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I just don't get it. It's difficult enough to spend 1000's of hours on honing my craft. How can I possibly justify that sort of investment in meditation? If y

I just don't get it. It's difficult enough to spend 1000's of hours on honing my craft. How can I possibly justify that sort of investment in meditation? If you tell me it helps those with sleep issues, mental blocks, psychological issues, or addiction, your point is well taken and understood. But for those of us blessed to be in relatively sound mind, how will we benefit from meditation?

phil_folrida 8y ago
It is difficult to assess what you will gain, for me it help in very uncomfortable situation, like a rough meeting sort of avoiding panic mode, I used Muse the brain sensing https://choosemuse.com/ https://choosemuse.com/ somehow this gadget helped me, and no I don't do 1 hour a day as I don't have time for that, 10 minutes a day and I think it helped me. A lot of it is subjective, but then pretty much all of interactions are too.
gchamonlive 8y ago
That's because the meditation practice gets mistaken with regular practices where one must be invested in the practice to get better at it. Meditation is a practice in the way that you must put it in practice, not practice to get better at it. And you can put it in practice doing anything, your attention just have to be in the moment. So when you are waiting on a line, or having a meal, brushing you teeth, preparing your coffee, going to work, paying your bills you can be meditating in which you are focusing entirely on the present moment and not letting your mind wander off. I believe that's you you achieve 7 years worth of meditation
- crispinb 8y ago
  The subjects of the studies in question really have done 1000s of hours of actual meditation 'practice', ie. sitting down (also lying down & walking) and going through programmatic sequences of meditation exercises. It is true that some traditions (including the burgeoning recent trend of secular meditation) emphasise mindfulness in daily life, particularly for lay persons. But the studies showing huge differences in mental activity have done so in 'Olympic-level meditators'. These people have made deliberate meditation practice the focus of their lives.
kawera 8y ago
It may improve the quality of those 1000 hours.
collyw 8y ago
This link was posted on HN for a while. I dabble in meditation compared to this, but I want to do a 10 day retreat having read it. https://github.com/deobald/vipassana-for-hackers/blob/master/vipassana-for-hackers.pdf https://github.com/deobald/vipassana-for-hackers/blob/master... I guess the answer to your question is, do you want to understand how your mind / consciousness works? It makes sense to understand how a computer works of you do any sort of programming. Wouldn't you want to understand how your mind works as well as you use it constantly?
ivm 8y ago
You will learn your mind much better and will be able to readjust your automatic thinking patterns that go unnoticed most of the time. Meditation is the highest form of hacking where you disassemble and modify the processes in your own consciousness.
Zelphyr 8y ago
It will improve your craft and you don’t need to allocate time away from the latter to do so. You can do both at the same time. Put more simply; when you’re doing the dishes, do the dishes. Focus on the sensation of the water on your hands and the movement of your muscles as you scrub and dry them. When your mind wanders away from that as it tends to do, acknowledge that your mind has wandered and gently bring it back to what you’re doing. That’s meditation. Likewise, when you’re working on honing your craft, notice when your mind wanders away from the task at hand and gently bring it back in focus when that happens without judgement. You’ll find that doing this will help you hone your craft in ways you’ve never considered.
- shaklee3 8y ago
  I'm not sure I understand that analogy. When I'm doing the dishes I've never had my mind wander to where it adversely affects me doing the dishes. Is it just a way to focus better?
  - joelhooks 8y ago
    It’s just focusing on the moment, not something to really master the art and craft of cleaning dishes. Dishes is just an example activity that many might find venal, but is an opportunity to practice mindfulness
crispinb 8y ago
People using meditation for therapeutic purposes generally establish a half to one-hour daily habit. They're not aspiring to becoming experts. Those with such aspirations (supposedly requiring 1000s of practice hours) have different motivations, which would are pretty opaque from a productivity-tweaking point of view.
steve1977 8y ago
> How can I possibly justify that sort of investment in meditation? It's just another craft really.
ceras 8y ago
Personally, I don't think the benefits are necessarily worth it for everyone. It benefits me a lot, but I don't go out of my way to recommend it to (say) my wife as she has things quite figured out without it. I'd say meditation has a few distinct key benefits, and it's reasonable to decide none of these are worth it for you at this point in your life (or ever): (1) It helps you tame your mind when it goes down an unproductive path. This alleviates the ailments you mentioned (sleep disorders, depression, anxiety, etc), and provides an overall sense of peace and joy. You may not suffer much from these. (2) It helps provides a comfortable detachment from your emotions and attachments. This helps with restraining your desires, improving your relationships, and making calmer and more rational decisions even when emotions are high. In other words, this helps narrow the distance between who your values want you to be (e.g. humble, thoughtful, calm under pressure, selfless) and how you act day-to-day. You may be doing just fine with these. (3) It can satisfy the need for fulfillment and meaning in a more stable way than anything else. Many people have something that guides them and provides long-term or lifelong fulfillment (a long-term goal, religious beliefs, etc), and IME meditation can provide the most stable source of satisfying this need (this is dark, but even if providing for your family provides this need for you, your family may die or you may become alienated from them). It does this by essentially uprooting that need on a fundamental level (at least, that's the Buddhist tradition's explanation of why it has that outcome). You may feel fine with the small anguish or small risk of anguish that occurs in moments of your life where your meaning and fulfillment come into question, or you may feel relatively positive they never will (e.g. if it primarily is sourced from strong religious conviction). (4) It helps you know yourself better. This feeds into (1) and (2), but on a meta level, it also helps you self-evaluate the extent to which (1), (2), and (3) are an issue. It also adds an element of fun and curiosity to meditation once you start to experience it. You may not care about this.
rohan1024 8y ago
Maybe your craft itself is meditation

phil_folrida 8y ago

It is difficult to assess what you will gain, for me it help in very uncomfortable situation, like a rough meeting sort of avoiding panic mode, I used Muse the brain sensing https://choosemuse.com/ https://choosemuse.com/ somehow this gadget helped me, and no I don't do 1 hour a day as I don't have time for that, 10 minutes a day and I think it helped me. A lot of it is subjective, but then pretty much all of interactions are too.

