RU version is available. Content is displayed in original English for accuracy.
Advertisement
Advertisement
⚡ Community Insights
Discussion Sentiment
64% Positive
Analyzed from 4378 words in the discussion.
Trending Topics
#meditation#more#wall#staring#mind#sitting#practice#zen#something#don
Discussion (94 Comments)Read Original on HackerNews
And by "maintain a practice", I mean it's more like something I return to with frequency and less a daily compulsion.
Focusing on the breathe or ambient sounds is "easy", and is precisely the reason meditation is seemingly difficult. The mind craves more than simplicity; for some this occurs after a few seconds, for others after a few minutes...it all depends on the day. Learning to observe when the mind wanders is one part of the practice. Labelling the quality of thought that caused the wandering (planning, worrying, visualizing, replaying, etc)and returning to the simpler act of focus on breathe or sounds is another part of the practice.
This article is very much the author discovering some variation of meditation; if they feel the need to "invent" something and share it in a blog post...then here's hoping it promotes more people to give it a shot and maybe it'll lead to at least one person developing a new practice for themselves.
As far as "inventing". I know what you (@reg_dunlop) mean but I don't see too much real harm. My father was into a book that talked about "not thinking". It was just a re-framing of part of mindfulness. If it helps... I'm not going to fuss about it.
As far as eyes. I was taught to not close my eyes completely but most of the way. I saw a documentary that explored Tibetan monks and their meditation. From what I recall, one of the monks said to use the eyelids as adjustable window blinds(or a valve... I'm paraphrasing to my understanding of what he was saying) so that if they got a bit sleepy they would open them more.
Personally, I'm a big believer in mindfulness but I do have some questions on some finer points. I might even aspire to teach it, but need further help myself first. Let me know of any resources that helped you (anyone)
Interesting twist- notice dark shapes in your color spectrum for a while, then switch to light. Trippy.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shikantaza
It could be, but it depends on what you're cultivating. If you're spaced out, day dreaming, then you're practicing distraction. Meditation is practicing the opposite of distraction, to become aware of the mind's true state.
In Zen Buddhism for example you are always striving to increase awareness, by constantly monitoring your internal monologue, pulling yourself back from day dreaming, expanding from focus on the breath to all near by sensation and phenomena.
True meditation, in the zen sense, is an order of magnitude more difficult to do consistently, and takes intense willpower.
> True meditation, in the zen sense, is an order of magnitude more difficult to do consistently, and takes intense willpower.
There are different forms of meditation and the one with the most evidence is also the easiest to do, mindfulness [1].
Very little intent is needed to get the majority of the benefits from meditation. I don't know that zen meditation offers more benefits, perhaps it does. But I do know that the "fake" forms of meditation are still beneficial.
[1] https://www.apa.org/topics/mindfulness/meditation
Specifically I would say the concepts of “striving” and “intent” aren’t ones I would use.
What it actually is takes a little more to pin down (famously) but I would consider the concept of surrender to be more applicable. In fact I would say the absence of striving would be a good sign you’re on the right track.
I would consider staring at a wall without intent to be completely compatible with Zen practice.
This seems counterintuitive. Maybe I'm doing it wrong but in my newbie practice it seems to be like resistance or cardiovascular training where there is effort in the moment and a sense of one's limits and a sense of unfolding and gains toward more depth and weight and duration. Like the gym it can be disappointing to lose ground after a break but there is also the contentment of regaining strength similar to rereading a familiar book and seeing it in new light.
There have been times that required more purposeful scheduling and preparation that is my default mode and times when whatever was in my head made me just actively hate sitting there and fail to realize that sensation as an ephemeral state. I accepted the door was closed that day and came back the next to pick up at the stopping point.
I have heard of zen described as 'just sit down and shut up' and stare at a wall. With no goal, no purpose.
The Zen approach, more than any other, seems to precisely emphasize the purity of 'sit down and shut up'. Shikantaza - literally means 'simply sitting'. It fundamentally involves no staring at walls, no koan to grasp and struggle over, even following your breath is not really a part of it... It really, really is 'just' sitting, in every systemic sense. A practice which has no clear goal or intent, instead focused on removing anything that could act as such, act as any tether over awareness. Awareness untethered, unbounded, past distinction.
Lao Tzu comes to mind... he said it much more succinctly: Wei - Wu Wei (do - not doing). The action of effortlessly being adrift with the flow, the action of surrender of your 'self' and the infinite schemes/designs/narratives that it builds (as someone in the discussion above here aptly suggested). Another quote comes to mind from elsewhere: 'Let go your earthly tether, enter the void, empty and become wind.'
I think your parallel is spot on!
There's one where you are at rest and slowly shift the focus of your gaze from near to middle distance to far away, and back.
It's supposed to be a grounding exercise to bring your mind back to a state of rest and just observing.
This is almost exactly like Transcendental Meditation, even down the to the length of time of ~20 minutes.
You're suffering some sort of burnout, and you want to try some hack to be _more_ productive? Looking at a wall so I can crank out _more_ work? No, screw that. If I'm ever feeling that way, I'm going to try and work _less_ and take _more_ breaks.
