Sprinkles

Hello all, I'm fairly new to Actualized.org and all the paradigms therein, and was just watching Leo's "Meditation for Beginners" video when he stated that when meditating, one should stop manipulating themselves towards feeling either good or 'safe' emotions, and instead let oneself fully experience whatever your body wants to express. HOWEVER, I perceive self-manipulation to be a very powerful technique in terms of getting things done that you really don't want to do (eg homework/studying/boring work tasks) or making them pleasurable, or pushing yourself towards feeling more positive moods, or improving self image, things of that nature. My main question, then, is that if we CAN drive ourselves towards more positive feelings, why shouldn't we? Is there something inherently wrong with these practices, manipulating ourselves to feel 'better'? Thanks for any insight you may provide you wonderful people. Cheers.

Thank you all for your input! I think this here (quoted) is an important distinction I wasn't making previously, so I will be sure to separate meditating time (for direct experience) from time spent on self-improvement mental techniques, such as visualizations, affirmations, etc.