Think meditation is just for former Beatles and people with too much time on their hands? Think again. This underrated practice could be one of the most valuable medical devices you're not using. Research has shown that it can help with everything from getting over a stressful day to staving off a potentially fatal heart attack. There are a lot of other reasons why you should shut out the world for 15 to 30 minutes with meditation.

Here are six of the most compelling benefits of meditation, supported by scientific research:

#1: Meditation can make you more productive. If you feel like you're just not as sharp as you used to be, give mindfulness meditation a shot. A study in the journal Emotion found that mindfulness, a meditative practice that requires you to sit quietly for a few minutes focusing on your breathing and other specific physical sensations without letting your mind wander, was highly effective in improving people's working memory; working memory is the short-term memory system we tap into for managing information, controlling emotions, problem solving, and complex thought. The best part? The study found that you can reap all these benefits with just 12 minutes of meditation per day.

Read More: A Mindfulness Meditation Primer