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Is enlightenment/mindfulness/etc. garbage?

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Recently on the West the Buddhist ideas of enlightenment, mindfulness and so on have been gaining a lot of traction. The proponents of these ideas reject not only the need for material things, but even basic emotional needs. They claim that by detaching from the physical world and focusing on one's inner world the person can achieve absolute unconditional happiness, where they no longer need anything and can feel happy and satisfied under any circumstances.

I have been on board with some of these ideas at various points of my life, but always found them lacking in substance and practicality. I tried various meditations, tried being mindful of my thoughts, tried detaching from the material goods, and I achieved some success in these venues - but I could always get much better results by just applying basic common psychology, which is based on logic and rigorous scientific research, rather than abstract philosophical claims with no grounds in science. I am nowadays leaning towards the notion that the whole ideology is complete pseudo-scientific nonsense based in religion and ancient philosophies, but not supported by any real world evidence.

Here is just a few the most obvious objections to these ideas:
  1. Countries in which these ideas are especially popular, such as India or Sri Lanka, you would expect to be populated mostly by happy people - yet whenever you go there, you see the same thing as you see in any other developing country: people tired of life and getting upset easily. On the streets you will not see people with calm or smiling faces, but people with frowns, treating each other poorly and constantly getting advantage of each other. The claims of the proponents of the Buddhist ideas of mindfulness certainly do not live up to the claims they make.
    You see the same thing in Buddhist monasteries. Do you see people with wide smiles there? No, everybody looks like they are done with life and just wait to die.
    In contrary, in allegedly non-mindful materialistic societies such as developed Western democracies, you see people generally being happy and content with their lives. It turns out that driving a nice car or living in a nice house gives you something real, tangible to feel good about, while simply having some nice abstract ideas in your mind does not give you much of anything.
    When I took classes at an acting school, our main teacher was a huge fan of Buddhism and even organised paid (of course; for people who claim to be above material things, these folks surely like getting paid for preaching their stuff) events at which he taught us mindfulness and other Buddhist techniques... Complete waste of time, and the guy himself did not seem like a particularly happy person, believed in crazy conspiracy theories and overall came across as a charlatan. This has been my experience with virtually every "mindfulness" preacher I have encountered.
  2. Inner world is just a small part of our lives. Sure, you can live solely in your inner world and ignore the outer reality, but you are going to miss on a lot of what the world has to offer. Why limit oneself so much? Why not enjoy both the inner and the outer world?
  3. The claim that being attached to material goods is bad is very suspect. It is true that you can make yourself miserable by going out of your way to chase nice things, but that can be said of anything: anything is good only in moderation. For myself, I find that my happiness is correlated quite strongly with my material well-being; granted, I am a fairly ascetic person and do not need much to be happy... But even so, for example, buying a car a bit over a year ago elevated my level of happiness dramatically. So did paying off a large fraction of my debt. So did learning how to make a very nice coffee at home.
  4. There are reasons our brain works the way it does. There are reasons we get angry and sometimes get overtaken by our emotions. It does not mean that we should just enjoy the ride and never do anything to take our emotional state under control - but, rather, I have always thought that we need to learn to use our emotions to our advantage. Becoming independent of our emotions seems like the wrong goal to me, as it detaches us from an integral part of ourselves.
I can say what made real, dramatic difference in the quality of my life: deliberate effort and action. I have struggled with social anxiety for the vast majority of my life; what really helped me was employing a positive and humorous mindset by forcefully pushing through positive ideas and humor (the "mindfulness" folks will tell you that you should just accept all emotions and thoughts that you have and become above them, but this never actually worked for me, and only overwriting those emotions and thoughts through hard intellectual effort did), and taking action to break through social barriers. I could not talk to people confidently no matter how much I meditated; but when I started approaching strangers on the streets to get out of my comfort zone, it took but a few days for my social anxiety to fade away.

