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My biggest advice for anyone is to not ignore the traditional advice. Secular meditation practises based on Buddhist meditation take the practise out of its con

My biggest advice for anyone is to not ignore the traditional advice. Secular meditation practises based on Buddhist meditation take the practise out of its context in a quick and forceful way. Buddhism has had 2500 years to slowly develop and work out what works and what does not. It is quite dangerous to take it and call the parts that do not immediately appeal to the secular western mind, like devotion, worship, compassion, traditional forms & rituals, and cast them away. I personally know two people who went into severe psychosis and depression by trying to practise meditation in a secular context. Something about meditation attracts people that think they fully understand something before they’ve even tried it. This will get torn down by the practise, and if you do not have support in place, this quickly can result in extreme mental health problems. I always say that the effects of meditation can be like the head space of an lsd trip except you don’t come down. It’s hard to “unsee”, and a lot of this religious “backwards” Buddhist worldview and practise exists specifically to integrate these experiences

bitcurious 4y ago
On the other hand, be careful - meditation in the context of Buddhism is a marketing funnel backed by 2500 years of experience. It systematically breaks down your value system and replaces it with one that puts Buddhist practice at the core. So if you’re not looking for a religious awakening don’t take any of their advice too seriously.
- bowsamic 4y ago
  Yes, it will break down your values. Unfortunately if you have the taste of bodhicitta: the mind that wants to awaken and liberate yourself and others from suffering, then you will mostly be forced to do it. I don’t recommend meditation or Buddhism for all, it will change your life in many ways that you will consider bad from your current point of view. Less motivation for tackling stressful tasks, less romantic attachment, less hunger for new experiences, often an increased neurosis, etc. EDIT: I find it quite horrifying that doctors prescribe it now. If you follow the doctors advice, mindfulness meditation every day, properly, then the doctor does not understand where that will take you. It is not a known thing for them. It only is “safe” because most people don’t actually bother doing it regularly or put effort in
  - d82nsjk9 4y ago
    > Less motivation for tackling stressful tasks, less romantic attachment, less hunger for new experiences, often an increased neurosis, etc. Bold statement that piqued my interest. Do you have backing sources or pointers to this topic?
    - bowsamic 4y ago
      Hmm not really, just the general side effects that cause people to go deeper into the practise. I saw a study that said that meditation can increase selfishness or neurosis, but other than that I only have anecdotal evidence. The whole thing is about realising your attachments are fake, and that so is your perception of the world, and realising that on a deep level. Obviously priorities will shift due to this
  - feanaro 4y ago
    What do you mean exactly by "increased neurosis"? How do you define neurosis here?
    - bowsamic 4y ago
      Selfish or self aggrandising thinking, feelings of superiority, lack of attention to others
      - feanaro 4y ago
        Are you describing something which can happen without proper technique/guidance or something which inevitably happens? And I guess I'm wondering the same for the rest of your list of changes.
        bowsamic 4y ago
        It happens for almost all practitioners, one problem is that the secular practise doesn’t offer the “save all suffering beings in the cosmos” narrative that Buddhism does, and so it cannot offer a way forward beyond the insight and into compassion. It usually doesn’t even try to.
lpcrealmadrid 4y ago
Author here. This is so spot on. I spent years avoiding the traditional practices/concepts because of a desire to be Someone Special (spiritual materialism). Burning that desire is probably one of the more profound early experiences of formal practice I’ve had with a teacher and a community. Wish I had the humility to avoid those 10 wandering years.
- bowsamic 4y ago
  Those 10 wandering years led you here, and you’ll have many millions more of them
  - xyproto 4y ago
    Why are you so sure he'll have many millions more years?
    - bowsamic 4y ago
      Because our practise is very long
sabellito 4y ago
I'm going to call bs on your claim that you "personally know two people who went into severe psychosis and depression". Since we're in "my personal experience"-land, I've been meditating and have been around people who meditate daily for 26 years. Never seen or heard about anything close to what you describe.
- vorpalhex 4y ago
  Out of a study of about a thousand people who were asked to start a daily meditation process (with weekly check-ins), about 20% reported at least one negative episode. Now, that included everything from "feeling sad" to full blown panic attack. I'll see if I can dig up that particular study. Here is a similar one which tracked longterm meditators: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/1428622/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/1428622/ > However, of the twenty-seven subjects, seventeen (62.9%) reported at least one adverse effect, and two (7.4%) suffered profound adverse effects.
  - selykg 4y ago
    27 subjects is a pretty low number of people to base this one. In any scientific paper, doesn't Hacker News get super uppity about the small number? I seem to think this one should be treated the same way.
    - bowsamic 4y ago
      I think we should generally be risk averse when the stakes are high. Telling someone to meditate is like telling them to trip, but without them even realising it is a trip, building up over time. It is quite dangerous. I mentioned those two people who had issues but I have others, maybe four or five, who are unsure if they would have embarked on this experience if they knew
    - vorpalhex 4y ago
      There are quite a few studies here though. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5584749/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5584749/ (online survey, 84 respondants) https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32820538/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32820538/ (meta analysis, 6703 total participants across 55 studies) My reading of this is we can't make claims like X% practicioners have negative outcomes - the numbers are too messy. We can definitely say a significant amount of practictioners do have negative outcomes. But, those negative outcomes are wide and while they include suicide, depression and panic attacks, the majority of them are things like anxiety. You are digging into and tinkering with your psyche. Of course there are going to be negative outcomes. I would be more skeptical if the claim was meditation did something and never had negative effects.
