The mystical experience and its neural correlates.

Three types of spiritually transformative experiences—near-death experiences, psilocybin experiences, and meditative experiences of cosmic consciousness—share common features including expanded awareness, profound lasting life changes, and reduced neural activity in major brain centers such as the Default Mode Network. The authors propose that decreased activity in brain regions that normally act as a filter or reducing valve allows expanded awareness, which is linked to lasting transformation. This synthesis draws on case studies, controlled clinical research, and neurophysiological data.

Study at a glance

Abstract

Abstract: Despite their different etiologies, three types of spiritually transformative experiences (STEs)--near-death experiences, psilocybin experiences, and meditative experiences of cosmic consciousness--appear to have attributes that are common to a broad range of mystical experiences, including an experience of expanded awareness. In addition, all three appear to be associated with profound and lasting transformations in the lives of experiencers. Finally, these three experiences appear to share some common neural correlates. In this article, we discuss similarities in case studies of these STEs, in data from controlled clinical research studies on their transformative effects, as well as from neurophysiological data correlated with the occurrence of STEs themselves. In all three STEs, research shows a reduction in neural activity in the major centers of the brain, including the Default Mode Network, the foundation of egoic stories involving the narrative related to oneself and the world in which one lives. It is proposed that during these STEs, reduced neural activity in areas of the brain that normally act as a filter or reducing valve mechanism opens the capacity to expanded awareness, which is associated with lasting transformation in the lives of experiencers.