Joe Dispenza Retreat Findings: Can the Mind Change the Body?

Key Takeaways

What this article examines
This article reviews peer-reviewed research published in Communications Biology (Nature group) evaluating whether intensive mind-body practices can produce measurable biological changes in humans.

What was studied
Data were collected from participants attending a 7-day Joe Dispenza meditation retreat that combined education, meditation, and healing rituals. Pre- and post-retreat testing included brain imaging (fMRI), blood-based multi-omics, and cellular functional assays.

Research question
Can sustained mental and emotional training—without drugs or medical interventions—produce objective, reproducible changes in brain function, immune signaling, metabolism, and gene regulation?

Key findings

•  Brain networks reorganized: Reduced default mode and salience network activity, with increased global neural integration.
•  Neuroplasticity increased: Blood plasma promoted nerve cell growth and neural repair.
•  Cellular energy metabolism shifted: Increased glycolysis without mitochondrial burnout.
•  Immune signaling rebalanced: Coordinated increases in both inflammatory and anti-inflammatory markers.
•  Endogenous opioids rose: Significant increases in β-endorphin and dynorphin.
•  Gene regulation changed: Altered microRNA and neurotransmitter-related pathways.
•  Stress and mood metabolites shifted: Changes in serotonin pathways, cortisol, and testosterone.

Why it matters
The findings suggest that mental training alone can trigger multi-system biological change, affecting the brain, immune system, metabolism, and gene expression. This provides mechanistic support for mind-body approaches as biological, not merely psychological, interventions.

Bottom line
This research does not claim meditation replaces medicine, but it demonstrates that how we think, feel, and attend to experience can measurably influence human biology within a short time frame.

The Full Blog

In this blogpost and accompanying video tip, I discuss a recent peer-reviewed paper published in Communications Biology (one of the Nature group of journals). The first author is Alex Jinich-Diamant. It was published in November 2025. The citation is available at the bottom of my blogpost.

As of Dec 29, 2025, the paper has been accessed over 100,000 times and has an altmetric score of 162, placing it in the top 1% of papers cited by other sources such as blogs, conventional and social media. This doesn't prove the results are true, but it indicates the paper is getting a lot of attention.

This paper compares biological measures before and after a 7-day Joe Dispenza retreat. Some of you will remember Dr. Dispenza from the controversial book and movie The Secret; others may have read his books, such as Breaking the Habit of Being Yourself or Becoming Supernatural. If you have wondered at any juncture whether his claims could possibly be true, this blog will be of interest.

What Was Measured?

Before and after the retreat, participants underwent

• fMRI brain scans to measure neural connectivity,
• blood draws for proteomics, metabolomics, and transcriptomics (studying proteins, metabolites, and RNA molecules),
• cellular studies to test how their plasma affected nerve cell growth and metabolism.

The researchers examined many of the same biological measures using the same tools as the premier ME/long COVID researchers, including Dr. Ron Davis’s big-data Stanford study, along with brain imaging and QEEG.

The Results: Meditation Rewires Neural Networks

Brain imaging showed that meditation didn't just calm the mind, it restructured communication between major brain networks.

• Functional integration in the "default mode network" (DMN), the system linked to self-focused thought and mind-wandering, decreased dramatically (p = 0.00009).

*** Technical note: A finding is considered statistically significant if it could happen by chance less than one in twenty times (a p-value of 0.05). The p-value of 0.00009 means the probability that it was a false finding occurring by chance is less than one in 10,000. This level of significance rarely occurs in human research, especially after a 7-day intervention.

• The salience network, which decides what we pay attention to (and is hyperactive in stress), also quieted significantly (p = 0.000003).
• Across the brain, "modularity" dropped (p = 0.001)—meaning the brain became less divided into isolated regions and more connected as a whole.

In summary, meditation helped participants' brains move from a noisy, overthinking mode toward a state of integrated awareness—less mental chatter, more coherence. These findings are consistent with many other studies of meditation, summarized in the highly recommended book Altered Traits, which explains how meditation changes brain function and structure via neuroplasticity (Goleman, 2017).

How Thoughts Change Blood

The scientists didn't stop at brain scans. They zoomed in on the molecular level, analyzing participants' plasma (the liquid part of blood) before and after the retreat. These next findings are from blood samples.

Brain Growth Factors Surged

When researchers added participants' plasma to nerve cells in a lab dish, something amazing happened:

• Post-retreat plasma made nerve cells grow longer neurites (tiny branches neurons use to communicate)—a sign of increased neuroplasticity (p = 0.01).
• On the molecular side, blood tests revealed upregulation of proteins linked to neural growth.