It seems to me that all this "mindfulness" fluff is just another new age scam, where people convert their followers into their cult by making big promises regarding achieving happiness, not needing money, etc., while they themselves are collecting money from gullible folks and enjoy the status of celebrities, while basing their claims on ancient pseudo-scientific ideas.

Now, I am not saying that absolutely everything regarding the idea of mindfulness is hogwash. There are definitely some helpful techniques there, such as learning to observe your thoughts and emotions from a distance, letting negative emotions run instead of suppressing them, being conscious of your negative habits... But all of these things are already covered by practical psychology, a real science based on rigorous research. In my opinion, you are going to get much further in life by reading a couple of high-quality psychological books written by experienced professionals in the field, than reading books written by those self-proclaimed gurus.
Something rigorous, such as cognitive-behavioral therapy (which you can do on your own at home), has worked far better for me than all these wacky Eastern ideas. Affirmations are very effective as well, if done right (most people get them wrong and think that you simply need to keep repeating something for it to stick). Reframing technique (where you come up with a positive interpretation of everything happening around you) is quite practical. Working on your breathing and being conscious of it can be very helpful. Getting out of your head by focusing on the physical feelings in your body is powerful. All of this is covered by serious psychology and has a scientific explanation.

I should note though that psychology also has its limitations, and many claims it makes are questionable and based on somewhat loose statistics. You should discover for yourself what works for you. In my experience, taking action and trying different things that sound reasonable is the best way to proceed. Again, coming back to my social anxiety problems, according to most psychologists I should have just learned to cope with it. But the simplest thing you can think of actually dealt a mortal blow to it fast: deciding to go outside and start approaching strangers regardless of how I felt. A thing that any kid can come up with and that you do not need psychology to arrive at.

But it is still better to use rigorous science, as opposed to a bunch of claims based on nothing but some people's individual testimonies (typically the people who do not seem to practice what they preach).

Anyone agrees/disagrees?

P.S. This post was triggered by me watching the latest video by Leo from actualized.org. For those who do not know, Leo is a self-help guru that teaches people how to allegedly achieve enlightenment. In the latest video, he says that he has achieved full enlightenment and does not worry about anything any more; a minute into the video, a delivery guy from Amazon rang in his door, and he flipped out and suddenly got very serious and negative. For someone who "achieved enlightenment", he certainly acted as a guy with a very short temper. Yet another "guru" who makes big claims, yet cannot handle the most basic situation without getting upset. Reminds me of those pickup artists who claim they have conquered the world of women, yet do not have a romantic partner and, instead, sell their courses online to gullible people.

I recently watched a Korean show where a couple of very successful guys take a very anxious person having trouble even asking strangers for directions, and over the course of a few days make him into someone who can speak to strangers about virtually anything, documenting the whole (very simple and straightforward) process. This is the real thing, something you can try for yourself immediately and see if it works. Not something that takes many years with barely anything to show for them, so you end up selling booklets on meditation to tourists at the Grand Canyon (I am not making this up, by the way!).
GnosticChristian



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  • DeeDee 5395 Pts   -   edited January 2020
    Another very interesting piece , you and I had a brief conversation about this before. I detest all this new ages stuff where assorted gurus regularly claim one can achieve enlightenment but of course for a price. Over here at the moment everywhere you go there are  “ empowerment groups “ which seems to be the thing.

    The teachings of Buddhism have been taken and repackaged by these “gurus” as a cure all for all of life’s ups and downs ,Alan Watts started the popularity of such a long time back . This stuff I used to find this very appealing a long time ago and at one stage I identified as Buddhist but realized I just swapped one belief system for another.

    Eckhart Tolle who’s taken bits and pieces from Buddhism and other systems is huge now and even has his own TV station,  he never stops promoting his wife’s business online and for a man who claims he has no ego he keeps referring to “I “ “me “ , “mine” , Tolle says some interesting things but so do they all as they need lures to get the suckers in .

