Exploring Connections: Yoga, Meditation, and Psychic Abilities
Yoga is an ancient practice that has made a global impact in the last century, and for good reason. Yoga, which combines poses (called asanas) with intentional breathing exercises (pranayama), has been shown to improve overall health, well-being, and the sense of joy and contentment. Studies have shown that it also helps to reduce stress and anxiety while improving general cognitive functioning, including attention, emotional regulation, and self-awareness.
A deeply meditative yoga practice has also been reported to unlock extraordinary abilities. These abilities, which are called ‘siddhis’ (from Sanskrit, roughly meaning “attainment” or “power”), resemble what we traditionally know as psychic abilities. But what is the true connection between these two concepts? Pondering such a question continues to generate even more questions than answers, such as whether a yoga practice could be the key to unlocking psychic abilities, as a few past studies imply.
A publication we recently coauthored, Experimental Investigation of Precognition in Yoga Practitioners, published in the Journal of the Society for Psychical Research, and run by a doctoral student at the Swami Vivikenanda University in Bangalore, India, explores this topic in detail by investigating individuals at different stages of yoga expertise. Additionally, the possible connection of psychic abilities to demographic factors, and other relevant factors, (such as mysticism and childhood experience) were analyzed.
Laying the Groundwork
A total of 273 students were recruited from a yoga university in South India to participate in this research. Four studies were conducted with approximately one to two hundred participants per study, with four hypotheses being tested. Pre- and post-tests, online assessments, and questionnaires were the tools used to collect data from the participants.
The four hypotheses
The four hypotheses developed by researchers are as follows:
- H1: Forty days of continuous yoga practice (a minimum of 60 minutes daily) affect the precognitive ability of students with different histories of yoga practice.
- H2: Meditation influences precognitive accuracy.
- H3: More yoga experience is associated with better precognition results.
- H4: The demographic characteristics of the participants correlate with their precognitive skills.
Exploring mind-matter practices and practitioner experience (Studies 1–3)
Researchers conducted 3 of the 4 studies online using simple forced-choice precognition tests where participants had to predict shapes or images that they would later see on a computer screen. These studies incorporated pre- and post- tests with a short-term yoga course and meditation as the interventions for Study 1 and Study 2, respectively. The third study assessed the performance between students with high and low levels of existing yoga experience. Before the participants selected the images, they were informed “that when their eyes were closed they might see images or colours or hear a voice or whisper inside them associated with the image.”
Correlation between participant background and psychic abilities (Study 4)
In the fourth study of the research project, investigators evaluated any connections between precognition performance and gender, personality types, age, education, and reports of unusual childhood experiences (such as witnessing “unusual” things, having “unusual” dreams, etc.). This investigation was conducted using three questionnaires — the Gunas Scale, a Mindfulness Attention Awareness Scale (MAAS), and a Mysticism Scale (M-scale).
The Gunas questionnaire is based on Indian philosophy and measures the personality traits referred to as dullness (Tamas), passion (Rajas), and illumination (Sattva). Dullness is associated with stillness and lack of drive, whereas passion describes an ambitious, driven, and restless personality. Illumination reflects mental clarity, focus, and calm.
The MAAS questionnaire measures mindfulness in daily life, and as such it was used to explore the relationship between mindfulness and precognition. The M-scale measures how often people report having mystical experiences based on their personal sense of spirituality.
Post-hoc Analysis: Interpreting “incorrect” responses
After the main analysis, researchers ran an additional check because it appeared that the participants were consistently picking the wrong answers more often than chance would suggest. This pattern, known as “psi-missing,” could point to the intentional suppression of possible psychic abilities.
The results—Insights and trends on psychic abilities
No statistically significant results were revealed by these tests. However, interesting trends in the data were observed across the four studies.
Researchers found that a short-term yoga practice showed a weak correlation with improved precognitive abilities. Perhaps most interesting is that the post-hoc analysis revealed that participants chose the target image incorrectly more often than chance, which researchers suggest may reflect an unconscious resistance to psi (i.e., psychic abilities). In Study 2, results showed a shift between pre- and post-meditation performance, which suggests improved precognitive ability due to a meditation practice.
When comparing beginners to experienced yoga practitioners (Study 3), scores between the two groups did not differ in a meaningful way. However, in the fourth study, trends were observed regarding education and personality traits. Participants with less formal education or stronger beliefs in psychic phenomena tended to perform better. Certain personality traits—being less dull, more passionate, more extroverted, and more spiritually aware—were also weakly associated with improved results, though the connections remain complex and unclear.
Coming Full Circle
The repeated pattern of psi-missing stood out as an intriguing trend, and those results provided compelling grounds for further exploration. Additionally, complicating factors that might have negatively influenced performance could be that part of this research was conducted online during COVID with students who were new to psi testing.
As usual, more research is needed, which could allow us to achieve more impactful results by focusing on experienced meditators and improving test conditions to reduce distractions in online settings.
