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Regular meditation may be more beneficial than vacation

health.harvard.edu

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Re: Regular meditation may be more beneficial than vacation

#191

Post by JamesBarney »

neves wrote: post #148
javajosh wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That falsely assumes that meditation's only effect is to make you emotionally more durable. One of the interesting effects is that when you become more durable, and able to endure, you're also able to make better decisions. You can "zoom out" and perceive options that were invisible before. Sometimes this means the often painful realization that you are the asshole, and need to change. But other times this means seei…

I'm fond of meditation. I just dispute the idea that in a world full of injustices, that meditation is the path to happiness. We need a bunch of extreme anger and indignation to change the world.

Most of the angry indignant men that I know focused their anger into voting for Trump. If that is your idea of changing the world then I think your on the right track. If it is not then maybe meditation is more helpful than you give it credit.

Re: Regular meditation may be more beneficial than vacation

#192

Post by nemo1618 »

criddell wrote: post #107
snissn wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you drink coffee? Try 100% cutting out caffeine!

If you love coffee and don't want to remove it from your life, try taking some L-Theanine with your morning cup of coffee. For me, it eliminates anxiety and jitters without tempering the cognitive benefits of coffee.

Worth noting that Coffiest (Soylent's latest drink product) contains both caffeine and L-theanine. Their ratio is questionable (150mg caffeine, 75mg L-theanine), but subjectively I have found it to be a great way to boost my productivity in the morning, and I've never noticed jitters or anxiety despite the (relatively) high dose of caffeine. I also prefer the taste to regular Soylent -- no "wet cereal" aftertaste, and you can add a bit of sugar or chocolate syrup if it's too bitter for you.

Re: Regular meditation may be more beneficial than vacation

#193

Post by pivo »

puranjay wrote: post #40
snissn wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you drink coffee? Try 100% cutting out caffeine!

Any strategies to cut? If I don't drink my morning cup, I get bad headaches around the evening and basically stop functioning.

Try cutting down gradually, eventually getting to a single cup in the morning. Supplement with decaf. Then just decaf. I've found I miss coffee more than cafeene now so I still drink decaf. Difference is I can sleep and don't feel the awful stress anymore.

Re: Regular meditation may be more beneficial than vacation

#194

Post by skybrian »

droopyEyelids wrote: post #146
lujim wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Life doesn't relent. Even young, rich, beautiful people are susceptible to feelings of unsatisfactory-ness that leave them reaching for the booze and hard drugs or just feeling all around unfulfilled and miserable. Humans are built to run on a hedonic treadmill, not to be content in the moment. Meditation is a tool so that when your life scks, your boss is an ssh*le, and your personal relationships are a mess, THEN s…

Your example was extreme with the 'running them off the road' bit, but actually meditation isn't helpful unless it pushes you to that breaking point. You need to get worked up, speak your mind, start the argument, quit your job when things get too bad. Life isn't a float on the lazy river. Feelings of anger and pain exist for a reason. Thats why meditation, as it's sold, is bullsh*t. You're describing an alternative…

So, here's the thing. You need to make an important sale. Is the best way to prepare for it to get more angry? Is quitting your job without having another lined up what you'd consider a winning move?

There are times where being angry actually helps, but they're a lot less common in the modern world. Usually, it will screw you over. (For example, getting angry in traffic is utterly useless.) Starting that argument because you're angry makes it unlikely that you'll actually persuade anyone.

You'll make a better case if you're calm about it and can think clearly. How do you do that? Meditation is one way.

