body, thoughts in our mind. All of that is happening together.
And so there are details of the episode that we're encoding, along with the feelings associated with those details. And all that gets encoded. That process of encoding is critically regulated by a structure that we all have in our brain called the hippocampus. The hippocampus is this elongated structure that sits within the medial temporal lobes. The temporal lobes are on each side of our head, and they fold in, and on that inner surface of the temporal lobe is the hippocampus.
And the hippocampus is extremely important for encoding new memories. And in fact —
Cortland:Am I remembering right that the encoding is stronger the stronger the emotional content? Like, if you're in an emotionally charged situation versus just something that's kind of neutral, the encoding will be stronger or more enduring in some way?
Richie:Yes, generally speaking, that is true. And there have been case studies. There's a very famous case in the annals of neuroscience that's been labeled H.M. It's a particular patient that was studied by a famous neuroscientist at MIT. H.M. had damage to the hippocampus on both sides.
And H.M. was not able to remember any new information. H.M. had access to old memories that were encoded before the hippocampus was damaged, but nothing new after the hippocampus was damaged.
Cortland:So new consolidation — memory consolidation. But we can get into reconsolidation as well — but the initial consolidation was disrupted?
Richie:Exactly. The initial consolidation was disrupted.
Reconsolidation: Repackaging Our Memories
The brain's built-in mechanism for rewriting the past
Richie:So that's what this consolidation business is about. Now, what is reconsolidation? Reconsolidation is fascinating, and it's only recently been described in the neuroscientific literature. When we retrieve a memory that is an older memory — so for example, if we think of a teacher that we had in college or maybe even before college, and we remember that teacher's face, maybe how they looked — so if you're given the prompt to bring into your mind a teacher that you had in your past, the process of bringing that person back into your mind is what we call retrieval, where we are retrieving this memory from long-term storage.
Then that memory gets reconsolidated. What that means is that once we retrieve it and it's available to us — we're conscious of that — we then get to reconsolidate it. We repackage it, if you will, and then put it back into our long-term memory. So just before I mentioned thinking about a teacher in your past, I think it's likely that the vast majority of listeners — maybe a hundred percent — were not thinking about a teacher in their past.
It was not part of their conscious experience. But the moment we give the cue, the prompt to recall a teacher in your past, that is a cue to retrieve this memory. Once it's retrieved and once it's conscious, it's in a state where it can be reconsolidated. And one of the amazing things about emotional memory is that when we retrieve it, we're retrieving the memory with all of its colorful characteristics.
But when we reconsolidate it, we have an opportunity to reconsolidate it differently. And in actual fact, nothing is ever reconsolidated in exactly the same way. And that's why memory is not like a photograph of what happened in the past. It is an interpretation.
The Game of Telephone
How memories drift with each retrieval
Cortland:And probably the more times you elicit the memory and then reconsolidate it, probably the less and less accurate it gets. Because every time it's like small changes. But if you recall a memory a hundred times over the course of five years or ten years, and each time you do that, you might have different associations that now it's linked to, and then you're re-encoding it. It's like a game of telephone.
The gap between the initial memory and how it changes over time is probably changing a little bit at each step. So by the time you get to the end, if it's a hundred of those steps, it's probably radically different, but you don't necessarily feel that it's different.
Richie:Exactly. And so during this process of reconsolidation, we have an opportunity to reconstruct the memory, if you will.
Meditation as Reconsolidation
Rewriting emotional tags with a calm body state
Richie:And so in the example you're giving from the retreat, you're sitting there meditating and you're in this mode of being rather than doing. I think it's safe to assume that your body is pretty relaxed, that even though you're having these thoughts, your mind is also pretty relaxed. But these memories are coming up for whatever reason.
And another thing that's safe to assume is that the body state you're in when you're meditating is likely very different than the body state you're in when those emotional episodes originally occurred.
Cortland:Yeah, radically different in this case.
Richie:Yeah. And so this is really the rich opportunity, because you can then have these memories being retrieved and you can reconsolidate them with the calm body state that you're now in.
And so it's an opportunity to reinterpret, if you will, this emotional experience. You're going to still have the memory, but the emotional tag, the affective charge, if you will, associated with that original memory is likely gonna shift. Because you are reconsolidating this now with the calm demeanor of your meditative posture and this mode of being rather than doing.
The Alchemy of Care and Presence
Holding space for our own inner experience
Cortland:When I was thinking about this experience and the way I was relating to my experience, the analogy that came to mind is the kind of presence that we offer when we're with somebody we deeply care about who's struggling. So, for example, if you're a parent and you're with a child that's having a temper tantrum, or you're with a dear friend that maybe just suffered a terrible loss or is suffering in some way. And in those situations, it's a really interesting mix that's going on internally.
