Studies find evidence that meditation is demotivating | Hacker News Reader

Studies find evidence that meditation is demotivating

nytimes.com

49 pointsgerbilly34 comments

The title is total clickbait.

From the article: "Then we tracked everyone’s actual performance on the tasks. Here we found that on average, having meditated neither benefited nor detracted from a participant’s quality of work."

They found that people who meditated were more calm and serene, reported less motivation, but performed similarly to people who had done non-meditative activities.

It seems to me that having a calm, relaxed workforce who performs just as well as your normal stressed workers is a pretty big positive. I'd find the study more interesting if it studied the long term effects, like do the two groups tend to diverge in productivity over time? Does it prevent burn out? Increase job satisfaction?

Not only that, but the tasks these people were assigned are not good models for work tasks. In a real professional workplace, the tasks are usually related to systems or processes over which the individuals feel ownership. Random tasks about which they know nothing are convenient for a study, but not a good model of actual work.

Perhaps the meditators were better able to recognize their actual lack of giving a fuck

That's a really good point. People work hard to try to justify to themselves why they're doing what they're doing, and that's exactly the kind of bs that meditation helps you reconsider and cut through.

No wonder the #1 question on Google Trends is "What am I doing with my life?"

Spoiler: that has been the number one question asked by sentients since sentience was a thing.

Not only that, but (speaking from personal, anecdotal experience), most of the benefit as it applies to work tasks will be realized over time, for outcomes where consistent and sustained focus and stress management is most beneficial.

That being said, what the mindfulness movement tends to gloss over is the fact that, with enough determination, meditators will occasionally shake loose deep-seated mental gunk, resulting in better quality of life if processed, but sometimes with a tumultuous period while dealing with it. Naturally, performance in other areas of life might drop during such a period.

My sample set is small, but I remain dubious about this study.

Accomplished meditators are very rarely couch potatoes; they tackle things that need to tackled with calm, wisdom, and efficiency.

True, motivations like "I don't want to yelled at.", or "I want more money.", or "I want to look good and smart to everybody." will go away or at least have less impact. But they are replaced by "How can I make this happier place?", or "What's the right thing to do for the company?", or "How can I take my ego out of this and do what's right?", along with better behaviour under stress and time constraints "When you're in a hurry go more slowly...", etc.

Also what kind of meditation are we referring to? Sitting and just breathing can also just be a relaxation exercise... not meditation. Those effects more or less just vanish when you come out of the sitting. Once some basic insights are there, the relationship to work changes and becomes more relaxed and practical and ... more effective.

As I said my sample set is small.

Although tour sample size is small, you are making the right conclusion out of it.

If you don't meditate then you are trapped in the cycle of wanting confirmation and approval from others.

After meditation you realise that it doesn't matter one bit what others think or say about you.

Inner peace is all that matters.

I would argue that you should care what other people think about you if you're inclined towards selfish behavior or treating others poorly. Caring what others think would stop you from engaging in behavior that would result in you alienating yourself. Of course meditation should help you become more prosocial as well, but I don't think removing the need for confirmation/approval of others is going to help everyone.

You are absolutely right. But I am not a snob, I am a socially awkward nerd so it did good to me when I begun ignoring how people judged me for

1. Reading books: wtf do you do? Read books? Why??? Don't you have a life? 2. You code in your free time? Wtf is wrong with you? 3. Why don't you dance with us? It is fun, you should.

Etx

Oh, wow. I can't imagine being judged negatively for reading books. I read a lot and almost everyone I tell this to tells me they are impressed and wishes they read more themselves. Never apologize for reading, that just sounds crazy to me.

I'm in India, ppl judge you for everything unless you do things they like.

My theory is that (correct) meditation makes people more aware of what's good for them and what isn't. One result of this could be that they realize that most of their goals in a company are BS so they lose motivation.

I know a lot of Buddhists including monks and they certainly are very active and motivated people. They are just a little pickier about what they put their energy into.

My observations about effects of meditations agree 100% with this user's.

What it does, among other things, is stop the meditator from running around like a headless chicken, chasing notifications and like counts, gasping at every clickbait-ey title, and pursing meaningless trivia, in addition to making 3 impulse purchases on Amazon everyday. So yeah, depending on the definition of motivation, meditation can be highly demotivating.

But by that same definition of motivation, most focussed people, and most people who’ve found success in their particular area, regardless of meditator-status, can be considered highly demotivated.

