you know, Hindu sutras or any formulaic prayer, what it typically does is it reduces your respiration rate. Not only does it reduce your respiration rate, but it also tends to increase the duration of the exhalations. And this is for meditation as well. What does that do? I mean, you talk about breath work a lot on your show, right? What it does is it um increases veagal tone, reduces heart rate. It puts the body in a state where it is not expecting um threat or challenge in the environment where it wants to engage and be more open to socialization. It reduces cortisol responses. And so what it's basically doing there is yes, you're saying the words, but it's reducing the stress in your body. And even if you're praying about things that are bothering you, things that you're sad or anxious about, by saying those prayers over and over again, stuff travels up the vagus, right? And so by increasing exhalations, by slowing the respiration rate, it's telling your mind you're safe, things are okay, and thereby it's reducing the stress. And so when you look at that data from Tyler Vanderules that I mentioned on young adults who pray, why does it reduce stress? It's basically a way of increasing veagal tone in that in that moment and it helps you sit with the ideas of the things that are bothering you while physiologically your body's telling you you're safe. Thank you for reminding everyone that signals travel up the vagus in addition to the vag nerve controlling slowing of the heart rate when you exhale because I think we hear a lot about the vagus pathway and um most people get it wrong. You got it exactly right. Um there's a lot of information flowing out from the body and that actually helps answer the question that was um in the back of my mind heading into this conversation which was um well I I'll tell by way of anecdote how I arrived there my high school girlfriend was Greek Orthodox a lot of Greeks in our family and it it wasn't like that movie my big fat Greek wedding but it wasn't dissimilar either to go over there you know and Greek Easter and like people were breaking plates and all the festivities. But one thing I learned spending time with people in the Greek Orthodox community is um there was a lot of prayer. Mhm. Um in their family. Uh there were also a lot of use of worry beads. Um you know these like beads that people would um would use not unlike spinners, right? Um but uh often while reciting prayer, this was more in the older generation in in her family and friends. Um, and there was also a lot of superstition that comes up in that movie. But there was a lot of superstition. So I asked her, I was why why all the superstition. Uh, why the worry beads? And she said, oh because um that replaces what the mind would be doing if you weren't manipulating these beads and and um carrying out, you know, kind of superstitious activities. He's like the superstitious activities as long as they don't take over your life um replace things that are much worse, darker thoughts, more terrifying ideas about terrifying things that that you don't want to happen. So, it's about it's about replacing all all of that with uh with repeating themes, literally loops of of thought that um of course they could break out of and interact. I'm not suggesting all Greeks are like this, by the way. I love Greek culture. I love the food. I love I think they're wonderful people. Um, but it's very interesting that at least within that culture, they've adopted s quote unquote superstitions are somewhat accepted. Again, they're somewhat generational. Um, worry beads and prayer and ritual, you know, and all these things sort of blend together seamlessly. Like you wouldn't say, oh, you know, they're over there using worry beads, then they're doing superstitious activities or um or reciting things in a superstitious way. But, you know, it's all kind of blended into the culture in a way that they seem like very happy people, I must say. Very joy joyful a lot of the time. A lot of the time. Yeah. I mean, I the way I like to think about these rituals as you're mentioning is they're really sophisticated mindbody practices. Like, you know, we we're a culture that wants the life hack. Give me the life hack so that I can study more. Give me the life hack so that I can save money or lose weight. Rituals are like sophisticated packages of life hacks where a life hack is like playing a single note on a piano. A ritual is like a symphony. So let me give you an example that kind of picks up on what you're saying. So one of the thing that cuts across everybody's lives unfortunately is that we have to we will grieve at some point. We will lose somebody and we will have the pain. Um and so I was interested in looking at at mourning rituals, right? And what is one thing that almost all religions do when somebody passes? you you eulogize this person and it seems normal, but when you think about it, it's kind of strange because if I just lost a job that I loved or if my wife just decided she was going to leave me, I wouldn't want to think about daily how wonderful this person was or this job was because it would increase the pain. But with someone passing, it does the opposite. So George Banano who's one of the nation's leading um bereavement researchers at Colombia he says one of the biggest predictors of who can move through grief successfully and by that I mean it doesn't get too intense or it doesn't go on too long that it becomes paralyzing is who can consolidate positive memories of the deceased person. The better you are able at doing that the more you'll move through grief successfully. And then you're talking about superstitions. You know, if you look at at the Jewish morning ritual of of Shiva, I won't say this is a superstition, but there are elements to it that some people think are strange. Like when someone