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Mindfulness and meditation can worsen depression and anxiety

newscientist.com

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Re: Mindfulness and meditation can worsen depression and anxiety

#101

Post by throwaway423122 »

dTal wrote: post #26

It's important to bear in mind that meditation is a religious practice specifically aimed at causing ego-death. Yogis writing about the practice (before it became big business) freely admit all sorts of horrible-sounding mental side effects, but couch them in religious terms (and encourage the acolyte to push through until they achieve "enlightenment", which they describe as a profoundly nihilist state of being). Thi…

Thank you for saying this!

There are hundreds of meditation types and techniques, with many different effects, just like there are treatments in medicine.

Meditation is being sold as casual activity, one-size-fits-all, often by people who received only few years of training, if not months.

Please look for credited teachers with decades-long monastic experience. Ask them difficult questions.

Re: Mindfulness and meditation can worsen depression and anxiety

#102

Post by baron_harkonnen »

pmoriarty wrote: post #90
dTal wrote: post #26

It's important to bear in mind that meditation is a religious practice specifically aimed at causing ego-death. Yogis writing about the practice (before it became big business) freely admit all sorts of horrible-sounding mental side effects, but couch them in religious terms (and encourage the acolyte to push through until they achieve "enlightenment", which they describe as a profoundly nihilist state of being). Thi…

It's a mistake to think that "meditation" is only a religious practice or that it has only one aim. There are many forms of mediation, with many different aims, some religious, some not.

Can you point out some of the traditional practices of meditation that have no roots in religious traditions? I can't think of any truly secular traditions of the top of my head (or at least any that weren't invented in the last 50 years).

Re: Mindfulness and meditation can worsen depression and anxiety

#103

Post by charliemil4 »

JesseMeyer wrote: post #67
charliemil4 wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How did you get out of the tailspin? It’s quite hard to “pull up” when there is nothing that feels grounded...

There was no pulling up. And there was no ground beneath my feet. Just an endless ocean with no points of reference by which to orient oneself. So the only course of action was not to search for rocks to cling to, but of learning how to swim, and dive in. As backwards as it may read, I only felt secure after having let go of myself. As odd as this description may sound to someone who has not experienced this, it is i…

Thank you for the amazing and thoughtful help - it feels like I need to go down for a long nap.

Re: Mindfulness and meditation can worsen depression and anxiety

#105

Post by naruvimama »

dTal wrote: post #26

It's important to bear in mind that meditation is a religious practice specifically aimed at causing ego-death. Yogis writing about the practice (before it became big business) freely admit all sorts of horrible-sounding mental side effects, but couch them in religious terms (and encourage the acolyte to push through until they achieve "enlightenment", which they describe as a profoundly nihilist state of being). Thi…

In ancient India if a beggar attains a state of self realisation he becomes a yogi and would find the king visiting him/her and begging them to stay at the palace.

A king in Europe attaining self realisation could have been executed by the church.

The reason why yoga and meditation developed into an advanced form in India and not elsewhere is because self realisation has always been the ultimate goal for at least 5000 years and highly valued.

When people say "grounded" they mean their surroundings and the people around them do not approve or support their transformation and they are frightened of leaving this familiar and comfortable routine.

Ultimately machines and AI will take all the jobs, what we will have is our self, it is quite valuable for the lucky few who were able to transform yourself.

The real problem is "trying to stay grounded", you do not have to.

This is actually captured in the Indian tradition itself. One set of people who reach this transformation early in their life, and the vast majority of the people who go through the different phases in life.

Children who play Students who learn A householder who runs a family, accumulates wealth, enjoys the pleasures of life of which pleasurable sex is also one to be pursued And retirement - even kings retire, denounce all worldly possessions in pursuit of moksha

Of course there are different kinds of yoga which includes perfection of ones art, knowledge and dedication.

Of course some additional challenges today include turning yoga into a boutique business (beer yoga, wine yoga), cultural appropriation and distortion (Christian yoga, Muslim yoga & Jewish yoga) and of course repackaging vipasana and other powerful techniques void of their roots and peddling them as trademarked products.