Re: Regular meditation may be more beneficial than vacation

#195

Post by windex5 »

droopyEyelids wrote: post #146
lujim wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Life doesn't relent. Even young, rich, beautiful people are susceptible to feelings of unsatisfactory-ness that leave them reaching for the booze and hard drugs or just feeling all around unfulfilled and miserable. Humans are built to run on a hedonic treadmill, not to be content in the moment. Meditation is a tool so that when your life scks, your boss is an ssh*le, and your personal relationships are a mess, THEN s…

Your example was extreme with the 'running them off the road' bit, but actually meditation isn't helpful unless it pushes you to that breaking point. You need to get worked up, speak your mind, start the argument, quit your job when things get too bad. Life isn't a float on the lazy river. Feelings of anger and pain exist for a reason. Thats why meditation, as it's sold, is bullsh*t. You're describing an alternative…

You become more aware of the unpleasantness of bad situations through meditation not less. You are just less reactive. In fact, you might take action much earlier on because things wouldn't have to reach a boiling point to make you really take note.

Re: Regular meditation may be more beneficial than vacation

#196

Post by tedks »

origami777 wrote: post #54
tedks wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>All this stuff draws contempt from curmudgeonly skeptics (of which I used to be the worst kind), but from painful experience I've found these techniques to be far more effective than any of the more conventional approaches I'd tried previously. Yes, throwing away your critical eye towards the world in favor of starry-eyed credulity can certainly kick the placebo effect into overdrive. If you're constantly questionin…

Interesting points. Can you expand on your last sentence? What part is being killed?

I would say Temporal is not far off in saying "commitment to the truth," but I would go further and say that the core of humanity, of being human, is striving towards bettering ourselves through the application of intelligence. Intelligence is the human superpower and when harnessed it can create incredible things.

Doing the reverse of empowering your intelligence, and empowering your confirmation bias (as comment parent), tribalism (as Donald Trump/neo-nationalists everywhere), or credulity (as meditationists/"everything is connected maaaaaan" types), is worse than suicide. You're using the power of your brain to enhance its flaws and create a perverted version of a human, progressing, but in the opposite direction; becoming stronger, but in a domain that should be avoided at all costs.

This is somewhat like the process of building a good military sniper by progressively dehumanizing them, stripping them of their empathy and agency in order to use them as an efficient killing machine. But worse, because you can think yourself out of that -- you can't think yourself out of a totally broken mind, and the more intelligent you are, the better you are at keeping yourself broken.

Re: Regular meditation may be more beneficial than vacation

#197

Post by tedks »

ephextom wrote: post #163
TeMPOraL wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Commitment to the truth. You have to successfully lie to yourself to pull off what GP described.

You're welcome to suggest measures I should undertake to be more effective at getting to the truth in these matters. Here's what I'm doing so far: - Reading a wide variety of scientific sources across the spectrum of thought on these matters: Dr Bruce Lipton - pioneering stem cell biologist, now author and speaker; Rudy Tanzi - Professor of Neurology at Harvard Medical School and researcher behind some of the biggest…

> You're welcome to suggest measures I should undertake to be more effective at getting to the truth in these matters.

I notice you don't mention double blinding any of these interventions. Have you tried that? How would you try that for something crypto-religious like meditation?

Re: Regular meditation may be more beneficial than vacation

#200

Post by house9-2 »

elcapitan wrote: post #51
not_an_account wrote: post #25

Mindfulness meditation is one of the pillars on which my life rests. If you have never done it before, realize that it's hard, especially if you fall anywhere on the ADHD spectrum, and it's just brutal for the first few weeks for anyone. As your brain becomes more still and your focus improves you'll notice your productivity improve. As the mental chatter drops you'll also notice the problems in your life, that you'v…

> I rarely talk about meditation in professional circles because, for one, people think it's weird No, it totally makes sense. Long walks in the woods or long runs are almost like meditation for me, and it is definitely like vacation for the mind. I just wonder where to get started with actual meditation - I have to admit I find the predominant literature about that topic extremely esoteric, and that's something that…

> Any tips what a good starting point would be?

You might be interested in the book '10% Happier' by Dan Harris (https://www.amazon.com/10-Happier-Self-Help-Actually-Works/d...)

The Appendix lists the basic instructions for learning to meditate. The book is a fun read, the journey of a skeptic into the world of meditation.

Currently the 'Look Inside' link on Amazon lets you read most of the Appendix.

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