roody15 4y ago
Disclaimer: This is probably going to make me sound crazy but perhaps it’s fitting. In a deeply meditative state you can open up yourself to a spiritual state of perception. In this transcendental state you can attract other spiritual and ethereal entities. Not all of which are benevolent. Lots of the meditative mantras, prayers and rituals perhaps are meant to ward off negative entities and even perhaps attract compassionate and positive spiritual forces In a sense train yourself to open the door to different states of mind … this and of itself doesn’t equal enlightenment or happiness.
- bowsamic 4y ago
  Yes, in the realm of emptiness (which we are never apart from) we can directly touch Buddhas and bodhisattvas, since we are never separate from them anyway. Buddhist practise helps us see this directly
- vorpalhex 4y ago
  Do you view this description as being literal or metaphorical?
  - bowsamic 4y ago
    It’s literal, else they would have said it’s not
taeric 4y ago
I don't know. This still feels heavy in the propaganda realm. Which... to be clear, propaganda works. Turns out, telling people directly how and what to feel is more effective than makes sense. That is, looking at it as 2500 years of successfully developing what works is hiding a lot of the failure that has accompanied things in that same time span. Is akin to saying that the religions that avoid certain foods are on to something, because no way something like that would stick without a solid reason. To that end, the folks you know that had a mental breakdown. Is there a counterfactual world where they did not have a breakdown by avoiding meditation? Or by picking it up with a new religion? My priors are low that that is the case, but I would be delighted to learn more.
- bowsamic 4y ago
  It’s very new to us, why would we assume we have a perfect system for understanding it? It isn’t a toy to play with. Far more scientific research is needed before it’s safe to do in a secular context.
  - taeric 4y ago
    Isn't this true of all frames? I feel that I could claim the same for science and religion as things, as well. Note that I'm fine pushing for caution on folks wanting to take up any practice. This would go as well for folks that think a running practice will help them. Maybe. At best.
    - bowsamic 4y ago
      I think we should treat it like a psychedelic treatment
      - taeric 4y ago
        In what way?
        bowsamic 4y ago
Hasu 4y ago
I've been noticing an increasing trend of people saying things like this, and I don't get it. Meditation has many forms and traditions, within and without Buddhism. Which ones are "safe" and which ones aren't? Is using Headspace twice a week enough to be dangerous, or is there some lower bound where meditation practice without Buddhist beliefs switches from harmless to dangerous? And are Hindu or Christian meditation practices dangerous, or just the secular stuff? What precisely is the nature of this danger? > I personally know two people who went into severe psychosis and depression by trying to practise meditation in a secular context. Sorry, but I simply can't believe this. I mean I believe you have two friends with mental health issues, but I don't believe that psychosis can be triggered in a normal person by practicing "secular meditation". That's an extreme claim that requires a lot of evidence.
- bowsamic 4y ago
  I would say that meditating for more than 15 minutes a day is very dangerous I’m sorry that you don’t believe (edit typo) me, nothing I can do about that
- Enginerrrd 4y ago
  >That's an extreme claim that requires a lot of evidence. For what it's worth, I Don't think it's an extreme claim at all. The potential for ill-effects from more extreme efforts in Meditation is starting to be documented by western scientists. A lot of adverse outcomes aren't only possible, but actually quite common. I personally had ZERO prior mental health issues, but after 3-4 months of meditating 30-90 minutes everyday in addition to fairly intense mindfulness practice throughout the day, I started to experience a lot of issues: strange emotional outbursts disconnected from any memory or thought, anger management issues, tension headaches, depression, etc. These ultimately only resolved by stopping meditation entirely for a long time and only carefully reintroducing it in smaller less frequent doses. It's really not all sunshine and rainbows.
  - bowsamic 4y ago
    I also had some of those side effects. I also had a trippy period, where I struggled to see anything as real. It was about a 2 week long solipsistic nightmare. I do think this is all “part of the path”, but without the traditional context, you will be quite lost on what to do next. Even with it, it’s very difficult
drieddust 4y ago
Absolutely meditation is just one part of 8 part Hindu Yoga system objective of which is to be one with the ultimate reality and live a good life no matter what. Person grown with strong Abrahmic values with find it confusing any strange. After reading Bhagwad Geeta I realised that yoga/meditation is all about discharging your duties with no expectations. I won't say I am transformed but my life do change for good by a huge margin after realising this.
greenglass 4y ago
The people who have popularized meditation in the west, Jack Kornfield, Sharon Salzburg, Joseph Goldstein, zinn, all come at it from the Buddhist tradition. It’s a useful approach for treating various medical problems. Anything, even nothing, can cause psychosis.
- bowsamic 4y ago
  This is minimising the risks, and those people you mention, while being from traditional backgrounds, afaik do not teach traditional practises, so they have effectively removed the wider framework Meditation is not “as safe as sitting down”. It has strong life altering risks
  - greenglass 4y ago
    For those dealing with chronic pain, insomnia and other debilitating conditions, these people offer a lot that cannot be achieved through other means. Opiates or benzodiazepines are more readily available, and preferred by mainstream medicine, but they too can alter one’s life. Anything can alter one’s life if you think about it.
taylodl 4y ago
I would argue Zen Buddhism is secular, so I'm not quite sure the distinction you're trying to make.
- bowsamic 4y ago
  Zen Buddhism is not secular at all. It is a traditional form of Mahayana Buddhism. In China and Vietnam Zen Buddhists practise Pure Land extensively. Dogen in Japan, the creator of Soto Zen, was heavily invested in the Lotus sutra and mentioned rebirth constantly. Where did you learn that it is secular? This is not true

