241–250 of 335 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
What's that choice's source? How do you 'do' it?
It's just something that happens once you learn to see the thoughts themselves arising, rather than feeling like you are thinking them. This occurs automatically, once you start meditating, typically within just a couple weeks even for those people (like me) who "don't get it" at first. Source: started meditating a few months ago.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27890790 Discussion on meditation induced psychosis and some a bit more metadiscussion on how it is perceived by pro-meditation groups - victim blaming (eg. you're doing it wrong, this didn't happen to me, this isn't meditation). Seeing some similar comments in here. Some areas of meditation actually acknowledge some sort of "dark night" that practitioners have to push through whi…
I agree. Meditation made a little “high” on life. Careless to the point of physical injuries. Stress via excess is obviously bad but it’s better guide in life than an utopia nirvana. Like if you look at a colony of beavers. Some are building a dam, others are collecting fruits, kids are playing in the river, some beavers are making love, … . And you have Dave. Dave just stay there 5 hours straight in some sort of yog…
One of the points about meditation is about being present, fully experiencing the present moment. By fully experiencing every present moment, you fully experience your life. The opposite would be living perpetually in the future or in the past; not living your life, but continuously preparing to start living it some day.
In your example, the beavers being present and building a dam/collecting fruits are in fact the equivalent of skilled meditators. Dave 'lost in his thoughts' is a person unskilled in meditation, the default situation for a lot of people a lot of the time. Consider how many hours a week people tend to spend distracting themselves, 'lost in their thoughts' - time better spent just sitting and doing nothing, getting bored, and then getting an urge to be creative - like when you were a child.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27890790 Discussion on meditation induced psychosis and some a bit more metadiscussion on how it is perceived by pro-meditation groups - victim blaming (eg. you're doing it wrong, this didn't happen to me, this isn't meditation). Seeing some similar comments in here. Some areas of meditation actually acknowledge some sort of "dark night" that practitioners have to push through whi…
> As much as some think meditation is beneficial, the effective sample size is 1. It's not - there are many such responses.
For me, meditation started a fundamental shift in how I think about free will, and oddly nobody I've mentioned it to in real life has felt this. I used to feel very in-control of my own mind, but after intentionally sitting and monitoring for thoughts, labeling those thoughts, etc, I became sensitive to how thoughts can really come out of nowhere. You can't predict what you will think next. That strikes a little deep…
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It's just not not having anything to distract you of your mental pain. Like having a flesh wound and instead of using pain killers, you put you finger on the wound and actually focus on the pain. That would be quite stressful, right? Have you ever had something bad happen and you try to distract yourself by working or watching something? Meditation feels like the reverse of that.
It can feel like that when you resist the painful memory or emotion. But if you stay with it, accepting it, neither rejecting nor holding it, you may notice that it dissolves. It's like the effect of exposure in behavioral therapy, phobias are treated with sustained exposure to the feared stimulus.
Yeah, I know how to accept them and don't resist but it's not like I will be able to sort out my issues in a 20min session. The best I can hope is to get to the deeper issues which will be even more painful.
I personally found the combination of regular physical exercise plus reading physical books (training my concentration, helping me relaxing) the best way to stay productive. If I meditate then after physical exercise when my body is full of happiness hormones giving me a nice cool-down.
This is a great perspective. I know what the author means with it, too. I spent 5 years in daily meditation practice (twice a day for 20 minutes) and it completely altered my state of mind. I was a naturally introverted person when I started, though I believe that meditation really stepped it up a notch for me. The strange thing about meditation and the idea of living in the present is that it completely transcends y…
I'm sorry, but this is such an extreme example. You should not overdo anything, be it meditation, gaming, playing, reading, any sport, even drugs. Drugs also give you a state of mind that, when taken to the extreme, can harm your social life and well-being. That is not a problem specifically of meditation. You can safely do anything up to the point that it benefits you. The moment your well-being suffers, or you negl…
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27890790 Discussion on meditation induced psychosis and some a bit more metadiscussion on how it is perceived by pro-meditation groups - victim blaming (eg. you're doing it wrong, this didn't happen to me, this isn't meditation). Seeing some similar comments in here. Some areas of meditation actually acknowledge some sort of "dark night" that practitioners have to push through whi…
I agree. Meditation made a little “high” on life. Careless to the point of physical injuries. Stress via excess is obviously bad but it’s better guide in life than an utopia nirvana. Like if you look at a colony of beavers. Some are building a dam, others are collecting fruits, kids are playing in the river, some beavers are making love, … . And you have Dave. Dave just stay there 5 hours straight in some sort of yog…
Can confirm from personal experience. Even a lot of vipassana meditation by itself can send you into psychotic states when you're not ready for all the insight yet. I came very close to psychosis once, experienced ego death, broke down mentally and had to spend 2 months in a depression ward. Cannot recommend. I don't regret the 2-3 months of active ego dissolution phase, life has never been more beautiful and strange…
I had a brief experience with what you're talking about induced by drugs. It's made me decide I have no appetite for either meditation (except for short, surface level sessions to help with anxiety) or mind altering drugs anymore. I had briefly waded into the depths of something I wasn't prepared for, and I don't want to go back. > I have gained insights I was not supposed to have and I've preferred to mostly live in…
I think diving into ego death when via substances in uncontrolled settings isn't a great idea, because you can get bogged down in delusion and paranoia.
I found it helpful with zazen to realise that any judgement of whatever I was experiencing (whether good or bad / joy or fear / enlightenment or hell), was just as much a delusion in itself as much as anything else. I personally found this made it illogical to be scared by whatever is happening inside your head, because that fear is just line noise.
Coincidentally Mingyur Rinpoche just posted a talk about this as well [1]. I think the most important thing is to find a lineage to practice under, with texts that can support that practice. As much as people want to divorce it from it's historical context, meditation is part of a spiritual practice and communities of people have ways of teaching it in particular ways for a reason. No one should just go sit with zero…
>No one should just go sit with zero context and no support. C'mon now. It's not hang-gliding or dropping acid, it's sitting quietly in a room. Not everything in life should be treated as if it's horrendously risky or can't possibly be understood by people exercising common sense. Nor, in my opinion, do the agglomeration of various meditative practices and teachings, no matter how old and "sacred" they may theoretica…