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- Hacker News
- I'm lucky enough to not notice my tinnitus except when I try to do nothing.by xlbuttplug2
- I noticed the more I do nothing (and think nothing) the more my tinnitus lessens. I think mine has something to do with permanent neck muscle tension, the result of everyday rush and stress.by imhoguy
- I have this same cactus same thing, but later on I realized even when I do nothing, and even my tinnitus is there I realized it doesn’t bother me anyway. I miss that deep winter / snow silence now and then but kind of learned to live with it I think. I realize this is very different experience for everyone.
- Your brain is a prediction machine. I am afraid doing nothing is inhibiting that function. I think it's perfectly healthy to not want to be a vegetable. Maybe using that life force to focus on the things you're avoiding by rumination and escapism is good enough, and we don't have to be cosplaying the dead to get there?by jqbd
- Your brain is also self-reflective. It can from the inside change its expectations. Reaching for the metaphor of evolved prediction machine implies you can't train in any other way, but you can. Let's say society collectively decides (or capitalism) that we need liesure living just like Europeans do, then that will be the system. Why are we following on Elon's footsteps of compressing 1000 years of progress into 100 years. No asteriod is coming to destroy us, so no rush.
- > Your brain is a prediction machine
It's not.
> I am afraid doing nothing is inhibiting that function
It isn't.
> I think it's perfectly healthy to not want to be a vegetable
Not having an opinion about everything for 3 minutes != vegetable.
The author of the post is selling what he himself doesn't understand. Paying attention to your inner chatter without judgement is part of a much broader tradition. Westerners stealing bits from cultures they don't understand is nothing new. Neither is the polarizing fascination/dismissal it entails.
by alexashka - Sure - no real argument but it's maybe worth examining the assumptions underlying this which you know exist because you say 'maybe' and 'I am afraid ...'. Accounts abound as to why 'doing nothing' is not necessarily a negative activity. If you're in good health, sometimes absolutely passivity after having drunk in the fact that 'For a while I am alive and consciousness in this inexplicably incredible universe and it's a massive privilege' is extraordinarily beneficial for the times you are not predicting.by vixen99
- > It’s oddly difficult to do nothing, and while you’re doing nothing, it’s oddly difficult to feel at ease.
I don't have difficulty with this. Doing nothing, thinking about nothing, and simultaneously feeling perfectly at ease just comes naturally. I know that my experience is not universal and that many people do struggle with this. If you struggle with this and you were wondering, serenity really is very nice, and I wish I could share it, and I'm sorry that I can't.
- I can only do it with instant satisfaction and ease on certain drugs or combinations of drugs, I assume it's a mechanical thing for me rather than spiritual, the brain functions, so could be both environmental and genetic, the body being like the ship for the spirit, though a spirit not at ease can disrupt an otherwise well oiled machine.by luxuryballs
- Emil Cioran, in "A Short History of Decay", thinks that if humanity were deprived of work and sustained action for an indefinitely long "Sunday afternoon," boredom would become so unbearable that violence—crime in particular—would emerge as the principal means of escaping the oppressive emptiness of time.
"If Sunday afternoons were extended for months, where would humanity get to, liberated from sweat, from the weight of the first curse? The experiment would be worth the trouble. It is more than likely that crime would become the sole diversion, that debauchery would seem candor, shouting melody and jeers tenderness. The sensation of time's immensity would make each second into an intolerable torment, a sublime firing squad. In hearts imbued with poetry would appear a blasé cannibalism and a hyena's melancholy; butchers and executioners would die out—of lethargy; churches and brothels would split with sighs. The universe transformed into a Sunday afternoon... it is the very definition of ennui, and the end of the universe."
by netfortius - I find just going for a walk in nature, after walking for 2 hours something happens with my brain. I'm more calm, relaxed, focused, and coherent in my inner thoughts. I think it takes around 2 hours of inner monologue and thinking about all the problems I'm facing in my life until I feel like I'm done and I can let them go, or I've gone over them enough.
- My understanding is this is the default mode network allowing your brain to process things. I think modern life just completely inhibits any amount of this happening and that’s why these things are so importantby gf263
- The closest I get to that is when I am getting a massage actually. If I get a 90 minute one, about halfway through my brain stops racing and I enter this, not quite hypnogogic, state where things are quiet and fluid and peaceful. The closest thing is waking up after a good night's sleep with an empty brain before the weight of the world comes crashing in.by shostack
- One of the most concise and to-the-point explanations of meditation I've ever seen.
One thought I had while reading it: isn't trying to get more comfortable with doing nothing just another thing to do? isn't it another form of changing what already is?
EDIT: I'm advocating and practicing mindfulness but I always have this thought on the background and it's a real dilemma. Any thoughts?
- If you take seriously the notion that enlightenment isn't some separate state or goal to be reached but simply the actualization of things as they are, I find the goal- and outcome-oriented drives tend to subside. Instead one is left with all the minutae of how things unfold, which seems inextricable from the goings-on of mind/perception/whatever. Paying close attention to those goings-on is pretty nice, IME.by xelxebar
- No. You're allowed to direct your attention. The problem would be in how you approach it. If you strive then you're doing it wrong.