bitcurious 4y ago

On the other hand, be careful - meditation in the context of Buddhism is a marketing funnel backed by 2500 years of experience. It systematically breaks down your value system and replaces it with one that puts Buddhist practice at the core. So if you’re not looking for a religious awakening don’t take any of their advice too seriously.

bowsamic 4y ago
Yes, it will break down your values. Unfortunately if you have the taste of bodhicitta: the mind that wants to awaken and liberate yourself and others from suffering, then you will mostly be forced to do it. I don’t recommend meditation or Buddhism for all, it will change your life in many ways that you will consider bad from your current point of view. Less motivation for tackling stressful tasks, less romantic attachment, less hunger for new experiences, often an increased neurosis, etc. EDIT: I find it quite horrifying that doctors prescribe it now. If you follow the doctors advice, mindfulness meditation every day, properly, then the doctor does not understand where that will take you. It is not a known thing for them. It only is “safe” because most people don’t actually bother doing it regularly or put effort in
- d82nsjk9 4y ago
  > Less motivation for tackling stressful tasks, less romantic attachment, less hunger for new experiences, often an increased neurosis, etc. Bold statement that piqued my interest. Do you have backing sources or pointers to this topic?
  - bowsamic 4y ago
    Hmm not really, just the general side effects that cause people to go deeper into the practise. I saw a study that said that meditation can increase selfishness or neurosis, but other than that I only have anecdotal evidence. The whole thing is about realising your attachments are fake, and that so is your perception of the world, and realising that on a deep level. Obviously priorities will shift due to this
- feanaro 4y ago
  What do you mean exactly by "increased neurosis"? How do you define neurosis here?
  - bowsamic 4y ago
    Selfish or self aggrandising thinking, feelings of superiority, lack of attention to others
    - feanaro 4y ago
      Are you describing something which can happen without proper technique/guidance or something which inevitably happens? And I guess I'm wondering the same for the rest of your list of changes.
      - bowsamic 4y ago
        It happens for almost all practitioners, one problem is that the secular practise doesn’t offer the “save all suffering beings in the cosmos” narrative that Buddhism does, and so it cannot offer a way forward beyond the insight and into compassion. It usually doesn’t even try to.