    It’s all ancient bunk in new clothes. I laughed when you mentioned the pick up artists as it’s so true they’re always single but of course state it’s out of choice 

    MayCaesar
  • MayCaesarMayCaesar 5965 Pts   -  
    @Dee

    I would say that some of those ideas have a grain of truth, and some of the techniques can be useful - but the overall framework the practitioners base them on is fallacious.
    In general, one should be very-very sceptical if someone is telling them that material wealth is not important and it is all about the inner world. Almost always it means that you are about to be taken advantage of. And while there is a lot to say about the importance of the inner world, no one who has good intentions is going to say that it is okay to, say, stay poor and do nothing about it.

    Regarding pick-up artists, they are a mixed bag. I have never liked the whole idea of "picking-up girls", which sounds extremely derogatory and unhealthy - but I like the "social freedom" aspect its practitioners advocate for, stating that you should to a large extent free yourself from being controlled by others' opinions and express yourself more openly, regardless of people's judgement. 
    Ironically, most of those artists themselves seem to place a lot of importance on people's judgement of them, otherwise they would not tell everyone how great they are, how many partners they have slept with and so on.

    My idea of social freedom has never been to walk around picking up ladies and showing everyone what a boss I am. To me, it means interacting with people in the manner that makes their day brighter, not being afraid of judgement of the negative minority of people who are going to hate me for stepping over social norms. I would never "pick someone up" just to prove something to someone, and I respect the time of people I interact with.

    It seems that a lot of these new age ideas come fundamentally not from someone's genuine desire to improve the quality of their lives, but from their need to compensate for something - which is generally a terrible and destructive motivation to have. I think the "scarcity mentality" versus "abundance mentality" separation is one of those few neo-Buddhist ideas that are actually useful and logically sound. When you believe that you already have what you need in life and everything else is optional, then the quality of your action improves dramatically, as you now go after your actual dreams and interact with others in a mutually beneficial manner, as opposed to coping with your insecurities by taking advantage of others.
    Dee
  • DeeDee 5395 Pts   -  
    @MayCaesar

    It’s interesting regards the pick up artists and what you say about interacting with people as a lot of people are socially shy and don’t know how to be themselves outside their close circle of friends and family, all they’re selling is confidence really.

    It’s also amusing one of the skills they sell is teaching clients some basic magic tricks which is a great way to approach complete strangers.  When I used to work as a menatalist/ magician I could find myself surrounded by women all wanting to talk to me and the hook was simple , if I was in a bar and a table of women were having a drink I would approach look at one and say “ excuse me but I couldn’t help notice your hand shape is most interesting “ then I would follow up by saying “ I’m sorry I’m a professional palm reader and mystic” I would then walk back to my table and within minutes the request to please “will you read our palms would come “  Anyone can do this with a basic knowledge of palm reading or even using Barnum statements in a creative way these guys are just selling social confidence nothing else.

    ****It seems that a lot of these new age ideas come fundamentally not from someone's genuine desire to improve the quality of their lives, but from their need to compensate for something

    I couldn’t agree more , I was talking to a guy last week who bought a new car and before he told me what type he told me it cost him €52,000 such was his need to impress me and others he was addressing , I was struck by a thought and wondered to myself did he get it to impress someone else as in did he really need it?  His brother later on ( it was a house party) told me he admitted getting the new car to “top” his brother in laws recent car purchase which was €10,000 cheaper.

    I wonder what he compensating for ? A feeling of not being good enough who knows? Cases like this are everyday it’s as if people are all the time trying to prove themselves to family , friends and society at large 
    bjinthirty
  • @MayCaesar ;

    I cannot agree with your assessment of the Sri Lankans.

    The opposite has been my experience there.

    That aside.

    I highly recommend, --- as most sages and mystics do, including Jesus, should you think him real, ---- seeking enlightenment through meditation and fasting. 

    It is not easy but if diligent, you might be surprised at what your mind can accomplish. 

