I thought that we are never really in the present but always a little bit behind it.
Pretty sure that’s just life. Doesn’t really support your 98-2 theory. I don’t think it’s a matter of “should be” as it is “at all”. Kind of like the guy who tries to make friends but meets failure each time and doesn’t know what’s next. It’s pretty frustrating to always meet with failure despite your efforts. Being present doesn’t remove that suffering, rather it compounds it (speaking from experience, among other things). Sitting with difficult emotions doesn’t help because the source of that hasn’t gone away. Kind of like having a gash and bleeding out. Unless you close that wound the bleeding continues.
Sometimes I wonder if the imagination plays too much of a part in this “present” stuff.
I’d like to see your evidence to support this assertion, cite please!
I don’t think the point is “being happy”. The point is to be engaged in what you are doing right now because “now” is when stuff is happening and when you have a chance to affect change on that stuff. Sure, zoning out and going to your “happy place” might feel good. But it doesn’t really address anything that’s actually going on in your life at the moment.
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Cite for harmful effects?
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Are you sure there are no long-term studies? I’ve seen several.
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When you say ‘meditation’, which type of meditation do you mean? Different types of meditation have different measurable effects on the brain.
A paper in the Journal of Consciousness and Cognition proposed three categories of meditation techniques based on EEG signatures:
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Focused attention:
e.g. Tibetan Buddhist (loving kindness and compassion), Buddhist (Zen and Diamond Way), and Chinese (Qigong).
Characterized by beta/gamma activity -
Open monitoring
e.g. Buddhist (Mindfulness, and ZaZen), Chinese (Qigong), and Vedic (Sahaja Yoga).
Characterized by theta activity -
Automatic self-transcending
e.g. Vedic (Transcendental Meditation) and Chinese (Qigong).
Characterized by alpha1 activity
Qigong includes several different meditation practices, which is why it appears in all three categories.
The “happy” part seems to be the major selling point. But they don’t mention the psychosis though, or depression.
I can’t really track down the articles, but I have seen more than enough citing those individuals. There’s one book called “THe Buddha Pill”. Point being there is more to it than people think. It’s not all good. But this is off topic.
In a sense I can guess how leaving your worries, etc. can potentially make you happy. But like I said before they don’t really fix what causes them. It feels more like a ban-aid or a painkiller.
Example: I have a friend who lives much of her non-day-to-day life through her phone’s camera. Any time we are doing anything with her and her family, she is planning out the next picture. She has her family trained to pose on command, stopping whatever they are doing and smiling for the camera. It drives me nuts. Can we just enjoy the game of miniature golf, without the staged action shots, with everyone lined up and smiling? I’ve got a windmill to conquer, after all.
She’s not really there with us, playing mini-golf. She’s mentally planning the next photo album or facebook post. I wouldn’t be surprised is her only memories of that afternoon are actually stories she’s build around those pictures.
I always find it’s a bit of a balance between taking a couple of photos to capture the moment and acting like you are directing a documentary.
I’m not a therapist or psychiatric professional or anything. But here’s my $0.02.
In the case of your particular friendless hypothetical, the situation of not having any friends isn’t immediately causing physical pain or suffering. Like, he’s not going to die or lose his home from friendlessness. Having no friends doesn’t cause a burning sensation or anything like that. Most likely what he is actually feeling is bored, lonely and perhaps a sense of anxiety that he will spend the rest of his life that way. Well, that anxiety and boredom doesn’t help him find any friends (and in many cases, might hinder it).
So, in this particular case, I think “being present” would mean to NOT focus on his imagination of all the possible ways his life is miserable and go look for activities where he can interact with other people.
Yes I can’t stand the living vicariously through the cell phone camera lens and social media thing that SO many people do now. Not every moment needs to be captured, I don’t need to livestream buying a snickers bar at the gas station or getting a pedicure. We all have to be stimulated now all the time even while taking a shit or showering. I’m just as guilty in some ways I have to put on music while I’m shaving, haha.
A coworker was recently using FaceTime from home to call others at work, and she was doing it a lot while we are supposed to be working. Lady get off Facebook and the put the phone down and take care of that newborn what’s with this constant need to be engaged with others no matter what you are doing!