lpcrealmadrid 4y ago

Author here. This is so spot on. I spent years avoiding the traditional practices/concepts because of a desire to be Someone Special (spiritual materialism). Burning that desire is probably one of the more profound early experiences of formal practice I’ve had with a teacher and a community. Wish I had the humility to avoid those 10 wandering years.

bowsamic 4y ago
Those 10 wandering years led you here, and you’ll have many millions more of them
- xyproto 4y ago
  Why are you so sure he'll have many millions more years?
  - bowsamic 4y ago
    Because our practise is very long

sabellito 4y ago

I'm going to call bs on your claim that you "personally know two people who went into severe psychosis and depression". Since we're in "my personal experience"-land, I've been meditating and have been around people who meditate daily for 26 years. Never seen or heard about anything close to what you describe.

vorpalhex 4y ago
Out of a study of about a thousand people who were asked to start a daily meditation process (with weekly check-ins), about 20% reported at least one negative episode. Now, that included everything from "feeling sad" to full blown panic attack. I'll see if I can dig up that particular study. Here is a similar one which tracked longterm meditators: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/1428622/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/1428622/ > However, of the twenty-seven subjects, seventeen (62.9%) reported at least one adverse effect, and two (7.4%) suffered profound adverse effects.
- selykg 4y ago
  27 subjects is a pretty low number of people to base this one. In any scientific paper, doesn't Hacker News get super uppity about the small number? I seem to think this one should be treated the same way.
  - bowsamic 4y ago
    I think we should generally be risk averse when the stakes are high. Telling someone to meditate is like telling them to trip, but without them even realising it is a trip, building up over time. It is quite dangerous. I mentioned those two people who had issues but I have others, maybe four or five, who are unsure if they would have embarked on this experience if they knew
  - vorpalhex 4y ago
    There are quite a few studies here though. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5584749/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5584749/ (online survey, 84 respondants) https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32820538/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32820538/ (meta analysis, 6703 total participants across 55 studies) My reading of this is we can't make claims like X% practicioners have negative outcomes - the numbers are too messy. We can definitely say a significant amount of practictioners do have negative outcomes. But, those negative outcomes are wide and while they include suicide, depression and panic attacks, the majority of them are things like anxiety. You are digging into and tinkering with your psyche. Of course there are going to be negative outcomes. I would be more skeptical if the claim was meditation did something and never had negative effects.

roody15 4y ago

Disclaimer: This is probably going to make me sound crazy but perhaps it’s fitting. In a deeply meditative state you can open up yourself to a spiritual state of perception. In this transcendental state you can attract other spiritual and ethereal entities. Not all of which are benevolent. Lots of the meditative mantras, prayers and rituals perhaps are meant to ward off negative entities and even perhaps attract compassionate and positive spiritual forces In a sense train yourself to open the door to different states of mind … this and of itself doesn’t equal enlightenment or happiness.

bowsamic 4y ago
Yes, in the realm of emptiness (which we are never apart from) we can directly touch Buddhas and bodhisattvas, since we are never separate from them anyway. Buddhist practise helps us see this directly
vorpalhex 4y ago
Do you view this description as being literal or metaphorical?
- bowsamic 4y ago
  It’s literal, else they would have said it’s not

taeric 4y ago

I don't know. This still feels heavy in the propaganda realm. Which... to be clear, propaganda works. Turns out, telling people directly how and what to feel is more effective than makes sense. That is, looking at it as 2500 years of successfully developing what works is hiding a lot of the failure that has accompanied things in that same time span. Is akin to saying that the religions that avoid certain foods are on to something, because no way something like that would stick without a solid reason. To that end, the folks you know that had a mental breakdown. Is there a counterfactual world where they did not have a breakdown by avoiding meditation? Or by picking it up with a new religion? My priors are low that that is the case, but I would be delighted to learn more.