    If you are not into self discovery, then finding what Jung and Freud called your Father Complex will elude you.

    Regards
    DL
  • M C & Dee

    Could I have your thoughts on the pineal gland?

    Regards
    DL 
  • DeeDee 5395 Pts   -  
    @GnosticChristian

    All I know is pineal gland is key to the body's internal clock , Descartes thought it housed the “soul” others called it the third eye all nonsense of course 
    GnosticChristian
  • Dee said:
    @GnosticChristian

    All I know is pineal gland is key to the body's internal clock , Descartes thought it housed the “soul” others called it the third eye all nonsense of course 
    Not to the esoteric or mystics.

    I think the ancients used it as a mantra but we should remember that the Egyptians were well of the curve in terms of knowing the body and medicine.

    Regarsd
    DL
    Dee
  • DeeDee 5395 Pts   -  

    ***** Not to the esoteric or mystics

    Who’s opinion on such is worthless as what’s the point in listening to the ramblings of charlatans on what is nonsense?
    GnosticChristian
  • Dee said:

    ***** Not to the esoteric or mystics

    Who’s opinion on such is worthless as what’s the point in listening to the ramblings of charlatans on what is nonsense?
    You would have to include Jesus in that description. He promoted introspection to the point of apotheosis.

    If you have never experience that, then that would explain your doubt. I did the one time and it still disturbs me and generates a lot of thinking 30 years later.

    As a Gnostic Christian, I will use Jesus' words as a reply.

    John 6 ; 63 It is the spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing: the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life.

     Luke 11:52 Woe unto you, lawyers! for ye have taken away the key of knowledge: ye entered not in yourselves, and them that were entering in ye hindered.

     Mark 7:13 Making the word of God of none effect through your tradition, which ye have delivered: and many such like things do ye.

    Regards

    DL




  • DeeDee 5395 Pts   -  
    @GnosticChristian


    ***** You would have to include Jesus in that description. He promoted introspection to the point of apotheosis.

    Right , you’re basically re-branding Jesus as a “mystic” , Jesus was a mere mortal with charisma nothing else , how are his teachings in any way esoteric? 

    ****If you have never experience that, then that would explain your doubt. 

    Experienced heightened states of awareness sure , most humans have the thing they don’t do is give it labels 

    ****I did the one time and it still disturbs me and generates a lot of thinking 30 years later.

    Right , you had a deep experience we all have them once in a blue moon 
  • GnosticChristianGnosticChristian 285 Pts   -   edited January 2020
    Dee said:
    @GnosticChristian

    Right , you’re basically re-branding Jesus as a “mystic” , Jesus was a mere mortal with charisma nothing else , how are his teachings in any way esoteric? 
    Judaism has had an esoteric branch from the days of the kabballa.

    Your religious education is lacking, as your response shows.

    "Right , you had a deep experience we all have them once in a blue moon "

    What did you learn with yours?

    Regards
    DL 
    Dee
  • DeeDee 5395 Pts   -  
    @GnosticChristian

    ****/Judaism has had an esoteric branch from the days of the kabballa.


    So they claim , so what? You avoided my question


    *****Your religious education is lacking, as your response shows.


    I’ve forgotten more about religion than you’ve ever learned I’d wager , this opinion is informed by your juvenile understanding of such 


  • @Dee ;

    I think I answered your question with the quotes I gave you.

    I did not rebrand anyone. I just showed what Jesus branded himself with.

    You are used to supernatural garbage but Jesus held no supernatural beliefs.

    Here is the real way to salvation that Jesus taught.

    Matthew 6:22 The light of the body is the eye: if therefore thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light.

    John 14:23 Jesus answered and said unto him, If a man love me, he will keep my words: and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him.

    Romans 8:29 For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren.

    Allan Watts explain those quotes in detail.


    Regards
    DL


  • DeeDee 5395 Pts   -  
    **** You are used to supernatural garbage but Jesus held no supernatural beliefs.

