I've found that many people (myself included) start down the path of Vipassana(analysis) type of meditation too early or from a position where we weren't prepared for the consequences. I wish I had spent more time with metta(compassion) and samatha (calmness) meditation and build up stability/forbearance and kindness/compassion first before starting to de-construct experience. It is said that one type of meditation leads to the others and even with Vipassana you might have the realization that "I'm suffering because I was doing a thing, I laid the trap and stepped in it" and achieve peace of mind, but that won't happen on a schedule. I would recommend any busy person to avoid Vipassana until they have more experience and focus more on sense-calming (avoiding sensuality), and compassion/generosity practice. It will bring a quicker (though possibly less deep) taste of the peace of mind that is possible.
My mindfulness practice led me to meltdown
441–450 of 600 posts
Re: My mindfulness practice led me to meltdown
#442This thread is blowing my mind, although not for the obvious reason. I’m just astounded by all the anecdotes people are mentioning here that suggest meditation, mindfulness, etc. actually work , even the secularized, distorted, popularized versions we get here in the West. Previously I just assumed this was all a bunch of wackadoo woo-woo bullshit designed to separate dissatisfied California yuppies from their money.…
> designed to separate dissatisfied California yuppies from their money Can I ask how the generic advice of "sit for 20 minutes a day paying attention to your own attention processes" costs anything?
The author is a professional meditation instructor, describing attending professional meditation training and conferences. Someone is paying money.
Re: My mindfulness practice led me to meltdown
#443In the midst of all of the "You're just doing Buddhism wrong!" comments, I would like to point out the PLOS One paper mentioned in the article, "The varieties of contemplative experience: A mixed-methods study of meditation-related challenges in Western Buddhists" ( https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal... ). " In one of the only prospective studies to use qualitative methods to deliberately as…
An intensive Vipassana retreat is just that, an INTENSIVE retreat. I've meditated for ~10 years. I don't think anyone's FIRST meditation experience should be a 10-day Vipassana retreat. I don't think anyone's first silence experience should be a 10-day Vipassana retreat. That's like going to a Navy Seal bootcamp when you've never exercised in your life.
A lot of Buddhist or meditative practices also have close student-teacher relationships. You should have an active human coach guiding you through the process, because shit comes up, people have different mental health setups (just like a physical therapist has different workout plans for people with injuries and physical conditions) and if it's just DIY experimenting, you can encounter something and get screwed.
A good example of this is the Tim Ferris podcast where he did a 10-day Vipassana retreat and decided to fast for a certain number of days to amplify the effect and almost had a complete mental breakdown. It worked out and led to a very vulnerable podcast down the line (https://tim.blog/2020/09/14/how-to-heal-trauma/), but these are things to keep in mind when going into deep waters.
Re: My mindfulness practice led me to meltdown
#444In the midst of all of the "You're just doing Buddhism wrong!" comments, I would like to point out the PLOS One paper mentioned in the article, "The varieties of contemplative experience: A mixed-methods study of meditation-related challenges in Western Buddhists" ( https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal... ). " In one of the only prospective studies to use qualitative methods to deliberately as…
> promoted with no regard to the side-effects.
Many people are blind to the inherent risks of anything which can be labelled as "natural". We've been socially conditioned through health campaigns and advertising to believe that if something is "all natural" or part of a certain "organic" lifestyle it literally cannot precipitate any kind of harm. Those kinds of "appeal to nature" arguments are all around us, constantly. And many people see meditation as falling within the scope of "natural remedies". So it's not surprising that people would, by their conditioning, believe meditation to be innocuous.
Re: My mindfulness practice led me to meltdown
#445This thread is blowing my mind, although not for the obvious reason. I’m just astounded by all the anecdotes people are mentioning here that suggest meditation, mindfulness, etc. actually work , even the secularized, distorted, popularized versions we get here in the West. Previously I just assumed this was all a bunch of wackadoo woo-woo bullshit designed to separate dissatisfied California yuppies from their money.…
There's decent empirical evidence of an effect.
It's not a huge surprise when you think about it - therapy works because of helping people change how they think.
The reason it's often dismissed by skeptics is because it's often surrounded by a lot of religious woo and other nonsense so people often dismiss the entire thing.
