Sharing an interesting posting on Reddit r/Meditation

[abrakamowse]

Meditation isn't as sold --- Posted by

u/Mister_Bitmouse on reddit

(Original post here: https://www.reddit.com/r/Meditation/comments/ba8qb1/meditation_isnt_as_sold/ )

 

So I am not sure how to write this and not come across like a dick.

I have fallen into many if not most of the pitfalls on the spiritual/meditation path.

I am not perfect and I don't claim to know everything.

I am feeling a bit concerned having read a lot of the recent posts on this sub now that it has made it's way into my google now news feed.

Basically my concern is there is a lot of using meditation to bolster a, "successful life," to, "improve oneself," or to, "feel better."

While I think this is the aim of meditation, in a way. I think people have a very false expectation of what meditation will deliver.

Meditation is not a tool for peace, it will not make you feel better, and it is more likely to make you less, "successful."

Why?

Sitting in stillness while focusing on the breath will dredge up you unconscious. Therein lies 3.5 billion years, at least, of unprocessed baggage.

Meditation is like a meat grinder with your personal version of Las Vegas sitting at the front, go in and get ground.

So why meditate?

Chogyam Trungpa used to say unless you were interested in enlightenment in this life time at the cost of everything you know, then run the other way like hell.

A lot of the threads I have read recently are written by people who have about 1-2 years of meditation experience.

That is no small thing.

However, I am here to tell you that it isn't what you think.

It isn't bad, but embracing all of reality means just that.

Usually all the fun stuff is upfront.

I have been meditating for 25 years. I know myself to be Self. I have no doubt about it. I am not the man writing this, I am not a nationality, a race, a gender, I am that which is. I stopped meditating as much as soon as practice was moment to moment. Every moment then became mindfulness. Now everytime I walk down the street all the trees look crisp and clear like I was on acid/mushrooms. However, I don't sit daily. It keeps increasing though.

My practice now is introspection and I get to see all the ugliness my family never dealt with.

Spiritually it is great. In life it is fucking hard.

My meditation teacher was a man who left to meditate; found himself in Thailand in a monastery and found that every person there was hiding from something, career, relationship, children. One by one they all left to face those things.

Meditation will make you.

I just need you guys to know this stuff. This isn't sexy and it doesn't sell, "yoga butts," however it is true. Meditation isn't a toy, it isn't a successory. It's not going to make you CEO, it might, but being CEO won't mean shit to you.

[Consilience]

??

[purerogue]

I do think that mediation can be helpful if it is taken lightly, without having Enlightenment work involved, for pure purpose of taking pressure off, but if your goal goes further then that and you think that you can just do little of this and little of that and you will get somewhere you are asking for big problems and you will get it. 

Also don't want to make people confused , or scare , so I try to stay away from negative things about all of this, there is so much misinformation about lot of things, it is like cultural things to make stories around  such stuff, also I might get crucified if I do it. 

[AlwaysBeNice]

You cannot get away from meditation.

And, 'you need to work through billions of years of stuff' is just a story, not real. 

[pointessa]

3 hours ago, AlwaysBeNice said:

You cannot get away from meditation.

And, 'you need to work through billions of years of stuff' is just a story, not real. 

It might not be as far off as you think.

[moon777light]

Truth

[Cosmo]

Honestly, I find meditation to be insanely hard. I can only keep my mind quiet for a few seconds, before my brain is trying to distract me. it feels really unnatural, and a struggle to 'not think about anything'. It almost feels oppressive.  While it can calm me down, it never really gives me any clarity. It can be a nice pause from a hectic day, but the hectic-ness picks up the moment I'm not sitting around any more.  

Is that how everyone else feels when they begin or just me? I admit that it's something I've tried on and off for the last 4 or 5 years. I've never really committed to it, but that's largely because the supposed effects (that beginners are supposed to experience), just don't come to me. 

