The Science of Meditation

A radical reinterpretation of mental exercise from two New York Times bestselling authors - "What if we could exercise our minds like we exercise our bodies?" - backed by state-of-the-art scientific research

More than forty years ago, two friends and collaborators at Harvard, Daniel Goleman and Richard Davidson were unusual in arguing for the benefits of meditation. Now, as mindfulness and other brands of meditation become ever more popular, to fix even more about our lives, they reveal the cutting-edge science of how smart practice can change our personal traits and even our genome for the better.

Drawing on the kind of cutting-edge research that has made them giants in their fields, Goleman and Davidson sweep away neuromythology and reveal what we can learn from a one-of-a-kind data pool of world-class meditators. They share for the first time remarkable findings that show how meditation can cultivate - without drugs or high expense - qualities such as focus, selflessness, and compassion.

For beyond the pleasant states that mental exercises can produce, purposeful, sustained mind training can create altered traits: sustained, beneficial qualities of thinking, feeling, and acting that are accompanied by lasting, supportive changes in the brain.

Demonstrating two master thinkers at work, The Science of Meditation explains precisely how and when mind training benefits us. More than daily doses or sheer hours, we need smart practice, including crucial ingredients such as targeted feedback from a master teacher and a more spacious, less attached view of the self, all of which are missing in many versions of mind training. Exploring, too, how new technologies can really help with meditation, this is the truth about what meditation can do for us today.

Gripping in its storytelling and grounded in new research, this is one of those rare books that has the power to change us at the deepest level.