Yes, that means no phone, no headphones, just you and your brain enjoying a walk. Let your mind wonder and be free.
Psychology research backs this up -- I think there are studies that show students who have a break between two classes before better in both classes (it's called interference).
Anyways it felt weird to me that our work never accommodated this, I think peak performance requires tuning the environment to the human biology, not management optics.
https://unsplash.com/photos/red-bricks-wall-XEsx2NVpqWY
But it never ceases to amaze me the consistency and time spent sitting and smiling and other similar endeavors by Benjamin - https://www.youtube.com/@BenjaminBennetttt/streams
Throw in YouTube Shorts / TikTok etc and it makes me wonder if that estimate is drastically too low. We went from the information age, to the brainrot overload age, to let's both have brainrot and let computers think for us.
The suggestion of going for a walk at least means when you get absorbed by something in your mind, you are still out on a walk, You can't just turn around and start working on some new idea if you are out on a path somewhere.
Again, I want to emphasize, that in none of these are you explicitly practicing the act of leashing in your mind.
All in all, I think the popular conception of meditation, Youtube-ized since the 2010s, has more nuance. Maybe people see this distinction and think it's obvious. To me, as someone who unironically feel like I'm net negative from self-help content than net-positive, this matters to me, personally.
If you want to get mystical, there are plenty of stories of deep Eastern masters practicing their craft every day. They certainly are thinking about their act - they are not trying their best to "get rid of all their thoughts". These are different activities, each with their own merits, both much different states than the common state of the modern man today.
That being said, meditation and the surrounding ideas have helped me overall, if not just because the specific influencers that I do hold as valuable had a good attitude when approaching it. But nowadays I'd imagine it's been silently incorporated into the very underlying forces they were trying to avoid (I have to meditate because it makes me a more improved human being compared to my peers!)
it could probably work as well to close your eyes instead of staring at a wall.
i've always found meditation types revolving around focusing on one thing (candle, wall etc), or nothing (empty mind) to be really hard. my mind just wanders and i end up super anxious, frustrated, and exhausted - resulting in me giving up pretty quickly
What I've found is that focusing on "everything" - ie sitting still and trying to observe your surroundings, your body, all sounds simultaneously seems to work much better. It's easier to get to a calm state this way.
Also, doing this while walking can also work - but perhaps easier to accidentally start thinking about something else
There will always be anxiety, otherwise you would have processed it already and not hurried away into other activities. It sure feels life-threatening, but as long as you don’t give in to the illusion and remind yourself that it is not, there is no rational reason to jump away. Breathing is a typical way to remind yourself that you are safe in the present environment. And the gift you receive is more and more clarity and a relaxed base state from which to face what’s next.
If staring at a wall helps then don't let me stop you but I've sometimes done something very similar by just sitting in a chair without any cell phone, book, electronic item, etc. until I'm very bored. Not like "gritting my teeth, come on we can do another 15 minutes let's goooooo" like an exercise push, but definitely waiting past the first couple of twitches of boredom until it's a constant. It's kind of an interesting way to start a vacation, really helps disconnect from work very quickly. It can be some hours, though.
I do find that this only happens for me if I'm "doing nothing". I see others suggesting exercise, or something else, and those are absolutely good in their own way. But they are not the same thing as just doing nothing. It's still trying to do something and "use the time productively".
The downside is that the family just sees a guy sitting there "doing nothing" and can find a dozen reasons to interrupt... it's hard to do this when there are any other people around, and while I'm not an absolutist about a plan that can be summed up as "sit until you can't" without much loss, the interruptions do very quickly diminish the utility. There's a huge difference between sitting uninterrupted for an hour, and sitting for 15 minutes, putting away the dishes, sitting for 15 minutes, getting up to help reach something, sitting for 15 minutes, explaining that yes you really are sitting there just doing nothing would you please just let me do that, and sitting for 15 minutes.
This particular thing doesn't match "meditation" to me, because I'm not even doing the minimal thing meditation involves; I'm not concentrating on breathing, not trying to "not think", not trying to do anything. If the mind races, let it race until it is done racing[1]. In this point in particular this certainly doesn't match a lot of specific meditation traditions. If the thought of doing something occurs to you, that meditation technique of letting it pass through you until it disappears can be useful.
If meditation is a deliberate attempt to slow down, or a deliberate attempt to concentrate on some particular thing, or a deliberate attempt to empty one's mind, it still has a deliberative goal. If you're willing to broaden the term to encompass not even having that much of a plan, then I have no objection. But this feels to me too low level to even justify the term meditation as most people use it. If you're "trying" to do anything at all, then this isn't really what I'm talking about here. I'm not saying this is "better" than meditation, I'm more saying I'm not sure this even rises to that level, as low as some of them may be. It's really just "rest", a concept our century and culture has largely lost track of.
(Of course the obvious semantic argument about "well are you trying to not try, hmmmmmm?" is there and you are free to debate that in your own head, because like I said, I'm not trying to be absolutist about this. This isn't a program I'm proposing so much as an experience report. You do whatever and call it whatever and argue about definitions as much as you like.)
