Mind tricks don't work on me, only money...
Yes. Money can buy a lot of things that are more enjoyable to be mindful of, but not everything.
The Problem of Mindfulness
21–30 of 161 posts
Re: The Problem of Mindfulness
#22The word mindfulness itself is a poor translation of the Pali word 'Sati'. The Pali word actually means 'remembering to be aware of the objects that your mind is attending to'. There is no word in western languages to capture that phrase and hence word 'mindfulness' was used to convey in a confusing manner what 'Sati' means. I have been meditating for 1 hour to 1.5 hour every day for several years and I finally got i…
I think it’s also possible that some people aren’t looking for altered states from their mindfulness practices.
Re: The Problem of Mindfulness
#23That's not awakening, that's going to sleep. Dare to be human, to have desires, to have a will. Don't just "accept" the world, shape it. You have an eternity to be nothing, be something now.
Re: The Problem of Mindfulness
#24Mindfulness was a major step forward in the exploration of the self, at least for western culture. I see this criticism as the next step forward. I too have felt some ambiguous disconnect between mindfulness and experience that this essay does a good job capturing. The goal of mindfulness is to make you realize you don't exist, and to try to reach a state where you don't exist, and teach you that your thoughts aren't…
> The goal of mindfulness is to make you realize you don't exist, and to try to reach a state where you don't exist, and teach you that your thoughts aren't your own and you have no free will. You have spent billions of years not existing, you will spend billions of years not existing, yet you also want to achieve this state of not existing within your comparatively short actual lifetime? What a waste.
This brings to mind an illustrative example made by the Buddhist teacher Alexander Berzin:
“You’re driving down the road, and another driver is doing something crazy, swerving about and you almost have an accident, and you think what an asshole!
Having the thought that the other driver is an asshole is the first obscuration that prevents omniscience. Believing this thought to be true is the second obscuration (paraphrased) that cements the prevention of omniscience.”
It’s not that “you” don’t exist. It’s that the conditioned and conventionally accepted ways that we think we exist (and by extension the ways that we project that others exist) are ultimately false and don’t correspond to reality.
Re: The Problem of Mindfulness
#25Earlier quoted context omitted.
The problem with the mindfulness approach is that it only leads you knee-deep. Enough to enjoy the waves and the joy of water, but too little to start swimming. For example, I can still see you are not accepting your past self for what it is ("I thought I was insightful and deep before") or how the world is ("would be a FAR better place"). You are on a path towards awakening. Some of us have come to understand that t…
I think this is actually the exact problem the article talks about. It’s possible to engage with mindfulness practices without buying into the entire Buddhist belief system. This comment reinforces the author’s (I believe mistaken) point, that mindfulness sneaks in a bunch of Buddhist ideology. In my experience, it’s been possible to benefit from the practices while deciding some of the more doctrinal Buddhist belief…
Well, the problem is rather simple. If you decide to only engage in mindfulness, you'll have a great time discovering things about yourself and your environment. You will feel better about yourself. That will work for a while and it might set you on a larger, longer path with more peril.
In (Mahayana) Buddhism you train more. Like the opposite: concentration. Think about the same topic for one hour, repeatedly. Who am I? Who do I think I am? What thoughts am I suppressing?
Fundamentally, it teaches you that all these things are like sliders on a big mixing console. Pushing one slider will bring the others down. Pushing mindfulness might reduce equanimity and concentration.
In the end, it is the art of letting go. If you want to hold on to something, you should be able to let it go.
Re: The Problem of Mindfulness
#26What about... reflection? To me it seems a far more effective approach to self-knowledge. Reflect on your life and experiences in a detached manner. Have a conversation with someone you trust or with yourself. Ask yourself unsettling questions. Answer them honestly. It's amazing the things you can learn this way.
Re: The Problem of Mindfulness
#27The main premise of the article seems to be that 'you are not your feelings' in mindfulness covertly introduces the idea of 'no self'.
I don't find this compelling. If anything 'you are not your feelings' reinforces the 'western' picture of a self that has (but is not identical to) feelings.
Re: The Problem of Mindfulness
#28While there are a lot of truths in this article, there's also a thread of misconception running through it, embodied most prominently in the line "Without some ownership of one’s feelings and thoughts, it is difficult to take responsibility for them." Mindfulness is about creating space between you and your thoughts, not ignoring or discounting them. It allows you to look at them subjectively, rather than being carri…
Exactly the definition of mindfulness is literally being aware of your mental state.
If being carried away by emotions is like being lost than mindfulness is developing a good sense of direction. And mindfulness meditation is the practice through which one develops this skill.
Re: The Problem of Mindfulness
#29Earlier quoted context omitted.
> The goal of mindfulness is to make you realize you don't exist, and to try to reach a state where you don't exist, and teach you that your thoughts aren't your own and you have no free will. You have spent billions of years not existing, you will spend billions of years not existing, yet you also want to achieve this state of not existing within your comparatively short actual lifetime? What a waste.
This brings to mind an illustrative example made by the Buddhist teacher Alexander Berzin: “You’re driving down the road, and another driver is doing something crazy, swerving about and you almost have an accident, and you think what an asshole! Having the thought that the other driver is an asshole is the first obscuration that prevents omniscience. Believing this thought to be true is the second obscuration (paraph…
> Having the thought that the other driver is an asshole is the first obscuration that prevents omniscience
You know what else prevents omniscience? The second law of thermodynamics. So what?
> It’s not that “you” don’t exist. It’s that the conditioned and conventionally accepted ways that we think we exist (and by extension the ways that we project that others exist) are ultimately false and don’t correspond to reality.
Again, so what? Even the simplest biochemical processes inside my body are so complex and astounding, I have no hope of ever truly understanding even a tiny part of them. I have no issue with this. I have no issue with not truly knowing "reality", or with the prospect that understanding it is literally impossible.
Re: The Problem of Mindfulness
#30That's not awakening, that's going to sleep. Dare to be human, to have desires, to have a will. Don't just "accept" the world, shape it. You have an eternity to be nothing, be something now.
The ego: indestructible, why fight?