BODY AND SOUL

Mindfulness and happiness

Thanks to important work by Joseph LeDoux at New York University, we know that a person can be conditioned via their amygdala and thalamus to be scared of things that really aren't worth being scared of. We also know that it is extremely hard to override what the amygdala 'thinks' and 'feels' simply by conscious rational thought.
That said, there is some fascinating early work that suggests Buddhist mindfulness practice might tame the amygdala. Paul Ekman of the University of California San Francisco Medical Center, a renowned researcher on basic Darwinian emotions, is, like Davidson, in the early stages of studying Buddhist practitioners. So far, he has found that experienced meditators don 't get nearly as flustered, shocked or surprised as ordinary people by unpredictable sounds, even those as loud as gunshots. And Buddhists often profess to experience less anger than most people.