Together, these findings show that meditation and mental reframing can biochemically prime the brain for learning and repair.

The Body's Energy System Shifted Gears

When scientists exposed human nerve cells to participants' post-retreat plasma, they found a major metabolic transformation:

Cells began producing more energy through glycolysis, the "fast-burning" energy pathway (p = 0.008). Mitochondrial and total ATP production didn't change, indicating the body was reallocating energy use, not burning out. This shift from oxidative phosphorylation (OXPHOS) to glycolysis is a surprising new finding. We typically consider OXPHOS more adaptive because more energy is produced over the long term, but glycolysis can produce short, fast bursts of energy when needed and can be adaptive. Glycolysis may allow for the dramatic increases in heart-brain cohesion and massive spikes in gamma brainwaves on QEEG, consistently reported among intensive participants (Dispenza, 2019).

Inflammation Was Reset—Both Up and Down

Interestingly, inflammation-related proteins didn't just go down—they balanced out.

After the retreat, inflammatory markers increased slightly, signaling immune activation and repair (p = 0.0001), and some anti-inflammatory molecules also rose (p = 0.03).

This dual pattern suggests an intelligent immune recalibration, not the blunt suppression typical of anti-inflammatory medication. The body seemed to enter an immune reset state, clearing out damage while restoring balance.

Natural Opioids Increased

Another striking result: the endogenous opioid system, which governs pleasure and pain, became more active. Blood samples showed significant rises in both β-endorphin (p = 0.0002) and dynorphin (p = 0.009), two natural opioids that relieve pain.

These are the body's own "feel-good" chemicals—evidence that meditative states naturally trigger the brain's reward circuits. This also links meditation to the placebo effect, in which belief and expectation release the same biochemical messengers, including endogenous opioids, as actual treatments do.

Changes Reached the Genetic Level

In participants' exosomes (tiny vesicles that carry RNA instructions between cells), scientists detected major changes in microRNA expression—small molecules that regulate gene expression.

At least 66 protein-coding RNAs were altered after the retreat. Pathway analysis showed enrichment in serotonin and dopamine neurotransmission, confirming that participants' mental work was reshaping molecular communication networks throughout the body.

Metabolites of Mood and Stress Changed

A study of thousands of molecules in the urine revealed deep shifts in the tryptophan pathway, the biochemical route that produces serotonin, the "happiness molecule." Levels of L-tryptophan, tryptamine, and related molecules decreased, consistent with higher serotonin turnover and enhanced emotional stability.

Cortisol and testosterone levels trended lower, aligning with the participants' reports of calm, clarity, and reduced stress.

The Research Question: Can the Mind Influence the Body?
Can sustained mental and emotional training, without drugs or medical interventions, produce objective, measurable changes in brain function, immune signaling, metabolism, and gene regulation and more?

What Happens at a Weeklong Joe Dispenza Retreat?

The retreat combines

• Education/reconceptualization: 30+ hours of education, reframing experiences to see the mind as a driver of healing (note there are no claims that the mind is the only driver).
• Meditation: 33 hours of guided meditation focusing on awareness, heart-centered stillness, and presence.
• Healing rituals: the most woo-woo aspect of the retreat is three coherence healing sessions in which some act as healers and some, typically people with significant physical and mental health diagnoses, are "healees." The hypothesis is that 6–8 people synchronizing their heart and brain energy and directing it toward the healee will assist with healing.

My Experience

I have been curious for years about what a weeklong Dispenza retreat would be like, and I finally attended in person in December 2025. I went as a rank-novice meditator and found the meditations and music surprisingly engaging. I had some pretty cool experiences, enough to open my mind that there might be something to this.

It was a very hard week, but by the end, I felt I had learned a lot and experienced shifts in my thinking that I could build on into the future.

As an aside, I was very impressed with the Dispenza organization. The 2000 participants were organized into color groups and split up so that there were no long waits to enter, exit or eat. I hung out with the greenies and talked to several repeat attendees, who shared the benefits they have experienced.

When I had a question, someone at the "meditation support desk" answered it respectfully and usefully. The team seemed to be walking the walk. Dr. Dispenza was present for every moment of the 70+ hours of the weeklong retreat. The food was decent (though not very hot). The ingredients of every buffet-style dish were noted, and there were vegetarian, carnivore and gluten-free options at every meal.

Would I go back? It was expensive and grueling to attend 14+ hours a day for 7 days. I have set myself the task of practicing daily to improve my skills, and yes, I would consider going back in the future—my choice is the Cancun, Mexico beach location.