    I don’t believe in the supernatural and everything you say regarding Jesus is speculation nothing else . Why are you sending me these quotes? Alan Watts indeed an interesting man but another peddler of B S.

    What is your point anyway about the Pineal gland you still haven’t made it ?
    Plaffelvohfen
  • MayCaesarMayCaesar 5965 Pts   -   edited January 2020
    @Dee

    Yes, I myself have never been interested in pickup itself, and I prefer more creative and original approaches. It is surprising just how easy it actually is to meet new people and get into deep discussions with them, and usually you only need to throw an initial hook to get them interested, and it just flows from there. Something as simple as, "I really like your t-shirt; where did you buy it?", in many cases can get you into a few hours of conversations.

    People absolutely buy a lot of expensive things to impress others - even though, in practice, others do not care about them that much. I even saw on some car forums statements such as, "I do not want to sit at a red light in a beater" - as if anyone sitting at a red light cares about what you drive.
    At least we can take advantage of that: since people buy a lot of new shiny cars, older and simpler cars are in low demand and, hence, cheap.

    Not to mention that there are very easy ways to impress others without much investment at all. People mistakenly think that how much something costs is what gets people's attention, but that is not actually true. I typically wear very bright original clothes with printed high-quality ornaments, such as this:
    https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07YFBWB62/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1
    Costed me around $20 on a sale, and I get compliments from strangers almost every day. While other people buy a Rolex for $20,000 and nobody even notices it.
    Marketers really learned how to establish the connection in people's heads between an item's price and its actual value. Yet this connection is an illusion.


    @GnosticChristian ;

    I have never encountered anyone who has accomplished a lot in life by just sitting on the floor and meditating. Meditation probably can be useful in many ways, but in my experience a much better way to get your mind straight is to go out in the world and do stuff. Nothing teaches you how to manage your mind as well as getting burned by real-life experiences and being forced to readjust your thought patterns.

    Look at any person that has achieved social, economical and professional prominence, and they are all doers. Even those who constantly talk about the value of enlightenment, such as Eckhart Tolle, themselves constantly attend talks, interviews and other events, get a lot of students, etc. The only person I know that has actually practiced what they preach and still achieved a lot in life is Dalai-Lama, but one could argue that Dalai-Lama is only so popular because he is Dalai-Lama. Had he been a random monk, nobody would know him.

    Self-reflection and introspection is very important, but I do not think that meditation is the right way to go about it. You can perform introspection while doing something. You can think all you want at home about quieting your mind, but when you actually encounter a sharp stressful situation in life - that is when you get to directly observe how your mind behaves. You will not learn to deal with stress by doing anything in a non-stressful environment. You have to actually go through stress repeatedly and desensitise yourself to it, and only then will you achieve solid and lasting results.

    I have the same problem with most philosophers and economists, for that matter. So many philosophers/economists talk about incredibly deep abstract things sitting in their ivory towers, yet when they go out in the world, the world turns out to work quite differently from what their theories suggest. It is impossible to truly learn something without interacting with it in some way, and, say, to build a plausible economical theory, you have to be an active market participant. You have to understand the psychology of the market participant if you want to understand how economics works as a whole, and that psychology has to be experienced first-hand to truly appreciate it.
    This is why, for example, so many zoologists routinely partake in field trips. You would think, "What is the point going to a shore every weekend to observe seagulls, if you can just study papers about seagulls?" Well, no. If you want to truly understand seagulls, to "feel" them, then you have to observe them and interact with them regularly. There is no other way to get real, natural knowledge.

    Again, speaking of Jesus... All his philosophising did not save him from being executed, which was quite easily preventable by just adjusting his behavior a bit. Quite often very intelligent people happen to also be extremely impractical, making beginner mistakes much less intelligent, but a bit more integrated in the real world, people would never make.
    Dee
  • Dee said:
    **** You are used to supernatural garbage but Jesus held no supernatural beliefs.

