You ever be driving somewhere, and then suddenly realize you don’t remember the last 20 minutes of the road? Or maybe you were working on something, then looked up and had no clue how much time passed or where your body even went?
That wasn’t some glitch in your brain. That was your frontal lobe showing up to do its job.
Back then, I used to watch people pray and fast and do all the right religious things. me included. But none of it fixed the emotional chaos inside me. The anxiety. The sadness. The constant pain of living with a narcissistic mother who knew exactly where to stab me every time I hoped she’d love me back.
So I left the rituals. Not because I stopped believing but because they weren’t helping. It wasn’t until I discovered the science behind focus, awareness, and the frontal lobe that I finally understood: the problem was never with the religion. It was with how we’d been taught to do it on autopilot, with no understanding of the real inner work it requires.
If you’re doing the rituals but still feel empty, exhausted, or stuck. it’s not your fault. It’s your brain trying to survive without you leading it.
Let’s talk about what actually happens in the brain during moments of deep spiritual focus and how that knowledge can finally set you free. in the brain during moments of deep spiritual experience, and how it can help you stop feeling stuck in your own survival loop.
When the brain stops time, space, and self
Let’s break this down, because most people have never heard this, even though they experience it all the time.
You know those moments when you’re so deep in thought, maybe driving, cleaning, or even working, that you suddenly snap back and realize you haven’t noticed your body, the clock, or anything around you? That’s not zoning out. That’s your frontal lobe doing a full takeover.
When your frontal lobe kicks in and you’re focused on something meaningful, it signals your brain to quiet everything else: your body sensations, your environment, even your perception of time. That orientation center in your brain, the superior parietal lobe, normally helps you know where you are in space. But under deep concentration, that region goes quiet.
This is exactly what researchers like Dr. Andrew Newberg found using SPECT scans on meditating monks and praying nuns. The field studying these changes is called neurotheology,(yes, it is real neuroscience of religion) and it’s blowing open old assumptions. It proves that deep spiritual experiences are not just psychological, they’re neurobiological.
That’s why spiritual practitioners often report feeling like they’re floating, timeless, or merged with something greater. The brain is literally reorganizing itself in those moments. You’re not hallucinating, you’re accessing a very real, very measurable brain state.
This shift is called disassociation, not in the trauma sense, but in the intentional sense. You’re temporarily stepping out of the programs that tell you who you are, where you live, what you’re dealing with, and what hurts you carry. Your frontal lobe disconnects the “old self” phone lines so you can become more than just your past.
And guess what? You’ve done this before, hundreds of times. You just didn’t know it. Now you can do it on purpose.
Why your most spiritual moment might happen with zero candles or crystals
You know what counts as a spiritual experience? That moment when you’re knee-deep in something, painting, writing, gardening, even organizing your messy drawer, and the whole world disappears. No past. No future. No aches in your body. Just full-on focus.
You’re not thinking about how you look, what time it is, or whether it’s even working. You’re just there.
It’s the same brain state that monks and nuns train years to enter, and you just slipped into it folding laundry. That’s the wild part.
What makes it powerful isn’t the task. It’s the quality of attention. It’s your frontal lobe stepping in to silence the usual chaos. This is intentional disassociation. not spacing out, but tuning in so deeply that your “self” falls away. The identity you wear all day. labels, wounds, patterns, goes offline.
That’s why someone deep in a hobby, invention, or act of care can experience transformation without ever setting foot on a yoga mat. They’re practicing presence. And presence is the real altar.
It’s not about the incense. It’s about the intensity of being there.
Why your rituals might not be working (and how to fix that)
Did you ever wonder why so many deeply religious people still feel disconnected, anxious, or stuck? Or why the ones who follow every rule often don’t look like they’re living in peace?
The truth is, it’s not about the ritual. It’s about the brain behind the ritual.
You can do all the right practices, prayers, fasting, reading holy book, positive thoughts, but if you’re not fully present while doing them, your frontal lobe isn’t driving the change. And if it’s not engaged, your brain just replays old emotional and behavioral loops.
That’s the painful part I had to face too: I was doing all the right things, just like I saw others do growing up. But nothing inside me changed. I was still overwhelmed, still reactive, still hoping things would get better without actually becoming someone different.
The moment I understood that repetition without awareness is just habit, not transformation. it shifted everything. Real change begins when you bring concentration, presence, and intention to the practice. That’s when the frontal lobe lights up and begins to reshape how you think, feel, and live.
The monks didn’t reach enlightenment because they chanted well. They focused better than anyone else. Their frontal lobes weren’t just awake, they were conducting a full-on internal symphony of transformation.
When you disappear, your future appears
You know how earlier we talked about what happens when your brain stops tracking time, space, and even your sense of self? This is why that matters.
When you enter that deep focus state, by just getting lost in something that means a lot to you, your frontal lobe disconnects the noisy wiring of your past. All those circuits tied to your history, personality, emotional triggers, and reactive behaviors begin to shut off.
You stop being the version of yourself who’s held together by old stories and repeated emotions. You become “nobody”. not in a bad way, but in the most powerful sense. You’ve exited the default self.
And it’s only from that state that you can intentionally start building a new version of you.
That disappearing feeling isn’t the absence of self. It’s the clearing of space for something new to grow. In that void, your brain is ready to be rewired. Your body, no longer receiving the same emotional signals, becomes ready to feel something different. And the signal you emit into the quantum field, yes, it changes too.
This is the moment transformation becomes biologically possible.
So how do you use this in real life?
Here’s where most people go wrong: they meditate, but they stay stuck in survival thoughts. They journal, but only rehearse the pain. They pray, but the mind is still in the past.
What actually works? Mental rehearsal.
Mental rehearsal is when you go into that disassociated, frontal-lobe-led state, and instead of thinking about what went wrong, you mentally practice being who you want to become.
Close your eyes, enter stillness, and rehearse:
- How you want to show up in that tough conversation.
- What it feels like to trust yourself again.
- How your body would feel if it was already healing.
- The emotions you’d live in if your future had already arrived.
And here’s why it works: when you feel it and imagine it clearly enough, your brain fires in the exact same way as if it’s already happening. Your frontal lobe sends out the signal, your body begins releasing new chemistry, and your cells start responding to a future, not a past.
This isn’t imagination. It’s transformation on a cellular level.
Do it daily. Let it feel awkward. Let it feel real. And keep showing up, even when nothing outside has changed yet.
Because inside, you’re already becoming new.
If you want to dive deeper into how your brain rewires through intention, check out my blog on Intent and the Frontal Lobe. And if you’re ready to stop waiting for miracles and start becoming one, subscribe to my newsletter given below.
I also break this down raw and real on Threads, follow me there too.
We’re not just healing, we’re evolving.