gchamonlive 8y ago

That's because the meditation practice gets mistaken with regular practices where one must be invested in the practice to get better at it. Meditation is a practice in the way that you must put it in practice, not practice to get better at it. And you can put it in practice doing anything, your attention just have to be in the moment. So when you are waiting on a line, or having a meal, brushing you teeth, preparing your coffee, going to work, paying your bills you can be meditating in which you are focusing entirely on the present moment and not letting your mind wander off. I believe that's you you achieve 7 years worth of meditation

crispinb 8y ago
The subjects of the studies in question really have done 1000s of hours of actual meditation 'practice', ie. sitting down (also lying down & walking) and going through programmatic sequences of meditation exercises. It is true that some traditions (including the burgeoning recent trend of secular meditation) emphasise mindfulness in daily life, particularly for lay persons. But the studies showing huge differences in mental activity have done so in 'Olympic-level meditators'. These people have made deliberate meditation practice the focus of their lives.

kawera 8y ago

It may improve the quality of those 1000 hours.

collyw 8y ago

This link was posted on HN for a while. I dabble in meditation compared to this, but I want to do a 10 day retreat having read it. https://github.com/deobald/vipassana-for-hackers/blob/master/vipassana-for-hackers.pdf https://github.com/deobald/vipassana-for-hackers/blob/master... I guess the answer to your question is, do you want to understand how your mind / consciousness works? It makes sense to understand how a computer works of you do any sort of programming. Wouldn't you want to understand how your mind works as well as you use it constantly?

ivm 8y ago

You will learn your mind much better and will be able to readjust your automatic thinking patterns that go unnoticed most of the time. Meditation is the highest form of hacking where you disassemble and modify the processes in your own consciousness.

Zelphyr 8y ago

It will improve your craft and you don’t need to allocate time away from the latter to do so. You can do both at the same time. Put more simply; when you’re doing the dishes, do the dishes. Focus on the sensation of the water on your hands and the movement of your muscles as you scrub and dry them. When your mind wanders away from that as it tends to do, acknowledge that your mind has wandered and gently bring it back to what you’re doing. That’s meditation. Likewise, when you’re working on honing your craft, notice when your mind wanders away from the task at hand and gently bring it back in focus when that happens without judgement. You’ll find that doing this will help you hone your craft in ways you’ve never considered.

shaklee3 8y ago
I'm not sure I understand that analogy. When I'm doing the dishes I've never had my mind wander to where it adversely affects me doing the dishes. Is it just a way to focus better?
- joelhooks 8y ago
  It’s just focusing on the moment, not something to really master the art and craft of cleaning dishes. Dishes is just an example activity that many might find venal, but is an opportunity to practice mindfulness

crispinb 8y ago

People using meditation for therapeutic purposes generally establish a half to one-hour daily habit. They're not aspiring to becoming experts. Those with such aspirations (supposedly requiring 1000s of practice hours) have different motivations, which would are pretty opaque from a productivity-tweaking point of view.

steve1977 8y ago

> How can I possibly justify that sort of investment in meditation? It's just another craft really.

ceras 8y ago

Personally, I don't think the benefits are necessarily worth it for everyone. It benefits me a lot, but I don't go out of my way to recommend it to (say) my wife as she has things quite figured out without it. I'd say meditation has a few distinct key benefits, and it's reasonable to decide none of these are worth it for you at this point in your life (or ever): (1) It helps you tame your mind when it goes down an unproductive path. This alleviates the ailments you mentioned (sleep disorders, depression, anxiety, etc), and provides an overall sense of peace and joy. You may not suffer much from these. (2) It helps provides a comfortable detachment from your emotions and attachments. This helps with restraining your desires, improving your relationships, and making calmer and more rational decisions even when emotions are high. In other words, this helps narrow the distance between who your values want you to be (e.g. humble, thoughtful, calm under pressure, selfless) and how you act day-to-day. You may be doing just fine with these. (3) It can satisfy the need for fulfillment and meaning in a more stable way than anything else. Many people have something that guides them and provides long-term or lifelong fulfillment (a long-term goal, religious beliefs, etc), and IME meditation can provide the most stable source of satisfying this need (this is dark, but even if providing for your family provides this need for you, your family may die or you may become alienated from them). It does this by essentially uprooting that need on a fundamental level (at least, that's the Buddhist tradition's explanation of why it has that outcome). You may feel fine with the small anguish or small risk of anguish that occurs in moments of your life where your meaning and fulfillment come into question, or you may feel relatively positive they never will (e.g. if it primarily is sourced from strong religious conviction). (4) It helps you know yourself better. This feeds into (1) and (2), but on a meta level, it also helps you self-evaluate the extent to which (1), (2), and (3) are an issue. It also adds an element of fun and curiosity to meditation once you start to experience it. You may not care about this.

rohan1024 8y ago

Maybe your craft itself is meditation