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5 years 2 months ago #110297 by John
Replied by John on topic Why?

Chris Marti wrote: Seriously.


Why not?

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5 years 2 months ago #110298 by Shargrol
Replied by Shargrol on topic Why?
and How?

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5 years 2 months ago #110299 by Rod
Replied by Rod on topic Why?
I can see this is going to go viral! Chris you're a genius!

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5 years 2 months ago #110300 by Andromeda
Replied by Andromeda on topic Why?
Because!

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5 years 2 months ago #110301 by Chris Marti
Replied by Chris Marti on topic Why?
My friend, who teaches computation and semantic logic at Stanford, has a big sign in his office that says "Marvin Minsky is _________."

Why?

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5 years 2 months ago - 5 years 2 months ago #110302 by Chris Marti
Replied by Chris Marti on topic Why?
Not once has anyone used the "Thank You" button on this topic.

Why?
Last edit: 5 years 2 months ago by Chris Marti.

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5 years 2 months ago - 5 years 2 months ago #110303 by Chris Marti
Replied by Chris Marti on topic Why?
So can you tell me why?

Here's Judson Brewer, a neuroscientist who famously studies brains during meditation using fMRI machines. He's created a commercial venture, I assume to capitalize on what he learned:

www.unwindinganxiety.com/

Modern science + Ancient practices

Recent research has uncovered incredible insights on how the brain functions — and what can create patterns of anxiety and panic. Research has also discovered the pathways that make the traditional practice of mindfulness so effective, and how to apply it specifically to the modern epidemic of anxiety. Initial data from the Unwinding Anxiety program shows a 48% reduction in anxiety after just 28 modules.


I'm not sure what to think of this. He seemed at first to be genuinely interested in the relationship between awakening and brain function. This reminds me more of the MBSR stuff that's now popular. I can see programs being rolled out for specific things like smoking and vaping, overeating, gambling, and so forth. This program costs $210 a year, or $30 a month. You can get a 28-day free trial.
Last edit: 5 years 2 months ago by Chris Marti.

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5 years 2 months ago #110304 by Andromeda
Replied by Andromeda on topic Why?
In the past few months I've been thinking a lot about this division between what I'm thinking of as meditation as medicine vs. meditation as mysticism. This Judson Brewer venture is clearly "medicine" and of course it is medicine that sells. And it may help a lot of people with anxiety. But my own use of meditation as "medicine" has mostly been to treat issues brought on by mystical misadventures and so while I do know some things about it, the purpose has been quite different from this sort of commercial mass market "medicine" venture. A part of me is very sad to see spiritual practices used in this way--it really made me cringe to read that part, "Research has discovered the pathways that make the traditional pathways of mindfulness so effective." Effective at what?

I'm glad people are getting help but I've realized that I personally can have nothing to do with meditation as medicine and generally need to stay as far away from it as possible. It basically has nothing to do with me and so I should probably just mind my own business and focus on my practice.

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5 years 2 months ago #110305 by Chris Marti
Replied by Chris Marti on topic Why?
Yeah, I agree, It's sad to see meditation, a spiritual activity, used as some kind of commercial cure-all. That's what bothers me about MBSR, too. Brewer's program sounds like MBSR on steroids. It's another trail marker on the path to commercializing everything. It's what we Americans like to do. Take other people's stuff, make money from it.

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5 years 1 month ago #110306 by Andromeda
Replied by Andromeda on topic Why?
The hard part for me is that it gets me thinking: is it even a good thing to have that kind of mental health care delivered through an app? We have emotions for a reason. What if those people have good reasons to have fear, such as abusive partners, etc.? Society is messed up in all sorts of ways, and so widely available tools for making people into better cogs to fit that system give me pause...

Oops, I'm going down that judgmental trail again. I can't help myself.

What if the anxiety some of the app users are feeling is samvega, for which the real cure is spiritual? Will the app "fix" it? And if so, how? What will the end result of that be?

This line of conversation is making me feel a sort of dread and horror. Maybe I need the app!!! :sick:

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5 years 1 month ago #110307 by Andy
Replied by Andy on topic Why?
So what does this app actually do?

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5 years 1 month ago #110308 by Chris Marti
Replied by Chris Marti on topic Why?
Andy, you can find out here: www.unwindinganxiety.com/#hiw

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5 years 1 month ago #110309 by Noah
Replied by Noah on topic Why?

