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Comment by warent | Hacker News Reader

I'm interested to know if you can cite specific evidence for that? I've heard that some certain yoga practices (i.e. traditional yoga. Not the westernized kind where you do stretches and talk about positive energy) can be harmful especially to beginners (e.g. kundalini), but that's not what's being discussed here.

Mindfulness just means being aware and non-reactive. All humans experiences mindfulness. Any time we choose to go against our initial impulses is a moment of expressing mindfulness. Mindfulness meditation simply strengthens and expands on that so it holds up under greater pressure and for greater periods of time. It's nothing mystical or psychedelic.

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Willoughby Britton is a meditation teacher and researcher who studies adverse effects of meditation and mindfulness. There is a risk of diverse mental problems, especially - but not only - for people with a history of trauma.

As a meditator myself I think it would be helpful if this were more well-known.

If you search for her name, you'll find more information and studies. Here's an interview and article:

https://tricycle.org/trikedaily/trauma-meditation/ https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2014/06/the-dark-...

Is anything not a risk of mental problems for people with a history of trauma? Risk of mental problems is half the definition of trauma.

I would not classify “mindfulnes” as going against “initial impulses” but rather as being aware of the impulsive reactions and the effect on mind and body to situations and then making a conscious decision on what to do next. This next action can then be in line with the initial impulse or not, it will be mindful either way.

For example, meditation can lead to addiction (to do meditation). This is a certain contradiction, very often to find in the teachings/techers themselves. Meditation lets things pass. This is also true for meditation sessions itself, this is what is sometimes forgotten - it has to end.

In your description, it sounds like building a fence around a hungry tiger. I think, understanding those impulses and directing them into a useful way is a healthier approach.

Except in this analogy doesn't account for the fact that a mindful person can simply wait for the tiger to disappear.

If a mindful person can wait, then they don't need a fence to begin with.

If psychoanalysis has taught us anything, it's that if you're the tiger, it doesn't disappear until confronted.

Recent years has also seen an increase in studies surrounding the sociological concept of `Mobbing'. This has taught us that the tiger only goes away if there is outside help, often in the form of fellow students, teachers, and so on.

It seems reasonable to assume there are outliers.

Perhaps if $historical_bad_actor meditated / exercised / ate better we wouldn’t be here having this conversation.

I’m not trying to be flippant here.

What do you mean of traditional yoga? Yoga sutra of patanjali, which consist of 8 limbs? In USA most yoga studio only touches Asana, which is one limb of Yoga Sutra.

Research into mindfulness emphasises the benefits, but tends to minimise the harm. Some research fails to mention any risk at all. This makes it hard to devise a mindfulness program that doesn't cause harm.

Mindfulness in schools is applied to the entire school population.

Mindfulness in schools is usually delivered by teachers, and not trained therapists or psychologists.

The combination of taking the entire population, including children at higher risk of harm, and not understanding how that harm can be caused, and using people with minimal training to provide the programme, means that some people get harmed.

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/01410768166441...

https://www.brown.edu/research/labs/britton/sites/britton-la...

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S027273581...

> Mindfulness just means being aware and non-reactive

Mary is a 10 year old girl. She is raped once a week by her step-father. You can see how being "aware" and "non-reactive" might cause extra harm.

Mindfulness is supposed to be a practice, and it's not necessarily an easy thing you can do with all benefits and minimal work. It's also deeply personal and not a one-size-fits-all kind of thing.

I think schools should treat meditation like prayer, because it's essentially the same function, and we should just avoid it in the classroom.

Perhaps the real tragedy here is that many students will learn about mindfulness in schools and dismiss it as useless nonsense, when there actually may be something of value in there somewhere.

Prayer and meditation are completely different. There are studies which demonstrate a causal connection between meditation and mental health benefits, and even structural changes in the brain. It demonstrably helps with anxiety and depression. The same cannot be said for prayer.

https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2018/04/harvard-resea...

Pinning the problems of rape on meditation is absurd.

If meditation causes Mary to freak out and the rapes to by discovered, that's a pretty huge win for Mary.

The example works even if the rapist has been convicted and is now in prison and Mary is no longer being raped. She deserves access to an evidence-based therapy such as EMDR, and she's not getting that because (in the UK) Government thinks mindfulness in schools is equivalent.

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