There isn't really one "correct" way to meditate. There are a number of ways. You can observe thoughts, sounds, bodily awareness, specific bodily sensations, feelings, the breath, look at some specific object or a combination of all these. Meditation can be an active activity (you're trying to cultivate certain intentions) or it can be passive (you just let things happen). You can choose to be more narrowly focused on your meditation object or less and just let whatever comes, comes. In my view, as long as you're focused on something without judgement then you're meditating. Mindfulness meditation would be a subset of this where you're observing your own experience without judgment. I really doubt that this alone would lead to knowing what is good for you and what isn't, without an underlying philosophy (which Buddhism provides, but the westernized secular version of mindfulness meditation does not).

Edit: I guess I should also add that Buddhist philosophy is influenced by insights that could be gained from meditation but my feeling is that the average person doing mindfulness meditation for 10 minutes a day is not having these insights. So my main argument here is that you can be meditating correctly and not having these insights.

> And the very notion of motivation — striving to obtain a more desirable future — implies some degree of discontentment with the present, which seems at odds with a psychological exercise that instills equanimity and a sense of calm.

'at odds with' is sort of a funny way of putting it: the realization that 'striving to obtain a more desirable future' often ends up being a trap is part of the very foundation of meditation, and explicitly so.

The other aspect of what's being said here is sort of a subtle problem, and one of the things that freaks people out about getting too into meditation: if I'm totally content, I would have no motivation to do anything then, right? In practice however, that's not the case. 'Motivation' in this sense is about making yourself do something you don't want to do. For instance, someone highly motivated to succeed at work might put in super long hours and make sacrifices in other aspects of their life in order to get ahead. If you were more content with where you were, it's true you probably wouldn't do that—but instead you might start writing a novel or building a house or doing charity work or whatever. It doesn't mean you're going to be lazy (in fact, meditation can be quite energizing; often times after finishing a restful session I pop up and effortlessly start cleaning and taking care of whatever needs to be done), just that you won't feel pressure to change your situation.

I haven't read the article so this is more off the cuff.

I read Emotional Intelligence by Goleman couple of months ago. And one of the bigger takeaways for me was that "meditation" or calmness was not an answer for everything. While meditation works on anger, stress (which are heightened emotions) etc it is not a good option when you are feeling sad/down. The better option will be to go out, have fun and get your emotional state up a bit.

So, IMO is meditation pill for everything? No but if you are stressed it is the best thing you can do.

Exactly. If you are sad and you meditate you might feel super depressed as you'd want to give up everything in lofe wondering "what's the point in all this?"

Meditation is for getting a calm mind and not being bothered by stupid things like countless notifications etc it doesn't make us superman or batman

Different meditative practices surely have different goals, but to my experience the big advantage is making clearer to myself the actual content of the emotional state I'm in. And thus making better decisions about "handling" that state.

In other words, (for me) meditation does not directly solve the problem: it just lets me see and consider the problem more clearly.

This experimental design is... weird. The participants were assigned tasks that "were similar to everyday workplace jobs", and asked about their concomitant motivation level to complete them. But why would they either group have any intrinsic motivation to do a purposeless simulation of busywork, except because it was part of the study?

But now I knew contemplation at its height. At its height, but not yet in its fullness. For in its fullness the way of Mary includes the way of Martha and raises it, so to speak, to its own higher power. Mescalin opens up the way of Mary, but shuts the door on that of Martha. It gives access to contemplation---but to a contemplation that is incompatible with action and even with the will to action, the very thought of action. In the intervals between his revelations the mescalin taker is apt to feel that, though in one way everything is supremely as it should be, in another there is something wrong. His problem is essentially the same as that which confronts the quietist, the arhat and, on another level, the landscape painter and the painter of human still lives. Mescalin can never solve that problem; it can only pose it, apocalyptically, for those to whom it had never before presented itself. The full and final solution can be found only by those who are prepared to implement the right kind of Welranschauung by means of the right kind of behavior and the right kind of constant and unstrained alertness. Over against the quietist stands the active-contemplative, the saint, the man who, in Eckhart's phrase, is ready to come down from the seventh heaven in order to bring a cup of water to his sick brother.

Aldous Huxley, "the doors of perception"

I have found that meditation is demotivating -- in behhaviors and activities that don't serve me.

