Re: Isn't mindfulness meditation exposure therapy
Sigh. Yes, mindfulness does seem to be detachment from feelings, or at least separation from them. "I know how I feel." "I know what I think." "I choose thoughts." I can do that without or with therapy, and still remain miserable. I can do that without meditation.
To me, the way that I practice meditation, when I experience the grace of meditation, I don't have to choose. I don't get whipped around by feelings. There's another mind that emerges. The enlightened mind. That mind knows the feeling and is separate from it. It can choose.
You see, I've experienced so much doing meditation. The way that I experience meditation it leads me to interpret that what I read in different traditions, religious, is often describing the mystical experience, or the separation that I describe. There's no need to "make" oneself accept. It happens naturally. There's no need to have to choose thoughts over feelings. Both exist, and another mind intervenes painlessly. (BTW, none of this is a common experience for me, or easy to experience.)
I don't know. Maybe my experience is unique. There is just so much to experience with meditation, beyond this description or mindfulness.
My question then, is mindfulness a practice in overriding emotion and chosing thought instead? Do thoughts create happiness--always--or a better way of life--always? Again, I don't need meditation to do this.
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