[1]: If your mind literally never stops this may not work for you... that said, in the 21st century, are you sure your mind never stops racing if you just let it run itself to exhaustion? Have you ever tried? It could be some hours, plural. Again, I fully acknowledge that some people reading this can say "yes". I acknowledge the existence of great neurodiversity. But if you've never tried just letting it run itself to exhaustion you may be surprised what happens if you can find the time to let it.
Unfortunately for many, and few managers will admit it even though it's true - there is a performative aspect to physical presence at work. Being away from your desk, idle on slack, etc to go take that walk is a problem in many work environments.
Probably one reason why SWEs are disproportionately interested in FIRE.
SWEs are disproportionately interested in FIRE because it is (or was) an easy way to get a high paying job without an extended education period like becoming a doctor or lawyer. You could go straight into a six figure job after 4 years of college and even wear shorts to work, while your med school and lawyer friends were just getting started and had years of grunt work ahead of them and debt to pay off. SWEs are also disproportionately represented on online spaces like Reddit and forums where FIRE was popularized.
SWE jobs have been the most flexible I’ve had and seen across my career. I also had a manager who would police time spent in seats, but at every other job going for a walk was not an issue.
Contrast that with many of my friends in other careers who, still to this day, have stories about their managers imposing dress codes or forbidding headphones in the office. The average SWE is spoiled in workplace flexibility, even if there are exceptions.
This:? Financial Independence and Retire Early (FIRE) ?
I mean. Sure, who wouldn't want Financial Independence. Let me get right on that.
Kind of a stretch from staring at a wall.
So why not combine working out directly instead of staring at a wall? Ride a stationary bike at low zone 2/lower in my experience allow for uninterrupted focus during that time at work. While on bike, the mind shuns distraction and focus on "what's next" in the workstream (distraction includes HN, evidently I haven't gotten on the bike yet).
My homeopathic theory is that I have a total mental energy that is the sum of focused energy and a distracting energy. This distracting energy can be temporarily used at task at hand but it results in mental exhaustion, or left alone it leads to distraction seeking behavior. While on the bike, distracting energy is fully consumed by riding, allowing for focused energy stay focused. If I go above low zone 2, it starts eating into focused energy and I lose efficiency.
Exercising and sitting b meditating are two related but seriously different things. Which is why there are many other types of meditation to practice (walking, working, silent, etc) but zen mostly considers sitting and looking at a wall the OG
Like do you understand that everyone is not rich working home next to a nice park or great forrest? Like many, many, many in this world people have to travel 1,5h to work middle of an urban metropolitan area with almost no trees and definitely no fresh air, and their living conditions are no improvement? But this practice or other types of meditation you can do even during your remote, or even in a solitary confinement? And if you get good at this hou can do small few minute/seconds of meditations or “wall staring” during the day?
I am very privileged and there’s deers walking 5min from where I live, but I don’t have the audacity to think everyone in this world are as lucky.
Like yes it's cool to have air conditioning and basically any food anywhere at any time, and many have transportation that can take us across the country at a moment's notice. There are marvels now that our ancestors would die of shock trying to comprehend. That said, it seems still that we've made a remarkably awful place for the vast majority of people to live and work in, more the latter than the former, while a handful of people basically live in a never-ending theme park.
I had a same issue and I found it helped to just step away and blank out in nature.
Also try delaying your first coffee to after the first hour of being awake.
Reading this article is a great reminder that we all need to disconnect and ground ourselves again. My brain (and likely most of ours) just can't handle 100% up-time all day and needs that break.
Tangent - I used to go cycling a lot, and required a lot less wall/river-staring then. Of the people I knew who I cycled with, 95% of us were coping with some kind of mental health issue in some way and had found our fix on the bike. I miss it.
But a wall would probably do just fine as well.
It helps me focus to have just one active “feed”. And I put my phone away when I work to eliminate that screen as potential distraction.
Where I still kinda “fail” is during natural downtime. Like if I’m waiting somewhere, e.g the Dr office, I’ll pull out my phone and browse mindlessly.
The paper linked to justify this just talks about media that people consume which is growing. But that has nothing to do with the point this post is trying to make?
Your eyes "stream 4k video" anytime your eyelids are open regardless if you're watching a movie or looking at a wall? Why would me watching more videos say anything about how much information my brain processes?
Staring at wall produces little information in and of itself, perhaps through reflection, but staring at a TV produces a load of information, most of which is useless like names of characters, their favorite dresses, what food is being eaten where, etc. You can learn a lot by just passively observing even "dumb" TV especially if it contains foreign content or skills like cooking or sports. Again, not saying all of it is relevant to your life, but that's a different issue.
I'm aware of an association between perception of time to number of photons received in the eyes.
These relate to both how much time the events appear to take subjectively as well as how well remembered they are or how long they feel retrospectively. As in there is an actual physiological explanation for "time flies when you're having fun".
There probably is something to also be said for attention too. Increased awareness and attention will undoubtedly use up more 'bandwidth' or 'storage' too.
Show HN: Improve cognitive focus in 1 minute (oneminutefocus.com) 741 points by junetic on Feb 7, 2024 | 287 comments https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39288039
https://oneminutefocus.com/