Technologies of Transcendence: Validating Embodied Practices to Promote Health, Resilience, and Meaning-Making

Project overview, aims, approach, and impact — a single-page executive summary.

Principal Investigator: D. Vaughn Becker, PhD — Arizona State University

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Specific Aims

Rates of depression, addiction, and loneliness—“diseases of despair”—are rising. Many people turn to psychedelic substances for spiritual insight and relief, yet these remain inaccessible or risky for many. In parallel, millions are rediscovering ancient embodiment practices such as ecstatic dance, yoga, and meditation. These practices may act as endogenous entheogens, producing awe, transcendence, and meaning-making without pharmacological agents. Yet little is known about their efficacy, their mechanisms, or which practices best serve which individuals.

Our long-term goal is to develop evidence-based, accessible interventions that enhance resilience and flourishing. Our central hypothesis is that embodiment practices improve psychophysiological regulation and meaning-making, and that individual differences can predict optimal practice-person matches.

Aims

Aim 1: Characterize embodiment practices across diverse populations.
- Surveys of practitioners, students, and “entheogen-prevalent” festival-goers.
- Outcomes: mystical experiences, well-being, diseases of despair, individual differences.
- Hypothesis: Embodiment practices produce entheogenic states comparable to psychedelics and reduce despair-related outcomes.
Aim 2: Test embodiment practices in controlled interventions.
- Two RCTs with Wearable health tracker biometrics:
- • Guided Ecstatic Dance (vs aerobic/yoga control)
- • Ambient Music Meditation (vs silent control)
- Outcomes: HRV (RMSSD), EEG alpha asymmetry, sleep, resilience, meaning-making.
- Hypothesis: Dance and meditation outperform controls on biomarkers and subjective flourishing.
Aim 3: Develop predictive models and translational tools.
- Integrate survey and biomarker data with machine learning.
- Build a web application to match individuals to practices based on profiles.
- Hypothesis: Profiles (e.g., collectivism vs individualism, motivational style) will predict optimal interventions.

Impact: This project will establish embodiment practices as validated, scalable interventions for mental health, expand equitable access by loaning wearables to those who cannot afford them, and contribute to NIMH’s mission of developing novel approaches to prevent and treat mental illness.

Research Strategy

Significance

Problem: Rising depression, anxiety, loneliness, and addiction. Psychedelics show promise but remain restricted and not universally acceptable.
Opportunity: Ancient embodiment practices (dance, meditation, yoga nidra) are accessible, culturally grounded, and scalable.
Gap: Lack of rigorous biomarker and controlled trial evidence. We do not know who benefits most, nor how practices compare.
Importance: Validating these practices could expand the mental health toolkit with low-cost, safe, and inclusive interventions.

Innovation

Endogenous entheogens: Tests whether embodiment practices function as entheogenic technologies.
Wearable integration: Wearable health tracker HRV, sleep, and activity monitoring scaled beyond lab constraints.
Personalization: Predictive modeling to match practices to individual differences.
Equity focus: Loaning devices ensures inclusion of participants unable to afford wearables.
Cross-cultural: Replication planned internationally (Amsterdam, Cologne, Guatemala, Asia hubs).

Approach

Aim 1: Surveys

Samples: ~5,000 across students, practitioners, festival-goers.

Measures: Mystical Experience Questionnaire, Quest religiosity, loneliness, PHQ-9, AUDIT, motivational/personality measures.

Analyses: Latent profile analysis, SEM, cross-cultural invariance.

Expected Outcome: Evidence that embodiment practices yield mystical/meaningful experiences and reduce despair, comparable to psychedelic outcomes.

Aim 2: Controlled Interventions

Study 1: Guided Ecstatic Dance

Design: RCT, N≈150, 6 sessions + follow-up. GED vs aerobic+yoga control.
Outcomes: HRV, EEG, mystical experiences, resilience, connection.
Hypotheses: GED improves HRV (RMSSD), left frontal alpha activity, and resilience vs control.

Study 2: Ambient Music Meditation

Design: RCT, N≈120, 6 sessions + follow-up. Ambient vs silent meditation.
Outcomes: HRV, EEG (theta/alpha), sleep quality, meaning-making.
Hypotheses: Ambient meditation induces greater relaxation, mystical states, and HRV improvements than silence.

Common Methods

Biomarkers: HRV (RMSSD, SDNN), EEG asymmetry, cortisol (subset).
Self-report: mystical states, resilience, well-being.
Monitoring: Wearable health trackers loaned to ~200 participants across waves.
Analyses: Mixed models, cross-validation with biomarkers.
Equity: Devices loaned to ensure inclusion for those unable to afford.

Aim 3: Predictive Models & Translation

Data integration: Combine survey + biomarker data.
Machine learning: Train classifiers to predict optimal practice-person matches.
App development: Web-based tool to recommend practices.
Expected Outcome: Personalized, scalable pathway to flourishing.

Future Directions

Expand to yoga nidra and Waking Up app trials.
Replication at international partner sites.
Community dissemination via films, podcasts, and a public website.
Translation into clinical toolkits and facilitator guidelines.

Deliverables

Peer-reviewed publications (6–8).
Open, preregistered datasets.
Predictive practice-matching app.
Public-facing outputs (website, media, outreach).

Broader Impacts

Mental health: Validates non-pharmacological interventions for resilience.
Equity: Expands inclusion by providing devices to those without access.
Public health: Provides alternatives for those unwilling/unable to pursue psychedelic therapy.
Cultural: Illuminates ancient practices as living tools for meaning-making.