[Forestluv]

@abrakamowse It sounds like someone becoming more mature and realizing naunces within meditation. Meditation can be used for relaxation and stress reduction. It is wonderful for that. It can help someone "be in the moment" and help their attention. This may help that at work and in their relationships. This can promote a sense of successful in their life and relief from stress. Super duper. . . Meditation can also be used as a transcendental tool to self-actualize and transcend the personality. Cool jellies!

The tension and misunderstanding I see is when someone thinks they want to transcend the person, yet the true desire is for personal development and rewards. There is nothing "wrong" with other of these. It is the confusion that causes trouble. For example, someone might be attracted to the idea of "peace and bliss" they hear about with awakening. Yet they confuse the transcendental "peace and bliss" with their old concepts of personal "peace and bliss" (which is actually just a temporarily relief from stress and suffering). Such a person is likely to become very confused and frustrated.

[AlwaysBeNice]

1 hour ago, Cosmo said:

Honestly, I find meditation to be insanely hard. I can only keep my mind quiet for a few seconds, before my brain is trying to distract me. it feels really unnatural, and a struggle to 'not think about anything'. It almost feels oppressive.  While it can calm me down, it never really gives me any clarity. It can be a nice pause from a hectic day, but the hectic-ness picks up the moment I'm not sitting around any more.  

Is that how everyone else feels when they begin or just me? I admit that it's something I've tried on and off for the last 4 or 5 years. I've never really committed to it, but that's largely because the supposed effects (that beginners are supposed to experience), just don't come to me. 

I think that's quite common when you begin. It started out as a chore and becomes natural later for me, but I can't say that that is really true, it doesn't ever need to be a chore, I would say, certainly if you just feel tired or sick of the world, turn inward, do nothing, sitting or lying down.

But maybe it's a good idea to forget all ideas of doing any meditation and 'focus' on self-enquiry, which is also not really a doing, but just a willingness and open-mindedness to acknowledge you don't know what you are, -and that unknowing may bring about a silence and relaxation, and see that you can dissolve in that. 

[thesmileyone]

Life is chaos.

Think of a serene scene of beauty. Like this



How placid, gentle, beautiful, right?
But go down to a cellular level. Everything you see in that image is actually frantic...chaos.

Now what did that famous guy in that famous tv show say?

"Chaos is a ladda!"

It is a ladder. A ladder to enlightenment.

Chaos is a good thing. A tool.

You find choas inside via meditation. And you progress slowly up the ladder of Self.

 

Edit: Is time a ladder?

Is it not true that you start out enlightened, then people pile conditioning on you over and over, an EGO develops and you get lost in it...then you start meditating or you take a psychedelic and slowly but surely, you dig your way out... until you reach that which you already were, and are, but were living from, in the start?

We see time as a calm serene journey from point young to point old.

This is incorrect.


This is what time really is.
Chaotic
CHAOS IS A LADDER!

Edited April 8, 2019 by thesmileyone

[AlwaysBeNice]

2 hours ago, pointessa said:

It might not be as far off as you think.

No, it's completely off, there's nothing to work through, thinking you need to work through something; of something you have; that exists in time, is the illusion.

[moon777light]

@Cosmo try mindfulness meditation. Its easier for beginners because you focus on sensations so its harder for monkey mind to arise

[abrakamowse]

8 hours ago, Serotoninluv said:

The tension and misunderstanding I see is when someone thinks they want to transcend the person, yet the true desire is for personal development and rewards. There is nothing "wrong" with other of these. It is the confusion that causes trouble. For example, someone might be attracted to the idea of "peace and bliss" they hear about with awakening. Yet they confuse the transcendental "peace and bliss" with their old concepts of personal "peace and bliss" (which is actually just a temporarily relief from stress and suffering). Such a person is likely to become very confused and frustrated.

Exactly!

I shared because some of the things he said resonated with me, but I am one who benefited a lot of meditation to be more calm and think better. And much more. I agree a lot with what you say about peace and bliss from the personal POV and from the awareness POV.