The ant and the grasshopper is not relevant to “being present.”
“Being present” doesn’t mean failing to plan for the future. It means whatever you have chosen to do right now, dedicate your whole attention to it.
That seems more accurate. That story is a warning about not planning at all
Well loneliness can technically kill you and there are studies to prove it. I’m also referring to repeated attempts met with failure, which would likely make anyone suffer. If you are always falling down and don’t know what else to do that would cause despair.
Relating this back to “being present” or mindfulness. Certainly, being aware of the despair is not a lot of fun. It’s extremely painful, in fact it can be unbearable. But what are the alternatives?
People try to push away the feelings of despair and helplessness, but, more often than not, that’s a losing strategy. It’s one reason many people turn to alcohol, drugs or other means of escape, to deaden the pain or allow the mind to temporarily not think about it. However, those feelings often don’t disappear just because they get pushed aside.
For those who are suffering from severe emotional pain, something has to be done. People just aren’t wired to tolerate that degree of pain forever. And, from what I understand being present is a way to learn to handle that pain. The pain can’t be dealt with until you can face it and you can’t face it until you can be present with the pain.
For a number of years, my panic and anxiety attacks were becoming more frequent and worse. Sometimes up to 30 or more in a day. I was having to take an unsustainable amount of Xanax in order to get through life. Other meds weren’t particularly helping and therapy wasn’t doing jack shit. It was as close to Game Over as I’ve ever been.
I switched therapists and found a specialist in trauma recovery. After a couple of years, I only occasionally have to take a Xanax, I’ve settled down and the number of panic and anxiety attacks have dropped off tremendously both in frequency and severity. It’s still a work in process, with lots remaining, but I’ve made a tremendous amount of progress.
Learning mindfulness was absolutely essential for this change, and the daily practice is necessary for me to keep an even keel and continued improvement. Period. I do this through meditation and other techniques.
As I’m not a therapist, I only have an understanding of how this relates to people who have had early childhood trauma. I understand that dialectical behavior therapy, often used for people with BPD, is based on learning how to both accept yourself as you are while also accept the need to change. DBT also stresses the need for learning mindfulness as a tool necessary for recovery.
Most people don’t have that severity of problems. For most people, being present is a way to enjoy life better. For these people, there was one of those New Yorker magazine cartoons which perfectly illustrated not being present.
The cartoon was a guy in three situations. First, he was at work, thinking about golf. Then he was golfing, thinking about sex. Then he was having sex, thinking about work. Being present is experiencing the moment, not being distracted. For most people, that enough.
In Spanish we say “menos preocuparte y más ocuparte”: less worrying (about what ifs/what other people will think/what other people will do/what you will do…) and more getting things done. People who are always worrying are gnawing on their own minds and their own lifes. And if you have a toothache, well, what will stop it sooner: worrying about how long it will last, or getting your ass to the dentist?
Get a dog. Learn to take care of it. Take it for walks. Take it to a park and throw a ball for it to retrieve.
The reason I say this is, for anyone who has experienced your posts over the years, you seem very much (in the vernacular) stuck in your own head. Your focus is relentlessly inward. One way to address this cycle is to put yourself in a situation where you have to focus your attention outward. A dog is uniquely constructed to require your outward attention without returning complicated responses (like another human would). Get comfortable with focusing your attention outward with the dog. It will provide moments of quiet in your mind’s relentless internal monologue - being present. Just maybe you will get a sense of that feeling and recognize it, and find ways to build on it.
To me being present means taking the time to observe and appreciate where you are and what you are doing. You can’t always be looking forward, you can’t always be looking back. Both are important, but so is right now. You made it this far, take an assessment. Do you feel good, do you like where you are, do you like what you’re doing?
This thread reminds me of a song that I once caught by accident while taping something else. “Wish I Were Here Tonight”, by Backwoods Jazz. Wish I still had a copy.
Denationalization? Meditation causes governments to privatize? Is that an autocorrect?
Exactly. I’d say it intersects with planning for the future in that in order to plan effectively and wisely, you have to be present. Otherwise, you’re setting your retirement goals and investment strategies, etc… while you’re also thinking about what you’ll have for lunch, what’s on the honey-do list, how your team’s last game went, etc… and you won’t plan effectively.