It's this really beautiful alchemy of care on the one hand, presence on the other. And oftentimes that's all it needs to be. If you're with a kid who's having a temper tantrum — I think we all know, those who are parents, I'm sure you experienced this many times — if you get in there and try to stop your kid from having a temper tantrum, not only are you not gonna stop them from having their temper tantrum, pretty soon you're having a temper tantrum. You're both just having a temper tantrum together.
But if you can stay grounded in that situation and you're just there with that caring presence and you're just holding space — there's nothing more to do than that — you kind of love them, you see that they're suffering, you're not taking it personally if they're shouting or whatever they're doing. Similarly, if you're with a good friend who's struggling and crying, you just need to be there. And again, you're fully present.
You're not checking your phone or doing other things or thinking about other stuff, but you're infusing that presence with care and concern and love. Somehow that alchemy is incredibly powerful. We know when we experience it, we know when we give it to somebody else — it's a gift. But somehow we don't learn to do that for ourselves.
In many ways, meditation — or certain kinds of meditation — is learning to have that same caring, infused presence, but we can direct it to our own inner experience. And that's exactly what I felt. It was almost like I was just opening up this space, and I wasn't trying to let go of anything or move beyond anything. But somehow that magical alchemy of care and presence just allows that stuff that's blocked and stuck in the system to start moving.
Can You Delete a Memory?
Disrupting reconsolidation — from animal models to meditation
Cortland:But the thing I wanted to ask, because you talked about reconsolidation and you can change the associations — I wonder, can you disrupt it altogether?
Because it felt in some respects — I mean, we'll see if this reemerges again, but it certainly hasn't happened since then. In this case, it almost felt like a release. It started as a block of ice and then it turned into water, and then it turned into vapor, and then it dissolved, is kind of how it felt.
I'm curious if there's any research on actually disrupting reconsolidation or blocking the re-encoding of it.
Richie:Yeah, there is. Most of those studies have been done in animal models. They're not studies that we ourselves have done, but other scientists working in animal model systems to look at very detailed circuits in the brain.
And there have been some claims, based on this work in animals, that it's actually possible to delete a memory by blocking its reconsolidation. So once the memory is retrieved, it's in this state of plasticity where it can be reconsolidated, but if you somehow block the brain's ability to reconsolidate it, you can potentially delete it, which is kind of a radical idea.
To the best of my knowledge, that has never been shown definitively in humans, because in animals you can block reconsolidation by selectively interfering with specific neural circuits, either pharmacologically or surgically. You cannot do that in humans. And so the same kind of experiment has never been done in humans. But it's certainly in principle possible using meditative strategies to do that.
Although in your case, I assume that the memory itself is not gone. You still remember the situation. It's just that the affect associated with it is —
Cortland:Yeah, that's true. It's not as though I don't remember it. That's certainly true. But the emotional memory seems to be — like now, even right now when I bring it up, oftentimes with a highly emotional situation — and this was kind of my lowest point probably in my life, emotionally, and it was incredibly painful — and there was even a visceral, almost physical feeling that accompanied it.
When I had this memory on retreat, it was the physicality of it. It was that almost energetic — like, ugh — just a feeling of awfulness. I don't even know how to describe it, that came along with the more episodic memory component to it. But now that feeling — that's fine, that's fine — is like nowhere. I don't even have a hint of that.
The Magic of Plasticity
How the amygdala and hippocampus can be rewired
Richie:And so one of the cool things is — I mentioned the structure of the hippocampus, which is so important for this — and research shows that even relatively early-stage meditators, after just a few months of practice, are showing functional changes in the hippocampus. And one of the things that is so interesting about the brain is that just in front of the hippocampus is the amygdala, and it's directly connected to the hippocampus.
It's likely that our brains are wired this way for a reason. And one of the things you mentioned earlier, Cort, is so important, and that is that we tend to remember things that are emotional better than we —
Cortland:You can see why, from an evolutionary point of view, why the brain is structured that way.
Cortland:If you're threatened, if you have a physical threat, you don't wanna forget that. So you can remember the next time you're in that situation.
Richie:Right. Or on the more positive side, if there's a really nutritious food in a particular location, you wanna be able to remember that location so you can get to that food again.
And so there are evolutionary reasons why it's important for us to have really good emotional memory. And this is probably why the amygdala, which is a key site for emotion, is literally sitting on top of the hippocampus and they're closely interconnected. But in your situation, what likely is occurring is that the negative amygdala inputs to that emotional memory are no longer there. They've been extinguished. And so you can still retrieve the memory without the associated emotion. And that's really the magic of plasticity.