passes, you cover your mirror. Why would you cover your mirror? Well, there's lots of research in psychology that shows when you look into a mirror, whatever emotion you are feeling becomes intensified. So if you're happy and you look into a mirror, you'll feel more happy. If you're sad, you'll feel more sad. Those are solid data. Those are solid data from the like the 1970s or ' 80s. Interesting. Yeah. And so, um, they would give people emotional inductions. They'd have group who would look into the mirrors and groups who didn't. They would then measure their emotions after. Always goes up. Selfies. Just kidding. And so, by simply covering mirrors at a time when you were feeling intense sadness and grief, it reduces that. They also in during shiva, you're supposed to reduce self-focus. So, you're not supposed to shave. You're not supposed to wear your best clothes. There's work coming out showing that reductions in self-focus and focusing on you and your needs actually reduces grief. It's also the case that every day during the seven days of Shiva, your community has to come with come to your house and uh prayers are said in what's called a minion which is a minimum of 10 people. So people will come and they will say prayers together and while they're saying prayers they're kind of you know swaying in unison and saying the same words in unison that's something in psychology we call motor synchrony right what is motors synchrony it's simply moving your body in synchrony with someone else so in my lab we've shown that if we bring people in and we have them engage in motor synchry so you know let's say you and you and I don't know each other we sit down um you put on earphones I put on earphones or headphones and in front of us is a little sensor It's really not a sensor, but it looks like a little pad. And we play you tones, and you're supposed to tap that sensor every time you hear the tone. And in some conditions, we have these people who have never met hear. So, they're tapping in unison. In other cases, they're completely random, and so they're not synchronized at all. through a whole set of shenanigans that I won't go into. What then happens is is one of the persons is is is put in a situation where they need help to complete a task or they're going to be stuck there for a long time and not get credit for this study. If we had tapped in unison, people report feeling more connection to this person. They report feeling more compassion for their plight. and by 30% more they're willing to go help that person spend their time taking on some of that person's burden. Now, if you ask them why do they do this, they'll say, you know, I I feel like I must know this person, like maybe he was in my class last semester or maybe it was a party I was at. But that action of synchrony, right, is a cue to the mind that these two are joined. We kind of see this if you see flocks of birds or you see schools of fish, you kind of see a greater hole even out of individuals because they're moving together. And so it's an ancient marker to the mind that we are joined. People don't have insight to that, but yet they feel that connection and they can't explain it. So they create a story for it. What happens at Shiva when you say these prayers? You're surrounded by at least 10 people who are doing them in synchrony with you. What is that going to do? It's going to increase the empathy and the compassion you feel. It also happens just in religious community in general. Like I talked earlier about why are the effects of religious community better. What are you normally doing? You're singing together. You're praying together. You're sitting and kneeling together. That's a subtle signal to the mind that you are more connected and it will increase your empathy for each other. Having been a summer camp counselor in college, uh it was incredible to see the transition between the first day kind of shyness and awkwardness of the kids and then you get them singing together or or hanging out around a campfire one night by the next day. It's almost like they'd known each other for a year. Um the you know, there were other factors at play there. Uh but it's remarkable and um I I believe that nervous systems link up relatively easily if they're given the right they're going to train with each other the right opportunity. Uh it's just inherent to our species and to you know schools of fish have lateral lines. They measure each other's uh electrical signals without without trying. I think humans uh we I think we overemphasize that the extent to which this happens through speech. I think happens a lot more through bodily things. And um we had an expert in uh the evolution of human speech on here a few years ago, Eric Jarvis, who's a a excuse me, not Colombia, the Rockefeller. I almost insulted him in New York. He would never say that. Um and Eric um is a very accomplished dancer in addition to the the incredible science he does. And he told me that people now believe based on genetics, anatomy, and more that song evolved prior to spoken language, which makes sense. And so song and dance were the more um evolutionarily ancient forms of language and speech came out of that. So it makes sense that we would that we would bond that way. Um you mentioned um people sitting Shiva in Judaism. What other sorts of um activities that in other religions that you see around grieving seem to serve this kind of purpose? I've been to an Irish wake that was definitely a different experience. People laughing and telling jokes and stories. There was some crying too. Um certainly grieving was happening but in a very different way. Um I believe you grew up Catholic. Is that right? Okay. So what about some of the other forms of grieving in other religions? Yeah. So, you know, it's funny. Um, friends of mine who are Jewish will always say,