Ignoring the quality of the article and cited study, I did massively cut down my meditation routine for exactly this reason.

Essentially, through meditation I learnt how to release "knots in my brain". This was exceedingly pleasant to an extent I cannot emphasize enough.

But then I realized that these knots in my brain were often associated with things I wanted to figure out.

I used to release them by figuring something out. But when I knew how to release them a whole lot quicker without having to ever bother with the difficulty of figuring something out, naturally I figured stuff out a whole lot less.

That made me sad. So I decided that particular meditation skill was one I wanted to unlearn.

Recently started meditating daily, and I was worried about exactly this towards the beginning. I work with my mind, I like using my mind to solve problems. The guidance I was getting for the sessions was of this "let thoughts come and go, just observe, be neutral" variety. While I see the value, and I've enjoyed the overall effects, it seemed to be pointing away from thinking as a thing to do. How can you do something like brainstorming if you're just letting thoughts pass, not following up with them?

Later, there have been some hints about a more "concentrating" style of exercise. I.e. rather than just focusing on the breath, body, outside sounds, whatever, actually spending the session with an idea as the starting point of the focus. Then staying on track with it, exploring just that one thing.

I've tried this once or twice now, unprompted, and I'm eager to learn more about it. I haven't reached any conclusions, but the meditative state of mind seems to be good for this. Brainstorming is more effective if you're in a less distraction-prone mode.

I don't know if this matches up with your experience, but it might be worth trying to use a session to, so to speak, untie a knot, rather than just letting it go.

I think I'm a good canditate to share my experience here.

Just a few years ago I used to be grumpy, fought with my best friend over trivial issues and used to be depressed.

Then I re-discovered meditation and I was calm. I do ot regularly and you won't believe how peaceful I am. If I don't meditate then I become restless (I am a workoholic who has just finished writing my fourth novel, in six months time and now working on fifth one).

Meditation isn't to make you a Superman at your job. It is to make you be at peace, if you attain inner peace then it is worth it.

I also discovered that the breathing exercises in Yoga help a lot.

> the very notion of motivation — striving to obtain a more desirable future — implies some degree of discontentment with the present

Surely there must be a study somewhere that shows how the right kind of misery makes employees more productive.

Do your employees seem satisfied and happy? Big red flag! That means they're not working to their full potential.

Don't leave money on the table! Give us a call at Controlled Misery Inc., and we can help you access the increased productivity that comes only from optimizing your employees' misery levels.

Bright new startup idea: Meditation as a Service. MaaS.

A solid alternative, for the modern non-believer, to the more traditional Mass services.

Mission statement: Beware the risks of over-meditating! We aim to offer the (scientifically detemined) precise amount of medidation, customized to each individual, on a weekly basis to ensure optimal motivation and productivity levels among staff.

I don't have time at the moment to read the article in detail, but it sounds like the experiment tested non-meditators on work tasks immediately following a meditation session. I don't believe that this has much bearing on the overall levels of motivation on someone who does or does not meditate in general; it's easy to imagine that right after a relaxing mindfulness session people would be a bit sleepy and less inclined to carry out experimental makework tasks dutifully, but the meaningful benefits of meditation would presumably last much longer than such drowsiness.

I have ADD, and at least one form of meditation clearly helps me makes choices better for me when I do it regularly. Many people are clearly motivated in a way that is detrimental to them, and if it helps them in a similar way, they might very well become less motivated by seeing their situation more clearly. Work is a necessity, an abstracted exchange of labour.

But if the same holds for people without ADD and the most common meditation methods. Work output and quality is still going to be higher, although your employees might not appear as enthusiastic as before.

Experiments report loss of motivation to do toy tasks. I can imagine people losing motivation to do those, or participate in the study, after meditating. Not sure how that translates to lack of motivation in doing what you actually like/want to be doing.

The nap analogy from the article, I find, is very good. After taking a nap, it might be easier for you to concentrate and do deep work. If you need to do something tedious instead, like respond to admin emails or perform made up tasks for a meditation study, you might perform better pumping some loud music or being under social pressure.

Clearly not accurate. For one thing, there are many kinds of meditation, so the assessment that meditation (as a whole) is demotivating is overgeneralizing. Secondly, as further revealed by the study itself, motivation isn't a factor for successful task completion, so there may be something about self-attributed motivation that is superfluous to task completion (i.e., meditators become disabused of that and merely handle the task at hand).

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