Chris Marti wrote: Yeah, I agree, It's sad to see meditation, a spiritual activity, used as some kind of commercial cure-all. That's what bothers me about MBSR, too. Brewer's program sounds like MBSR on steroids. It's another trail marker on the path to commercializing everything. It's what we Americans like to do. Take other people's stuff, make money from it.


only 30 bucks/month!

:evil:

:(

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5 years 1 month ago #110310 by Shargrol
Replied by Shargrol on topic Why?
If you all are annoyed by this, I developed an app that blocks commercialized dharma from appearing on your operating system... It only cost $12 a month and your first upgrade is free! :)

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5 years 1 month ago #110311 by Andy
Replied by Andy on topic Why?
I'm hearing a lot of negative reactions, and I share the concern about commercializing meditation. There certainly is a lot that can be said about that general topic, and it is pretty easy to find poster children.

It seems initially easy to lump this in with all the rest, but when I look at the specifics it gets harder for me and I find myself feeling conflicted. The tech here is specifically designed with a limited, narrow, scope, and doesn't seem to be advertising as a cure-all. He's not claiming unreasonable results. I've read some of Judson's research papers before and his research is legitimate. He's build up some expertise in narrowly focused areas.

Here are some questions that occurred to me as I thought about this. (Full disclosure--I seem to want to defend this, but I'm really not sure why)

Is there something specific about Judson's app that's objectionable, or the content, or the presentation? So is it the marketing that's offensive? Or, if this is medicine, who gets to decide who can use it? If it's meditation, who gets to regulate that? Or is it that he's mixing money and dharma? Is it really dharma? How can you tell? Where do you draw the line between acceptable and unacceptable?

Has anyone here either signed up for the app, or for the free 5-day course on anxiety? I signed up for the free 5-day and have listened to two of the 15 minute segments. So far, he's talked about differences between stress and anxiety and did a short 10-second exercise to notice where in your body you feel fear and anxiety. It's hard to call it meditation, but any meditator with any experience at all would feel at home with it.

Comments?

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5 years 1 month ago #110312 by Chris Marti
Replied by Chris Marti on topic Why?
Noah, Netflix is only about $10 a month but the revenue from millions of subscribers adds up quickly into the billions. :P

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5 years 1 month ago - 5 years 1 month ago #110313 by Chris Marti
Replied by Chris Marti on topic Why?
Andy, Judd Brewer "sold" his research to a lot of meditators (his subjects) as academic, motivated by curiosity. This just feels "bait and switch-y" to me, so I'm just disappointed in what's come from it if this app is "it.". I was hoping for something deeper and more meaningful to the spiritual community. It's a visceral, emotional reaction I'm having. I'll get over it pretty quickly.
Last edit: 5 years 1 month ago by Chris Marti.

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5 years 1 month ago - 5 years 1 month ago #110314 by Chris Marti
Replied by Chris Marti on topic Why?

I developed an app that blocks commercialized dharma from appearing on your operating sWhich


Which operating system - the one I'm typing into or the one in my head?
Last edit: 5 years 1 month ago by Chris Marti.

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5 years 1 month ago #110315 by Chris Marti
Replied by Chris Marti on topic Why?
Maybe the Judd Brewer thing is subconsciously reminding me of the deep emotional wounds caused by the Jeffery Martin thing :P

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5 years 1 month ago - 5 years 1 month ago #110316 by Noah
Replied by Noah on topic Why?
It would be good if the greater meditation community(s) could find ways of teaching/facilitating/informing/training on the dharma that were not monitized/commercialized but were also honoring the need for complex metaystemic thinking that interact with our current lifestyle & world. Can't people work on the weekends? Can't people use donations from a few core individuals rather than making everyone pay? Can't people spend less money in their personal lives? Can't people supersave & plan for early retirement? Can't people make the decision to have children later & save more money? Or live in cheaper areas? Or crowd fund such as via patreon? Or other fundraising, or investing in cryptocurrency (or whatever), or vend goods unrelated to meditation as many ashrams/centers have done in the past? or run off of volunteers? or increase internal operational efficiency to require less funds to run their organization?
Or have sliding scales appropriate to a student's income level? Or "open their books" to explain exactly why they need the money they need? Shouldn't enlightened people be better at training themselves to work hard & spend less? I'm not saying that awakening makes one automatically harder working & more frugal; I'm saying it makes one's mental & physical patterns more malleable, more trainable. Why aren't the people who are teaching awakening or techniques related to the path to awakening (such as mindfulness to relieve anxiety)(who are presumably awakened) making the ethical decision to train themselves to be harder working & more frugal & thinking in complex, subtle ways such that they don't have to commercialize? A simple solution or hard line stance isn't the right answer -- but the right answer also is not to just dismiss this whole discussion & optimize profit.
Last edit: 5 years 1 month ago by Noah.