bowsamic 4y ago
It’s very new to us, why would we assume we have a perfect system for understanding it? It isn’t a toy to play with. Far more scientific research is needed before it’s safe to do in a secular context.
- taeric 4y ago
  Isn't this true of all frames? I feel that I could claim the same for science and religion as things, as well. Note that I'm fine pushing for caution on folks wanting to take up any practice. This would go as well for folks that think a running practice will help them. Maybe. At best.
  - bowsamic 4y ago
    I think we should treat it like a psychedelic treatment
    - taeric 4y ago
      In what way?
      - bowsamic 4y ago

Hasu 4y ago

I've been noticing an increasing trend of people saying things like this, and I don't get it. Meditation has many forms and traditions, within and without Buddhism. Which ones are "safe" and which ones aren't? Is using Headspace twice a week enough to be dangerous, or is there some lower bound where meditation practice without Buddhist beliefs switches from harmless to dangerous? And are Hindu or Christian meditation practices dangerous, or just the secular stuff? What precisely is the nature of this danger? > I personally know two people who went into severe psychosis and depression by trying to practise meditation in a secular context. Sorry, but I simply can't believe this. I mean I believe you have two friends with mental health issues, but I don't believe that psychosis can be triggered in a normal person by practicing "secular meditation". That's an extreme claim that requires a lot of evidence.

bowsamic 4y ago
I would say that meditating for more than 15 minutes a day is very dangerous I’m sorry that you don’t believe (edit typo) me, nothing I can do about that
Enginerrrd 4y ago
>That's an extreme claim that requires a lot of evidence. For what it's worth, I Don't think it's an extreme claim at all. The potential for ill-effects from more extreme efforts in Meditation is starting to be documented by western scientists. A lot of adverse outcomes aren't only possible, but actually quite common. I personally had ZERO prior mental health issues, but after 3-4 months of meditating 30-90 minutes everyday in addition to fairly intense mindfulness practice throughout the day, I started to experience a lot of issues: strange emotional outbursts disconnected from any memory or thought, anger management issues, tension headaches, depression, etc. These ultimately only resolved by stopping meditation entirely for a long time and only carefully reintroducing it in smaller less frequent doses. It's really not all sunshine and rainbows.
- bowsamic 4y ago
  I also had some of those side effects. I also had a trippy period, where I struggled to see anything as real. It was about a 2 week long solipsistic nightmare. I do think this is all “part of the path”, but without the traditional context, you will be quite lost on what to do next. Even with it, it’s very difficult

drieddust 4y ago

Absolutely meditation is just one part of 8 part Hindu Yoga system objective of which is to be one with the ultimate reality and live a good life no matter what. Person grown with strong Abrahmic values with find it confusing any strange. After reading Bhagwad Geeta I realised that yoga/meditation is all about discharging your duties with no expectations. I won't say I am transformed but my life do change for good by a huge margin after realising this.

greenglass 4y ago

The people who have popularized meditation in the west, Jack Kornfield, Sharon Salzburg, Joseph Goldstein, zinn, all come at it from the Buddhist tradition. It’s a useful approach for treating various medical problems. Anything, even nothing, can cause psychosis.

bowsamic 4y ago
This is minimising the risks, and those people you mention, while being from traditional backgrounds, afaik do not teach traditional practises, so they have effectively removed the wider framework Meditation is not “as safe as sitting down”. It has strong life altering risks
- greenglass 4y ago
  For those dealing with chronic pain, insomnia and other debilitating conditions, these people offer a lot that cannot be achieved through other means. Opiates or benzodiazepines are more readily available, and preferred by mainstream medicine, but they too can alter one’s life. Anything can alter one’s life if you think about it.

taylodl 4y ago

I would argue Zen Buddhism is secular, so I'm not quite sure the distinction you're trying to make.

bowsamic 4y ago
Zen Buddhism is not secular at all. It is a traditional form of Mahayana Buddhism. In China and Vietnam Zen Buddhists practise Pure Land extensively. Dogen in Japan, the creator of Soto Zen, was heavily invested in the Lotus sutra and mentioned rebirth constantly. Where did you learn that it is secular? This is not true