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It seems like we are still quite far from a unifying model for the effects of meditation, or even separate models for different types of meditation. However, I'd venture to guess that looking at the neurological basis for "letting go", as you briefly discussed, would be a step in that direction. Then again, I am only going off of my limited knowledge on the topic. I am definitely interested to see what direction meditation research goes in. It could be decades before any meaningful discoveries are made.
Thank you for sharing some of your own personal experience. I always think conversations around meditation are sometimes difficult, and prone to serious bias, simply due to the private nature of the activity, although individual accounts seem to often match up in practice. It's still nice to hear someone else's perspective.
Thank you for the advice!
Hello there! I'm Kaloyan ("Kalo") and I recently joined LessWrong. I was reminded of the platform's existence in an episode of the Your Undivided Attention podcast. I actually first found the site a couple of years ago (can't even remember how -- searching for Zettelkasten content perhaps?), but did not get involved because I found it very overwhelming. In fact, I still do -- there is so much content, on so many topics I believe to be important, that it feels impossible to become a part of the community. I realize that's just my little voice of worry talking, so now I'm on a mission to prove myself wrong, starting with this... (read more)
I find your first anecdote quite interesting. It speaks of a much larger fallacy: the convention of using rewards to make ourselves feel better in an emotional trough. I watched Eric Edmeades once speak on this topic. If our go-to behavior when we feel bad is to do the things we enjoy, in an understandably naive attempt to feel better, are we not reinforcing the same behavior that got us there in the first place? Although far from a full-fledged behavioral theory, I think this idea is worth contemplating.
On a different note, something my yoga teacher once said really struck me. His claim was that when we adopt a "no pain, no... (read more)