I have probably spent over a thousands hours practicing mindfulness meditation, and was pretty successful at achieving what I wanted to achieve with it. I have also read a lot of Buddhist books.
However, I think the basis for Buddhism crumbles if you don’t believe in rebirth, karma, Samsara, narakas, the Buddha’s omniscience and all those other metaphysical claims made by religious Buddhists. I’ve become a physicalist so I don’t believe those claims anymore so I don’t meditate anymore.
If after your death you just disappear, I don’t see any point in attaining meditative bliss, especially if it leads me to see the world in a less truthful way. Buddhism as I see it is centered around the suffering of Samsara, and not just the occasional suffering of this one life.
Let’s compare this to praying, which also feels very good, but it’s also something that only makes sense in the context of theistic beliefs.
I find that the day-to-day benefits in terms of suffering less already make meditation worth it. I’m not sure why rebirth would be necessary if my current life can already be made much better.
If that’s the reasoning, why pick Buddhism and meditation, when it’s so much easier to find religious communities in the west as a Christian, and praying also has benefits for mental wellbeing, and Christians, like Buddhists, are measurably happier than nonreligious people? I think it’s possible to be a secular Christian and not believe the supernatural, and go through the motions of a Christian life while not fully believing in it, and reap at least some of the benefits of it.
I guess you could reap some benefits out of it even without actually believing in Christianity, but those seem much smaller than the ones you can get out of meditation. Also I think some of the happiness benefit Christians get is from being in a supportive community, and I already have non-religious communities that make me feel happy.
I don’t really want to argue about this, but “those seem much smaller than the ones you can get out of meditation” is a subjective statement with which people with different temperament would disagree as long as there are no objective facts, like what happens to your consciousness after your death (like you go to Heaven if you are a Christian, or stop rebirth that would have otherwise gone on if you’ve achieved enlightenment). Anyway, I believe there’s nothing after death, so do what makes you happy, I suppose.
My experience is very different from yours. I came into this stuff already established as a material reductionist. I found meditation helpful to me, despite denying everything I consider supernatural.
I have probably spent over a thousands hours practicing mindfulness meditation, and was pretty successful at achieving what I wanted to achieve with it. I have also read a lot of Buddhist books.
However, I think the basis for Buddhism crumbles if you don’t believe in rebirth, karma, Samsara, narakas, the Buddha’s omniscience and all those other metaphysical claims made by religious Buddhists. I’ve become a physicalist so I don’t believe those claims anymore so I don’t meditate anymore.
If after your death you just disappear, I don’t see any point in attaining meditative bliss, especially if it leads me to see the world in a less truthful way. Buddhism as I see it is centered around the suffering of Samsara, and not just the occasional suffering of this one life.
Let’s compare this to praying, which also feels very good, but it’s also something that only makes sense in the context of theistic beliefs.
I find that the day-to-day benefits in terms of suffering less already make meditation worth it. I’m not sure why rebirth would be necessary if my current life can already be made much better.
If that’s the reasoning, why pick Buddhism and meditation, when it’s so much easier to find religious communities in the west as a Christian, and praying also has benefits for mental wellbeing, and Christians, like Buddhists, are measurably happier than nonreligious people? I think it’s possible to be a secular Christian and not believe the supernatural, and go through the motions of a Christian life while not fully believing in it, and reap at least some of the benefits of it.
I guess you could reap some benefits out of it even without actually believing in Christianity, but those seem much smaller than the ones you can get out of meditation. Also I think some of the happiness benefit Christians get is from being in a supportive community, and I already have non-religious communities that make me feel happy.
I don’t really want to argue about this, but “those seem much smaller than the ones you can get out of meditation” is a subjective statement with which people with different temperament would disagree as long as there are no objective facts, like what happens to your consciousness after your death (like you go to Heaven if you are a Christian, or stop rebirth that would have otherwise gone on if you’ve achieved enlightenment). Anyway, I believe there’s nothing after death, so do what makes you happy, I suppose.
I don’t have theistic beliefs but have found prayer useful.
My experience is very different from yours. I came into this stuff already established as a material reductionist. I found meditation helpful to me, despite denying everything I consider supernatural.