Skepticism About Joe Dispenza

For over 20 years, Dr. Joe Dispenza, DC, has been pushing the boundaries of mind-body medicine. He seeks to understand the power of meditation and spiritual practices through the lenses of biomedicine and quantum physics. In 2006, he was featured in The Secret, a book and movie about manifesting one's goals through thought alone.

He has created workshops of varying durations, teaching people how to change their lives and their health through mind-body practices. If you search for "Dr. Joe Dispenza recovery" online, you will find hundreds of testimonials (not all verified) of people who claim to have recovered from a wide range of health conditions, including complex chronic diseases, cancer, infertility, and even genetically determined conditions like cystic fibrosis.

For years, people have rightly asked, "Where is the evidence?" To answer this call, Dispenza created an arm's-length nonprofit foundation, the Inner Science Research Fund, which has raised the funds needed to analyze the mountain of data collected during week-long retreats over the past 10 years. The science is performed by a growing team at the University of California, San Diego.

Two recent papers stemming from this research describe changes in the blood after meditation that are protective against SARS-CoV-2 infection (Juan P. Zuniga-Hertz et al., 2023) and biological changes measured in twins who attended a week-long intensive compared with their co-twins who were not there (J. P. Zuniga-Hertz et al., 2025).

Why Mind-Body Research Matters

For centuries, healing traditions have claimed that consciousness influences health. Modern science is finally catching up, and now, with high-throughput multi-omics technology and neuroimaging, we can see it happening in real time. In this study, mindful awareness, emotional reframing, and intentional practice led to measurable changes without drugs or biomedical interventions.

This study doesn't argue that meditation replaces medicine, but it reveals that changing how you think, feel, and act can alter

• how your brain networks talk to each other,
• how your immune system balances inflammation,
• how your cells produce energy,
• how your genes regulate repair and resilience.

It's not magic. It's the mind meeting the body at a biological level.

To see the Video Tip corresponding to this blog, click here.

If you liked this blog, you may also like the following similar blogs:

https://www.eleanorsteinmd.ca/blog/can-mindset-improve-your-health

https://www.eleanorsteinmd.ca/blog/skeptics-are-welcome

https://www.eleanorsteinmd.ca/blog/what-is-neuroplasticity-and-how-does-it-work

https://www.eleanorsteinmd.ca/blog/the-powerful-connection-between-our-brain-danger-and-chronic-pain

If cutting-edge topics like brain science and the mind-body interface interest you, please join my Live! with Dr. Stein community. Learn from the live Zoom calls, ask your questions and make your request for topics for me to research and share.

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References

Dispenza, J. (2019). Becoming Supernatural: How Common People Are Doing the Uncommon: Hay House LLC.

Goleman, D. D., R.J. (2017). Altered Traits: Science reveals how meditation change your mind, brain and body. New York: Penguin Random House.

Jinich-Diamant, A., Simpson, S., Zuniga-Hertz, J. P., Chitteti, R., Schilling, J. M., Bonds, J. A., . . . Patel, H. H. (2025). Neural and molecular changes during a mind-body reconceptualization, meditation, and open label placebo healing intervention. Communications Biology, 8(1), 1525. doi:10.1038/s42003-025-09088-3

Zuniga-Hertz, J. P., Chitteti, R., Dispenza, J., Cuomo, R., Bonds, J. A., Kopp, E. L., . . . Patel, H. H. (2023). Meditation-induced bloodborne factors as an adjuvant treatment to COVID-19 disease. Brain, Behavior, & Immunity - Health, 32, 100675. doi:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bbih.2023.100675

Zuniga-Hertz, J. P., Simpson, S., Chitetti, R., Hsu, C. F., Huang, H. P., Jinich-Diamant, A., . . . Patel, H. H. (2025). Multidimensional Analysis of Twin Sets During an Intensive Week-Long Meditation Retreat: A Pilot Study. Mindfulness (N Y), 16(6), 1634–1655. doi:10.1007/s12671-025-02584-x

Dr. Eleanor Stein is a retired physician and psychiatrist who now dedicates her career to empowering people with complex chronic conditions—such as myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome  (ME/CFS), fibromyalgia, environmental sensitivities, long COVID and chronic pain—to reclaim their lives through science-based education using self-management, circadian biology, neuroplasticity, hormesis and quantum biology.

With over 35 years of clinical practice in Calgary, Alberta, Canada, along with research and decades of lived experience navigating ME/CFS, fibromyalgia, and multiple chemical sensitivity (MCS), Dr. Stein uniquely blends rigorous medical insight with personal resilience. Her online resource platform offers live group courses, self-study programs, webinars, blogs and a podcast to support patients and health care professionals worldwide.