The mind illuminated

What Hacker News says

1. viccy-kobulettiAug 2026
   You put very well into words why therapy felt off for me. I haven't been meditating for too long, but the perspective definitely shifts once you start turning the attention inwards, instead of following the narrative that the mind creates.

   My recommendation to any of those interested: The Mind Illuminated by John Yates. Great intro to the meditation practice. Once you have some understanding of the general technique Goenka's 10 day vipassana courses is a great opportunity for deep introspective work.

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2. spoilerAug 2026
   Read the book Mind Illuminated. Visualisation isn't really necessary for meditation
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3. praptakApr 2026
   > Let me know of any resources that helped you (anyone)

   For me it was "The Mind Illuminated" by Culadasa. A meditation textbook which tells us what to practice, how to practice and why. Especially useful if you need the finer points.

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4. __rito__May 2025
   - I was most influenced by HN threads on books. I read dozens of books based on HN recommendations. This tangibly, concretely changed my life in a small way. I found authors like Neal Stephenson, Greg Egan, Hofstadter, etc. from HN. I am forever thankful. Read Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, and it thoroughly changed my life (as one element, not the sole thing). Just search "ask hn books", ans you will see ~30/40 threads with high quality recommendations.

   - MOOCs recommended on HN threads are fantastic. I spent hundreds of hours on MOOCs recommended here. Same goes for textbooks. Other people’s lists I found posted here are also great. Like Mark Saroufim, Susan Rigetti, etc. I now have a really high threshold quality for tech/math books. I read SICP, Little Schemer, Steven Strogatz among many great books. There are threads on tech books, MOOCs, especially those posted during pandemics.

   - I learned about the fast.ai MOOC here, and projects I did from the MOOC helped me land my first Deep Learning job. I was a Physics undergrad.

   - There is higher quality of discourse where the standard is high. This put things into perspective, and made me much more confident and capable. Like, just learning a new language in a week- if you think this is normal to most people who do software, you are wrong.

   - HN posts links to direct judgements, court filings, papers, etc. Now for all areas of my life, I look for the direct source- read new laws, past tax treaties, papers etc. I prefer it over reading blogs or newpaper reports.

   - HN is actually diverse. I, for the first time in my life, encountered sane Right Wing here on HN. I am from India, and all American social media were biased towards one direction, and the RW discourse was kind of eh, not smart. Maybe Quora had a small faction of smart RW. Having smart RW sources to read and learn from makes me a well-rounded person. English is not my first language, and I jumped into social media without any supervision when I was 13. So, take that into account. All American social media was a particular side's echo-chamber. That was eyebrow raising and squint-demanding from even a 16 yo me.

   - I see many on HN working with electronics, Math, AI as hobbies/side projects. That has directly inspired me to do the same in my life.

   - There are a lot of people here who have families, a home, focus on friends, a job/business- helps me striving towards those. Before, there was a distorted view of consumer/hedonism/activism focused adult life focused on money, extremely strong opinions, bragging about achievements, etc. From the outside HN might seem like a startup/money focused forum for a certain "kind", but it has the highest concentration of diverse smart people in my experience. No other forum has so many meditators, electronics-tinkerer-for-fun, Math-obsessed-for-fun, etc. I started meditating ~4 years back based on a comment that recommended Mind Illuminated book. HN played an important role in my coming-of-age.

   Thank you, HN!

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5. scnsFeb 2025
   > teach a human how to be more emotionally supportive, especially in heated situations.

   Meditation helps with this. Mind Illuminated by John Yates, a meditation teacher and neuroscientist, is a great book to learn it.

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6. LanzaaOct 2024
   Observing where attention is aimed is a form of meditation. What you observed is something I have experienced as well. It is normal and expected.

   I have enjoyed reading "The Mind Illuminated" by John Yates. The book is a meditation guide and includes descriptions of experiences like yours.

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