Re: Mindfulness and meditation can worsen depression and anxiety

#106

Post by nabla9 »

uwagar wrote: post #76
nabla9 wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I just want to add that for some people the 'freak out' is psychosis, or other serious mental condition that needs immediate treatment. There are many people who come into meditation to fix something because they have a sense that something is going wrong with them. Meditation has become very popular and there is strong incentive to avoid mentioning possible negatives. Then you just ship out damaged people from the b…

while this is valid, one should take it with a pinch of salt of Not Invented Here Syndrome as meditation is generally a practice of the 'East' and there is a nervousness that it is a gateway drug to the eastern religions for the Christian / rational 'West'.

Asian monasteries have their share of weird and broken monks. Sutras and biographies are full of descriptions of people getting mentally ill. "Meditation sickness" is well documented.

Japanese Zen Master Hakuin Ekaku (1686-1769) wrote about his struggle with severe mental illness (Zen sickness he called it). He had to drop meditation practice for several years.

Re: Mindfulness and meditation can worsen depression and anxiety

#107

Post by pmoriarty »

baron_harkonnen wrote: post #102
pmoriarty wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a mistake to think that "meditation" is only a religious practice or that it has only one aim. There are many forms of mediation, with many different aims, some religious, some not.

Can you point out some of the traditional practices of meditation that have no roots in religious traditions? I can't think of any truly secular traditions of the top of my head (or at least any that weren't invented in the last 50 years).

Neither I nor the post I was replying to limited meditation to traditional practices. Nor were we talking about the roots of meditation.

Yes, the roots of meditation are in religious practices (as, are, arguably, the roots of every human activity). That doesn't mean that contemporary meditation practices are necessarily religious. Many aren't.

So if you're talking about the term "meditation" in general (as we were), to limit it to a religious practice is a mistake. It's much broader than that, even if it derives ultimately from something that once had a religious aspect.

Re: Mindfulness and meditation can worsen depression and anxiety

#108

Post by pdamoc »

yomly wrote: post #15
r34 wrote: post #7

I've been practicing meditation for several years now. The phenomenon described in the article is very obvious to every practitioner - it can happen that for some time you will feel worse (actually I'm surprised that it's only 8%). It is related to psychological mechanisms of repression, which is weakened during meditation practices. That is why during serious meditation retreats (like 10 days vipassana) some people…

I have never sat down and properly given meditation a go. That said I have encountered it in various walks - through yoga, martial arts and casual meditation sessions. What benefits would you describe you feeling from getting past beginner stage?

Robert Kegan has a constructive developmental model where he uses "Subject" and "Object" to describe the progression in development.

Basically, you identify with the Subject and at the next level you become aware that that identity is actually something you have, not something you are. Foe example, you have wants and needs you are not your wants and needs. Your identity is not grounded in the fulfilment of your needs.

Mindfulness helps with this. You stop identifying yourself with your body and you realize that you have a body. At an advanced level you stop identifying yourself with your mind and you realize that you have a mind. This ownership allows you to choose your reactions to outside stressors and to approach in a more rational manner changing the things you have. You can change your mind because you want to change it.

At ultimate level subject-object distinction disappears. Glimpses of this ultimate level can be obtained through proper use of entheogens but it is meditation that is the slow and steady road to the mountain top. In other words, you might get to experience the state in a psychedelic trip but if you want to live there, you need to pay the price. The price might be 10 years of daily meditation.

For a frequently funny and light-hearted approach to this subject I recommend the work of Anthony de Mello. He used the word "Awareness" to label this space an "Wake Up" for the process of getting there.

Re: Mindfulness and meditation can worsen depression and anxiety

#110

Post by tgflynn »

baron_harkonnen wrote: post #102
pmoriarty wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a mistake to think that "meditation" is only a religious practice or that it has only one aim. There are many forms of mediation, with many different aims, some religious, some not.

Can you point out some of the traditional practices of meditation that have no roots in religious traditions? I can't think of any truly secular traditions of the top of my head (or at least any that weren't invented in the last 50 years).

One might argue that stoicism would be one such case, though I don't think it developed techniques anywhere near as sophisticated as those of Eastern traditions.

As for Buddhism, which is at the root of what most people mean by "meditation" today, calling it a religion is a bit problematic because it doesn't involve worshiping gods and, in theory at least, is not supposed to be primarily faith based. Both of those things: god worship and faith seem so fundamental to the western concept of religion that applying that term uncritically to Buddhism seems ill-founded.

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