How TM Changes the Brain
A discussion with Dr. Sarina Grosswald
Severe stress can shut down the prefrontal cortex, which is like the commander-in-chief of the brain,” said Dr. Sarina Grosswald, the executive director of PTSD and stress-related disorders for the David Lynch Foundation.
“TM rebalances the brain chemistry…. TM creates the brain waves associated with settledness,” said Dr. Grosswald. “As you experience it over and over, these brain connections get stronger, and the connections related to trauma begin to fade away.
According to Dr. Grosswald, the military takes an academic approach to stress reduction, requiring soldiers to complete stress management courses before deployment. If soldiers were equipped with meditation they might be less likely to develop PTSD during combat.
“You can teach somebody something from a book, but a lot of that goes out the window when trauma happens,” she said. “With TM, you’re training the brain so the threshold for stress is different… Soldiers could come back to a baseline quicker, responding in a clearer way.”
