How Meditation Has Helped Jaylen Brown Become A Better Basketball Player

BOSTON — Jaylen Brown certainly isn’t new to meditation. In fact, it seems the practice has been one of the only constants over the past few years of his career.

In 2018, he spoke at length about his relationship with meditation — and a ton of other off-court topics. During his bout with COVID-19 in October, he said he practiced “a couple of times per day,” sometimes in sessions lasting hours, to try and restore his breathing.

And after he returned to the court Monday following an eight game absence because of a hamstring strain, Brown opened up about how mediating regularly has helped him retain his physical abilities into his fifth season in the NBA.

“My body definitely has changed over the years and it sounds kind of cliche, but meditation has really helped me take my game to another level, feel my body, get a better sense of myself and being able to control my breathing on the floor,” Brown said after Monday’s defeat of the Houston Rockets. “I look to do that more and l learn new and different ways to continue to improve my body and my health.”

Brown dropped 19 points in his first game back, though he revealed postgame that he wasn’t feeling his best and was dealing with tightness before tip-off. It still was an impressive effort, and alongside a continued hot streak from Jayson Tatum, it was enough to pull Boston to 10-8 on the season.