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Comment by skilled | Hacker News Reader

So learn it. It is one of life’s greatest secrets.

What the original commenter said is correct, meditation helps you see how thoughts arise in the moment, and with practice you can get to a point where there is very little noise and instead you have a broader view of ideas and your life in general.

It is also calming, for your entire system. Learning to monitor and control your breathing consciously is a serious mental workout. If you have never sat down to practice it, you might surprise yourself as to how much is going on in your own mind and how the wheels and cogs just keep turning.

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Do you feel like your professional life is also impacted/improved by it? I know the question is broad but I mean things like level of anxiety, success, financial, etc. Or does it improve your "personal life only"?

Not the prior commentator, but personally it distanced me somewhat from the bullshit of the rat race. For better or worse, I'm less of likely to chase targets that don't matter or that I don't actually give a shit about.

A caveat: my previous employer (a rent-seeking publishing company) used this sort of thing as a trap. Here, have Headspace for free. Here, take this training on how psychological safety and mental health are important in the workplace. Oh, your manager is psychologically abusing his team? That's against our core values - report that to HR right away. Surprise, HR cares but they are impotent; here's the shadow ER rep to hand you your walking papers.

It improves you. For example, being able to handle stress better isn’t useful just in personal life but also professional.

In my experience, complete introvert, it helped me enormously with anxiety. But it did take some work, such as working through emotions that I had bottled up. If you stick to your practice then you will work through it.

Part of me is resisting because people like you push others to do it. I’m somewhat allergic to that kind of evangelism.

Imagine I told you to go to the gym 3x a week or wake up daily at 4:30am. How would you react?

It’s a shame since I might even enjoy mediating. Maybe I try it one day.

That’s a very different suggestion than “try paying attention to your breath for 5-10 mins whenever it’s convenient for you”

I totally get it, I have that same contrarian instinct.

I have to reframe someone telling me "you should do X healthy thing" as "you should look into X healthy thing and see if it interests you/if there's really a good reason to do it", and then if I do my own research/reasoning, sometimes I can get my brain on board.

Basically, I have to trick myself into thinking it's my own idea. Very silly, but hey, it's how I started eating more vegetables and drinking more water, at least.

Under no circumstances should you try meditation! DO NO DO IT! That's an order.

> somewhat allergic to that kind of evangelism

Meditation, or some sort of reflection, may reveal to you that wrapped up in "allergic to evangelism" is an illusion that you received the intended message in the intended way. Or rather, that your reaction isn't necessarily in line with the reality of the intent of what was said. And that your reactions may be limiting you in your growth. You may even figure out ways to gamify your own improvement.

That said, realization is the easy part!! lol, who am I to talk, let alone preach

IMHO, some people who meditate seem to put on an air of superiority about what they experience, as if they assume others don't have these experiences.

Then they go on to blanket it with Oops! I forgot I don't do this! I am so mindful of myself! I am free of judgement!

You can say the same thing about a person that exercises and take care of their physical body. They always inject a sense of superiority when they talk about how much more energy they have etc. Well...what if they are indeed superior?

I've been sedentary and am now pretty active. Without a shadow of a doubt, my quality of life, mental clarity, energy, etc, are all improved relative to my past. Physical fitness is only one axis, and compared to actual athletes I'm a total turd. I only compete against myself and we all have our limitations, but yes, if you improve your fitness along one pretty significant axis, you are superior (all else being equal).

It's important to remember that all else is _not_ equal though. The totality of a human being can't be measured by any one form of aptitude, but most people would be better versions of themselves if they read more, exercised more, had better diet, were more introspective, engaged in some 'spiritual' practice that reinforced humility and charity, etc.

Someone who meditates is probably better than me on that particular axes. I don't seem to have an aptitude or patience for it, at least not yet. Maybe that means I need it all the more. Maybe some day...

I feel like you need to sign up to pretend it has meaning kind of like religion. "Have an open mind baxtr". My best friend has been going to Yoga and then Meditating for 9 years and the bile, misery and garbage that comes out him like a waterfall after a few ales is incredible.

> Imagine I told you to go to the gym 3x a week

I'd say "screw that, I'm not cutting back!"

What about in the cases where less is actually more?

Surely some random HN commenter is not going to become aware of whether you do or do not follow their suggestion on meditation?

Why let them - or rather, allow your imagination of them - have power over your future choices?

I know what you mean. I have a bit of a contrary streak I have to be mindful of that sometimes makes me be less receptive to certain things than I should be.

Meditation and yoga are two practices that I've never managed to make myself try earnestly because of the aesthetics, evangelism, and just a hesitance towards anything that has an air of 'spirituality' that a lot of western practitioners tend to employ.

I don't have a problem doing 'mobility work' and stretching and various exercises to make myself less injury prone, but yoga somehow is just beyond the pale. Our preconceptions are almost even weirder when we're consciously aware that they're probably silly, but abide by them anyway.

I think yoga will always have the spiritual tinge for some people because it among physical exercises disproportionately alters the state of mind.

Yeah I feel you. I meditate but I'm so allergic to anybody telling me anything. Like, I know you have good intentions, but why this call to action? Just state the benefits you get and let me make up my mind whether I want to do it or not.

In my case, I was advised by my cardiologist because of high blood pressure. He said in my case he sees significant correlation with stress so anything that helps me to lower my stress levels will also help me to lower the dose of medication. It works very well for me, but I have no idea if it worked for anyone else. Moreover, I also do it while walking outside, with even better results (like 15-20mm Hg difference before/after).

How do you go through life knowing youre making choices that don't make sense merely because someone told you to do something you had previously wanted to do?

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