Liken it to brushing your teeth: you can't really judge it. You probably did it good enough. It's more important to keep doing it steadily every day than to evaluate progress.
by diydsp - Zen talks about this frequently. It's not a issue unless you make it one. Don't let it be an excuse not to be mindful.by mlrtime
- The practice described there is close to shamatha (calm abiding). Just sit and when thoughts arrive, simply label it as “thinking” without prejudice or attachment and carry on.
A common occurrence is the thought that oneself is thinking or labeling too much. This is close to the recursion / self-reference you are referring to. The practice thereof is to simply accept that (and your labeling of inner activity and all wrapped up in that) and carry on abiding. The inner chatter that you are not meditating well enough is a funny one.
by neomantra - One way to look at it is that the act of meditation is just the exercise part; it helps you practice to “be with what is” in the rest of your life’s experience, which translates into “whatever happens within or around me, I always have choices of action and can decide on my actions from a place of silence, the eye of the hurricane, with sufficient space between where I am and my own emotions and feelings, body sensations, and other sensory input”.
A side note: the experience of meditation alone and in groups is very different. There’s a reason why people who are “serious about it” (or seriously interested) do it in community.
by 47282847 - That is called dualistic mindfulness. The feeling of the self (the thought “oh I am trying to meditate”) is just another thought. Pay close enough attention, and that dissipates as well.by born1989
- This is a great point. This is why I don’t meditate :)
It became clear to me at some point that meditation was another way I was creating some standard for good or bad, and comparing myself to it. Would be annoyed at myself if I weren’t “mindful enough” etc. I think even if you don’t have this tendency, but you’re still meditating with the intent to be in a certain state or arrange things a certain way, you’re still doing a minor version of this - how I was before, not good, how I am now, better.
What I do now instead of meditating is to just sit without doing anything on purpose. I don’t try to prevent myself from thinking or direct my intention in any way. So I just am as I am - maybe my mind wanders, maybe it doesn’t. This way there’s no contradiction. When I’m anxious, I’m anxious. When my mind wanders, it wanders. When I think about cheese, I’m thinking about cheese. If I think “I’m feeling kind of present right now”, then there’s “I’m feeling kind of present right now”. And before I know it, it’s something different
by msaltz - Yes? Like trying hard to get into that state of meditation. Then you notice that you're getting tense and stressed about it not working, realize that this is not helpful, get angry at yourself for doing it wrong, try harder to do it right this time, etc.
It's my favourite puzzle about meditation. You have to approach it sideways, but if you really try that it won't work. So you try hard not to that instead, which won't work either. It's kind of funny how focusing on your breath tends to work, but... don't hold that thought.
It's a contradiction, and that's okay. Get comfortable with it ;-)
by Matumio - I used to sit alone for 30-40 minutes, 100's of meters below ground, in absolute darkness, absolute silence, no life around, no movement around, not even a breeze of air. Only mild thoughts to stop myself from falling asleep. Above ground, I slept under the stars and sky, in the wild, with no buildings around.
What I learnt is, recent generations have too much of self awareness, causing the communities and groups to become weaker, compared to the tribal settlements that helped humans to dominate other species.
by zkmon - Most people are distracted and lack awareness of the present.by Cider9986
- How can one possibly have ‘too much self-awareness?’
under what circumstances is it beneficial to have less awareness of oneself?
by mock-possum - I think this makes as dominate other species even more. Society, and especially market capitalism, is like a giant optimization function for productivity. If you step off the treadmill, you will get dominated by those who are on it and have the latest ICBMs, AI models, infrastructure out the wazoo, can produce 10,000 drones a week, etc.by mindwok
- > I used to sit alone for 30-40 minutes, 100's of meters below ground, in absolute darkness, absolute silence, no life around
do you happen to be the narrator of notes from the underground?
by mathisfun123 - > and that many preferred to administer electric shocks to themselves instead of being left alone with their thoughts.
I see this study cited often, and I always reject this interpretation. I'm perfectly content sitting for long periods, with or without my thoughts, but if you give me an electric toy I've never seen before, of course I'll play with it! Can I make muscles twitch? Move my arm? Are some parts more sensitive/conductive? What happens at the limits?
For me, the pain would be the cost of playing with a new toy that gives me novel sensations. I would do it even if I had other, less painful activities available. It's not necessarily a way to avoid boredom or whatever else the common interpretation claims.
by BoppreH - I like your take. I think I'd personally be in the same boat, if I was a participant in the study. Not sure if that take generalizes beyond us, though.by indiv0
- Been doing this for 20 minutes in the morning for a few decades now. It has had an impact. I am a rather “high gain” person emotionally. I now tend to notice emotions and observe them, which helps when they threaten to suck me into a self-perpetuating ruminative vortex. Also, it has made me gentler, and an easier person to be around. I’m now well aware that whatever disturbances occur, there will be echoes and resonances tomorrow morning during my sit! Now for a moment of honesty: this is a religious practice for me. A prayer that “landed” for me: “Lord, I ask to be a conduit of grace.”by gregfjohnson