<story><title>My mindfulness practice led me to meltdown</title><url>https://danlawton.substack.com/p/when-buddhism-goes-bad</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>ljm</author><text>I wouldn&amp;#x27;t conflate mindfulness (or capital M mindfulness, you could say) with meditation either.&lt;p&gt;Meditation has always been a deeply spiritual practice; Mindfulness attempts to turn it into a psychological, clinical one.</text></item><item><author>stelonix</author><text>This is exactly what I took from it. He uses the terms &amp;quot;mindfulness&amp;quot; and &amp;quot;Buddhism&amp;quot; interchangeably, but they&amp;#x27;re not. Buddhism has ways to deal with meditations that &amp;quot;go bad&amp;quot;, but mindfulness takes the Buddhism out of the practice.&lt;p&gt;Mindfulness is not Buddhism.</text></item><item><author>cyberpunk</author><text>These sorts of things have been dealt with for centuries by Buddhists, it’s a fairly common effect when you start with Zazen. This is why taking one part of the practice and abandoning the rest (most specifically, an experienced teacher) isn’t a great idea for everyone. Most of the time all you need to hear is “just let whatever comes up during Zazen go, and return to the moment” but alas, if you don’t things can go a bit wrong.&lt;p&gt;I don’t think it’s actively harmful, but the “mindfulness industry” is full of charlatans and poor advice, and it does make me rather sad that it’s being monetised in such a way.&lt;p&gt;Just sit.</text></item><item><author>rolleiflex</author><text>Since this is a long article, here’s a summary for fellow readers — it’s mostly about the negative side effects of meditation that the author believes is under-documented or under-reported due to the ‘hype’ of meditation as the 21st century cure-all. He talks about dissociative experiences (which is well documented in medical research), it being a pseudo-religion, and lastly, his belief that the extended use of meditation is the ‘opposite’ of stoicism in the way that it can render a person not less, but more susceptible to breakage from smaller stresses, like one of a traffic jam. He also attempts to make a biological argument on how this works by invoking something he calls the limbic system feedback loop, however I have found that argument unconvincing due to lack of any actual evidence.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>loopz</author><text>From the article:&lt;p&gt;&amp;gt; &amp;quot;I spent my last day in Los Angeles riding on a Segway, buying legal marijuana and staring at some turtles in an on-campus pond at UCLA. I was unsettled yet intrigued by Britton’s message. Some of the adverse experiences she had described were similar to challenges I had faced. But, at this point I was a decade into my intensive mindfulness meditation practice. I was too deep to get out. &amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;There&amp;#x27;s just so many things that is bad with this new-new age wave.&lt;p&gt;First of all, doing spiritual practices generally do not go hand-in-hand with taking drugs. Just taking marijuana or hash may bring panic attacks, and even psychotic episodes. If you rely on drugs to keep your emotions in check, you&amp;#x27;re already dealing with them wrong. Meditation together with drugs won&amp;#x27;t help that, but may worsen things if done intensively.&lt;p&gt;Second, there&amp;#x27;s no such thing as &amp;quot;intensive mindfulness meditation practice&amp;quot;. Mindfulness is gentle and short, and more about stillness than meditation.&lt;p&gt;Third, &amp;quot;intensive meditation&amp;quot; is something everybody should be wary about. Max 20 minutes is recommended per day, and there is no need to do more in order to &amp;quot;get anywhere faster&amp;quot;. Most important of all, do it with an experienced teacher you trust. The most important ingredient in meditation is to let go and relax, and is not yet another &amp;quot;work&amp;quot;.&lt;p&gt;In the end, something can always go wrong. Not everyone can deal with meditation, and not sure if there&amp;#x27;s a way to ensure to filter out people. Often people come to classes because they have some issues, not when everything&amp;#x27;s alright. So there are already things to deal with. Recommended is that people doing medication like antipsychotics, should be prescreened from joining class.&lt;p&gt;In the end, meditation is a powerful tool. But not sure the stress of Western life is the right way to channel the clarity and calmess one may get from it. You may come back from long retreats, but need tools to deal with the stresses in modern day life. So just meditation may be too confusing or not enough, to deal with one&amp;#x27;s life once more.</text></comment>
<story><title>My mindfulness practice led me to meltdown</title><url>https://danlawton.substack.com/p/when-buddhism-goes-bad</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>ljm</author><text>I wouldn&amp;#x27;t conflate mindfulness (or capital M mindfulness, you could say) with meditation either.&lt;p&gt;Meditation has always been a deeply spiritual practice; Mindfulness attempts to turn it into a psychological, clinical one.</text></item><item><author>stelonix</author><text>This is exactly what I took from it. He uses the terms &amp;quot;mindfulness&amp;quot; and &amp;quot;Buddhism&amp;quot; interchangeably, but they&amp;#x27;re not. Buddhism has ways to deal with meditations that &amp;quot;go bad&amp;quot;, but mindfulness takes the Buddhism out of the practice.&lt;p&gt;Mindfulness is not Buddhism.</text></item><item><author>cyberpunk</author><text>These sorts of things have been dealt with for centuries by Buddhists, it’s a fairly common effect when you start with Zazen. This is why taking one part of the practice and abandoning the rest (most specifically, an experienced teacher) isn’t a great idea for everyone. Most of the time all you need to hear is “just let whatever comes up during Zazen go, and return to the moment” but alas, if you don’t things can go a bit wrong.&lt;p&gt;I don’t think it’s actively harmful, but the “mindfulness industry” is full of charlatans and poor advice, and it does make me rather sad that it’s being monetised in such a way.&lt;p&gt;Just sit.</text></item><item><author>rolleiflex</author><text>Since this is a long article, here’s a summary for fellow readers — it’s mostly about the negative side effects of meditation that the author believes is under-documented or under-reported due to the ‘hype’ of meditation as the 21st century cure-all. He talks about dissociative experiences (which is well documented in medical research), it being a pseudo-religion, and lastly, his belief that the extended use of meditation is the ‘opposite’ of stoicism in the way that it can render a person not less, but more susceptible to breakage from smaller stresses, like one of a traffic jam. He also attempts to make a biological argument on how this works by invoking something he calls the limbic system feedback loop, however I have found that argument unconvincing due to lack of any actual evidence.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>mxmilkiib</author><text>Here is a multi-hour playlist from a retreat by Sujato on the main mindfulness sutta that covers various points like this;&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;youtube.com&amp;#x2F;playlist?list=PL70fWqztn7OXdbGqWEOvhOVqf5oEDJCFV&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;youtube.com&amp;#x2F;playlist?list=PL70fWqztn7OXdbGqWEOvhOVqf...&lt;/a&gt;</text></comment>