Capacity for Success

PI: D. Vaughn Becker, PhD – expertise in psychology, motivation, and embodiment.
Co-Is: John Allen (psychophysiology, EEG, HRV), K.J. Patten (cognition & perception).
Team: Expert facilitators in dance, meditation, yoga.
Institutions: ASU (lab + recruitment), Cologne & Amsterdam (international reach).
Track record: Funded grants, peer-reviewed publications, open science.

Human Subjects and Ethics

Minimal risk: Soreness, emotional discomfort, wearable irritation.
IRB: Pending at ASU, Cologne, Guatemala (Q4 2025).
Consent: Multilingual, electronic + written.
Confidentiality: De-identified, HIPAA-compliant.
Compensation: Fair and non-coercive.

Timeline

Year 1: Surveys + pilot RCTs.
Year 2: Full RCTs (dance + meditation).
Year 3: Analysis + predictive models.
Year 4: International replication + dissemination.

Public Health Relevance

This project will evaluate how ancient embodiment practices—such as dance and meditation—improve mental health, resilience, and meaning-making, providing safe, accessible, and scalable alternatives for preventing and reducing depression, addiction, and loneliness.

Embodiment Festival Wearable Study Protocol

Purpose

This study examines whether participation in an embodiment festival, including practices such as ecstatic dance, meditation, breathwork, and movement, is associated with changes in stress, recovery, sleep, and well-being over time.

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Study Design

This is a single-group longitudinal study with repeated measurements at four time points:

Baseline week, 7 days before the festival
Immediate post-festival
1-week follow-up
1-month follow-up

Participants who use a wearable device will upload screenshots of summary metrics from their device or app, along with brief self-report surveys.

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Participants

Eligible participants are:

18 years of age or older
Attending the embodiment festival
Using a wearable device that provides summary metrics such as HRV, resting heart rate, and sleep
Willing to upload screenshots and complete brief surveys

Participants do not need to upload raw device exports. Screenshot uploads are sufficient.

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Measures

Wearable metrics:

Heart rate variability, if available
Resting heart rate
Sleep duration
Sleep quality or sleep score, if available
Recovery score, if available

Self-report measures:

Perceived stress
Mood
Calmness or relaxation
Sleep quality
Energy or fatigue
Practice engagement and perceived benefit

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Procedure

Baseline week

For 7 days before the festival, participants will continue their usual routine and upload one screenshot per day from their wearable app or device. Screenshots should show the relevant summary values for that day or night.

Festival period

Participants attend the festival and participate in sessions as they normally would. Participants will also complete a very brief daily check-in, if desired, to record stress, sleep quality, and general well-being.

If possible, they will log which sessions they attend. Here we do not want to interfere with the process, however, so we will make daily logging available, but reassure participants that they can wait until the end to report their activities, and that even this is not crucial if it detracts form their integration processes.

Immediate post-festival

Within the same day as the final festival session, participants will complete a short survey on stress, calmness, mood, and overall impact of the festival.

1-week follow-up

Seven days after the festival, participants will upload screenshots of wearable summary metrics from the prior few days or from the most recent day, depending on device availability and participant preference. They will also complete a short follow-up survey.

1-month follow-up

Thirty days after the festival, participants will repeat the same follow-up process:

upload screenshots of wearable summary metrics
complete a short survey on stress, sleep, mood, and continued practice

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Screenshot instructions

Participants will be given clear instructions on how to protect privacy before uploading screenshots.

They should:

crop the screenshot so that only the relevant metric values are visible
remove names, email addresses, account information, and device identifiers
remove any profile pages, menu bars, or unrelated content
keep only the summary metric display needed for the study

If participants are unsure whether a screenshot is safe to upload, they should err on the side of cropping out more rather than less.

The study team will review uploads only for the research metrics and will not request additional identifying information beyond what is needed for follow-up contact.

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Data handling

To protect confidentiality:

each participant will be assigned a unique study ID
identifying contact information will be stored separately from study data
uploaded screenshots will be used only for extracting the relevant metrics
no screenshots will be shared outside the research team

The study team should minimize collection of unnecessary information and delete or archive identifying contact information separately from research records.

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Ethics and privacy

This design is more privacy-conscious than raw screenshot collection because participants are instructed to crop identifying information before uploading. Even so, screenshots may still count as personal data if they can be linked to an individual, so the consent form will clearly state:

what data are being collected
why they are being collected
how screenshots should be cropped
who will see the data
how long the data will be kept
that participation is voluntary and withdrawal is allowed

Participants should provide explicit consent for collection of health-related data such as HRV, heart rate, and sleep metrics.

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Primary outcomes

The main outcomes are:

change in HRV from baseline to each follow-up
change in resting heart rate
change in sleep metrics
change in stress, mood, and calmness

Secondary outcomes include:

association between number of sessions attended and outcome change
persistence of effects at 1 week and 1 month
differences by practice type or engagement level

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Analysis plan

The simplest analysis will compare each participant’s baseline values with post-festival values at each follow-up.

Depending on sample size, you can also use:

repeated-measures models
change scores
subgroup comparisons based on practice attendance or wearable type

A useful summary figure would show average change in HRV, resting heart rate, and self-reported stress across the four time points.

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Practical notes

Because devices vary, the study should specify which screenshots are acceptable and what metric labels should be captured. We will develop device specific guidance to standardize instructions for participants so that uploads are as comparable as possible across devices.

For the People with Money

Specific Aims

Aims

Research Strategy

Significance

Innovation

Approach

Aim 1: Surveys

Aim 2: Controlled Interventions

Study 1: Guided Ecstatic Dance

Study 2: Ambient Music Meditation

Common Methods

Aim 3: Predictive Models & Translation

Future Directions

Deliverables

Broader Impacts

Capacity for Success

Human Subjects and Ethics

Timeline

Public Health Relevance

Embodiment Festival Wearable Study Protocol