    I don’t believe in the supernatural and everything you say regarding Jesus is speculation nothing else . Why are you sending me these quotes? Alan Watts indeed an interesting man but another peddler of B S.

    What is your point anyway about the Pineal gland you still haven’t made it ?

    You were not paying attention and our chat and tone has me ending here.
    I get that enough from brain dead theists and your mind is as closed as theirs. 

    Regards
    DL
  • DeeDee 5395 Pts   -  
    @GnosticChristian

    **** You were not paying attention

    I was , I asked you to state what your point regarding the Pineal gland was you still haven’t made it 

    ****and our chat and tone has me ending here.

    You introduced the tone by resorting to a sly jab 


    *****I get that enough from brain dead theists and your mind is as closed as theirs. 

    Oh right , you believe in a “third eye “ and I’ve the closed mind , come back when you actually have a point to make 




  • DeeDee 5395 Pts   -  
    @MayCaesar

    ***** I typically wear very bright original clothes with printed high-quality ornaments, such as this:

    It’s lovely and totally different may get one myself , I wear bright as well and different to the norm I believe the term for it is “peacocking “ a pretty good way to get noticed and stand out from the crowd 
    MayCaesar
  • MayCaesarMayCaesar 5965 Pts   -   edited January 2020
    @Dee ;

    Agreed. I would also add to the discussion that many people care too much about fitting in with fashion trends to try to impress people, while in practice coming up with your own style is much more likely to do so. When everybody wears the same cool jacket, it is no longer cool. But when you develop your own style and wear something few other people wear, then you become noticeable and remarkable.

    There was a funny encounter when I was road-tripping in Utah last summer. When I was at the Bryce Canyon park, a couple approached me and asked me, "Were you in the Grant Staircase-Escalante park yesterday, by any chance?" Turns out they recognised me solely by my outfit. To think of it, the probability of such an encounter is extremely low, considering how many parks there are in Utah, how large distances between them are and how long the park hours are...

    In any case, I just wanted to advocate for developing one's own style over following general fashion trends. Even if you do not intend to impress anyone or stand out, it is still nice to be recognisable and somewhat unique.
  • DeeDee 5395 Pts   -  
    @MayCaesar

    **** In any case, I just wanted to advocate for developing one's own style over following general fashion trends. Even if you do not intend to impress anyone or stand out, it is still nice to be recognisable and somewhat unique.

    Thats a good story and illustrates perfectly how effective having your own style can be ......Many years ago I used to dress in 1920’s style clothes as in tailored suits always with a tie pin , cuff links and double breasted waistcoats all topped of by a caranation in my lapel , I loved it because no matter where I went people always commented on the style and it didn’t cost a fortune either just a bit of thought and attention to detail 
    MayCaesar
  • xlJ_dolphin_473xlJ_dolphin_473 1712 Pts   -  
    No it isn't. I practice mindfulness myself, and it has a positive benefit on my life right now, including better sleep, a notable increase in focus and enhanced immunity to disease. 
    If you are asking, however, whether mindfulness is all you need to be happy or results in not needing money, I think that part of mindfulness is indeed garbage. It helps you to be happier with what you have, but it is in no way a substitute for money or other sources of happiness. I'm not sure who is making these claims, but the majority of scientific evidence shows that they have no measurable grounding in reality.
    ZeusAres42
  • No it isn't. I practice mindfulness myself, and it has a positive benefit on my life right now, including better sleep, a notable increase in focus and enhanced immunity to disease. 
    If you are asking, however, whether mindfulness is all you need to be happy or results in not needing money, I think that part of mindfulness is indeed garbage. It helps you to be happier with what you have, but it is in no way a substitute for money or other sources of happiness. I'm not sure who is making these claims, but the majority of scientific evidence shows that they have no measurable grounding in reality.

    @xlJ_dolphin_473 ; just one thing is that there is evidence that supports mindfulness and it is now often used in conjuction with certain types therapy.



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