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5 years 1 month ago - 5 years 1 month ago #110317 by Andromeda
Replied by Andromeda on topic Why?
Noah, there's a lot in your post.

You say that you consider using mindfulness to relieve anxiety as being related to the path to awakening and that's very interesting to me because I don't really see the connection. Care to elaborate?

Edit: To be clear, anxiety has never really been one of my personal issues. With the exception of a few years with a PTSD-related fear of heights, for the most part when fear shows up in my life it's usually trying to tell me something and I'm grateful for it. So I may be ignorant of something important here.
Last edit: 5 years 1 month ago by Andromeda.

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5 years 1 month ago - 5 years 1 month ago #110318 by Noah
Replied by Noah on topic Why?
I have a relatively traditional Buddhist view of awakening. In my understanding & experience, anxiety arises from kinks in the chain of dependent origination such as dualistic perception, early psychodynamic wounds & disproportional mental-emotional-behavioral reactionary patterns. So rather than fundamental awakening just being about an intuitive grokking of the way things are without needing to change them, I think it is about both surrender & action - hand in hand. That is likely different than the stance of others on here.
Last edit: 5 years 1 month ago by Noah.

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5 years 1 month ago #110319 by Andy
Replied by Andy on topic Why?

Chris Marti wrote: Andy, Judd Brewer "sold" his research to a lot of meditators (his subjects) as academic, motivated by curiosity. This just feels "bait and switch-y" to me, so I'm just disappointed in what's come from it if this app is "it.". I was hoping for something deeper and more meaningful to the spiritual community. It's a visceral, emotional reaction I'm having. I'll get over it pretty quickly.


Thanks for the context, Chris.

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5 years 1 month ago - 5 years 1 month ago #110320 by Andy
Replied by Andy on topic Why?

Andromeda wrote: Noah, there's a lot in your post.

You say that you consider using mindfulness to relieve anxiety as being related to the path to awakening and that's very interesting to me because I don't really see the connection. Care to elaborate?

Edit: To be clear, anxiety has never really been one of my personal issues. With the exception of a few years with a PTSD-related fear of heights, for the most part when fear shows up in my life it's usually trying to tell me something and I'm grateful for it. So I may be ignorant of something important here.


I recently had some insights into how dissatisfaction presents in my every experience. (On a side note, that part of the experience is now in my face all the time, and I can't see how I didn't notice it before, it's so freakin' obvious.) I found that I experience that dissatisfaction as turning into anxiety at some point, with the downstream thoughts centering around, "There's something wrong here and now. Whatever is going on in this moment, it's not quite right. There's got to be something else that's better, but that something else never seems to come."

For me, then, the relationship between anxiety and awakening is that anxiety is a downstream effect of wanting to change the experience of this present moment, and awakening is "grokking", as Noah puts it, that there's no need to change how that presents.
Last edit: 5 years 1 month ago by Andy. Reason: Clarified text in last paragraph.

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5 years 1 month ago #110322 by Andromeda
Replied by Andromeda on topic Why?

Noah wrote: I have a relatively traditional Buddhist view of awakening. In my understanding & experience, anxiety arises from kinks in the chain of dependent origination such as dualistic perception, early psychodynamic wounds & disproportional mental-emotional-behavioral reactionary patterns. So rather than fundamental awakening just being about an intuitive grokking of the way things are without needing to change them, I think it is about both surrender & action - hand in hand. That is likely different than the stance of others on here.


Okay. I don't necessarily disagree with that. But the methods I've chosen to work with that have been spiritual and more about getting to the root of things. This type of anxiety to me hasn't been a bad thing to be "relieved" but a helpful red flag for where work needs to be done. I guess that's just not something I would ever consider outsourcing to an app geared toward conventional mental health since the goals to me are quite different.

I aim for excellence in spiritual practice but when it comes to conventional mental health I am perfectly content to merely toe the line enough so that my neighbors don't get out the pitchforks. :woohoo:

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