From Ice to Vapor
Changing the trajectory through many small steps
Cortland:So the take-home really seems to be that it's possible for all of us, through really neuroplasticity at a more granular level, to move beyond these old patterns.
And probably one of the things that practices like meditation are doing is they're changing the trajectory and the way memory reconsolidation works. Not necessarily — I mean, maybe it's possible to delete the memories — but more importantly, we can change all the associations with the memory. So like when I think about anxiety now, actually, I feel gratitude about the experiences I've had with anxiety, because of probably all these built-up associations where I've seen how it's helped me gain insight into my own life and mind. It's helped me to be a benefit to others. It's been beneficial in so many ways. But of course it's probably hundreds or thousands of remembering, changing the associations, reconsolidating, and repeating that over and over.
Daily Resets
Practical ways to create space for healing
Cortland:So maybe we could talk about the practical side of this, because it's not like there's a quick fix, silver-bullet thing going on here. It's really just many, many small steps. But all those small steps together are incredibly powerful. So I'd love to hear what you do. There's one thing that I immediately thought of in my own life that I do regularly.
I found it incredibly helpful, and I never really thought about it from this point of view of memory reconsolidation and of releasing, reframing, and releasing all of this trauma and stuff that gets built up in our system. But it's really, for me, important to take time each day for some — what I kind of think of as daily resets. And in particular, at the end of days, I like to just lie down in my bed and just lie there for a few minutes.
A very light awareness of my body. And what I notice is it kind of feels like all this stuff has just sort of built up in my mind-body system in that given day. And I don't even really think about it because we're just rushing through the day. But when I pause — it's really just a little space for being versus all the doing.
It almost feels like all the stuff that's getting locked in the system can just move and be a little more fluid. And I can almost feel a little baby version of that release I talked about, that I experienced more intensely in retreat. So having those periods — especially at the end of the day — where it's just creating that space again, imagining like you would for a young child that's upset or a friend that's upset and just holding that space, it's incredibly healing.
And then on a smaller level, even doing that for short moments throughout the day. Like between meetings, just taking a 30-second pause, a few deep breaths, and just resting for a few moments. It's amazing to me how healing that magical alchemy of care and awareness is when I just bring it to my own mind-body system. So just for me, it's those daily resets and small momentary resets throughout the day. I'm curious if there's anything you do that has helped you, even if you weren't thinking about memory reconsolidation, which you're probably not. But what do you do?
Interstitial Spaces
Finding moments of pause in even the busiest schedule
Richie:No, that's great. One of the things I always do is around mealtime.
I'm someone that needs to eat three meals a day. And so around each meal, there are at least three opportunities to spend at least a minute or two just pausing. It's an opportunity to express gratitude for all the people it took to bring food to my body. It's also a wonderful time to reflect on our interdependence on all of these systems, and really to tune into what's going on in my body, my mind, and to allow things to settle.
When I work at home, I will often just take a break. I have a comfortable, sort of easy chair in my study, and I'll switch from my desk chair to my easy chair and just spend a few minutes letting things settle. That's helpful. When I'm here at the Center, as I am here today, I try to — to the extent that I can — build in at least a couple of minutes between meetings to reflect on the upcoming meeting in a way that could be helpful. Just thinking about how I can show up in the best possible way and be as helpful as I can to whatever it is that we're doing next.
If we pay attention, there are lots of these kind of interstitial spaces in our everyday life, even in lives that are quite busy. I would certainly consider myself to have a pretty crazy schedule. But even in the middle of this crazy schedule, if we harness it, I think there are these opportunities every day to have these brief pauses, which really can help.
Closing
Cortland:I couldn't agree more. And I think in different ways, we're both talking again about that magical alchemy between care — being of service, whether it's caring for ourselves, caring for others, caring for the world — mixed together with the healing power of awareness. And there's something just incredibly powerful about that.
So maybe we can wrap it up here. I think we uncovered a bunch of other little topics and conversations that we can pick up on in future discussions. I think the shift from doing to being is one that I would love to dig into with you maybe in an upcoming discussion. And a note of thanks to those of you who are listening to this. I think Richie and I are both motivated really just by wanting to share all of the many things that we've learned from the science, from the world's wisdom traditions, and all the remarkable people we've met over the world — just to pass on the generosity that we've been benefited by. So hopefully you found this helpful, and hopefully we'll see you in our next conversation through Dharma Lab. Thanks for being here.
DHARMA LAB · MODERN NEUROSCIENCE AND ANCIENT WISDOM