Most meditators who use psychedelics perceive them as beneficial for their meditation practice. Among 863 regular meditators (practicing at least three times weekly for the past year) who also used psychedelics, machine learning identified four factors most likely to predict this positive perception: greater frequency of psychedelic use, setting intentions before use, higher agreeableness, and having used N,N-Dimethyltryptamine (DMT). The model explained about 27% of the variance. The findings suggest that intentional and personality factors may shape how psychedelics influence meditation, but causality remains unestablished.
Most meditators who also use psychedelics report that the drugs improve their meditation practice. In a survey of 863 regular meditators who had used psychedelics, 73.5% said psychedelics positively influenced the quality of their meditation. Machine learning analysis of 53 variables identified the strongest predictors of this perceived benefit: greater frequency of psychedelic use, setting intentions before taking psychedelics, having an agreeable personality, and having used N,N-Dimethyltryptamine (N,N-DMT). The results suggest that individual traits and patterns of use shape whether psychedelics are seen as helpful for meditation, but causality cannot be established from this cross-sectional data.
Meditation encompasses various mental training practices that improve attention and emotion regulation. The electrical brain activity of highly skilled meditators engaging in one of six meditation styles (shamatha, vipassana, zazen, dzogchen, tonglen, and visualization) was recorded, with a mind-wandering task as a control. Lempel-Ziv complexity revealed differences in nonlinear brain dynamics (entropy) during meditation compared to mind wandering, suggesting that meditation, regardless of practice, affects neural complexity. However, no differences were found in power spectra across six frequency bands, likely because participants engaged in different practices. Exploratory analyses indicated neurological differences among meditation practices.