I have a pet hypothesis that it can make anxiety worse if you're not careful due to Hypervigilance (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypervigilance) - anxious people tend to have issues with ruminating and paying too much introspective attention to their bodies already. Most meditation rhetoric appears to be targeted to people who never introspect. Getting control over ruminating thoughts is helpful, but I've found mindfulness to be a mixed bag personally.
Re: My mindfulness practice led me to meltdown
#446I've had some very negative anxiety-driven experiences with dissociation (depersonalization / derealization / de-something-zation), usually when traveling to somewhere I'm unfamiliar with. It usually only lasts for 5 to 15 minutes rather than hours, but it does sound a lot like what he describes. Relating this to meditation: On the rare occasion that I try meditating, it doesn't trigger anything negative, but I have…
What you describe in your example about mind stop being focused on the future sounds like when sound and video on TV is not synchronized and you become aware that you are watching the TV
Haha... I hate that. I studied animation for a while years ago and became hyper aware of sound / video synchronization for a bit, it was super annoying. (Not nearly as bad as derealization though)
Re: My mindfulness practice led me to meltdown
#447Earlier quoted context omitted.
"western people sometimes come in wanting things to be intense, clinical and goal-oriented." That describes me exactly. I spent forever look for a "quantified meditation" course. I even kept a mediation journal where I could track how many times I lost track of my breath in a 5 minute session. I started out around 50 and was desperately trying to get to 0. I even used an app that counts taps, that I would rest under…
Woah that seems really the polar opposite of what I practice.. I think you’re doing yourself a bit wrong with this approach. Can I suggest a book to you? It’s “Sit down and shut up” by Brad Warner, it may help.
Just downloaded it from Audible. Thanks.
Re: My mindfulness practice led me to meltdown
#448In the midst of all of the "You're just doing Buddhism wrong!" comments, I would like to point out the PLOS One paper mentioned in the article, "The varieties of contemplative experience: A mixed-methods study of meditation-related challenges in Western Buddhists" ( https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal... ). " In one of the only prospective studies to use qualitative methods to deliberately as…
An intensive Vipassana retreat is just that, an INTENSIVE retreat. I've meditated for ~10 years. I don't think anyone's FIRST meditation experience should be a 10-day Vipassana retreat. I don't think anyone's first silence experience should be a 10-day Vipassana retreat. That's like going to a Navy Seal bootcamp when you've never exercised in your life. A lot of Buddhist or meditative practices also have close studen…
> "A lot of Buddhist or meditative practices also have close student-teacher relationships. You should have an active human coach guiding you through the process"
This seems to also open the door to a lot of fraudster con-man types and cults, so worth being wary of that relationship imo.
The author seemed to have experienced a bit of this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Depersonalization which I've felt before and can be quite scary.
Re: My mindfulness practice led me to meltdown
#449Earlier quoted context omitted.
> They assert that all beings have this buddha-nature innately, and that it is indestructible, because it does not arise dependent on causes and conditions Yes. > in direct conflict with the traditional teaching that ALL phenomena without exception arise dependent on causes and conditions With all due respect, make it a priority to seek understanding of ”Buddha-nature”. Try the Koans.
Studying koans is not a very good way of gaining understanding of something like Buddha Nature; they're designed to create confusion. I wasn't in a Zen tradition, and I'm no longer a Buddhist; I appreciate your respect, but I'm not about to start trying to figure out koans. [Edit: aren't you supposed to have a master, when you're working with koans?] Note that I'm not declaring Buddha Nature teachings to be heretical…
> aren't you supposed to have a master, when you're working with koans?
Buddha is my master, teacher and guide, etc. This is all sorts of hilarious from a Zen perspective; interpreting Tathagatagarbha as monism, or Buddha as anything, heh.
Re: My mindfulness practice led me to meltdown
#450Earlier quoted context omitted.
An intensive Vipassana retreat is just that, an INTENSIVE retreat. I've meditated for ~10 years. I don't think anyone's FIRST meditation experience should be a 10-day Vipassana retreat. I don't think anyone's first silence experience should be a 10-day Vipassana retreat. That's like going to a Navy Seal bootcamp when you've never exercised in your life. A lot of Buddhist or meditative practices also have close studen…
> "A lot of Buddhist or meditative practices also have close student-teacher relationships. You should have an active human coach guiding you through the process" This seems to also open the door to a lot of fraudster con-man types and cults, so worth being wary of that relationship imo. The author seemed to have experienced a bit of this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Depersonalization which I've felt before and can…
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