What the Buddha taught

What Hacker News says

1. rg111Dec 2022
   - Sapiens by Yuval Harari

   - Black Swan by Nassim Nicholas Taleb

   - Godel, Escher, Bach by Hofstadter

   - Fundamentals of Physics by Halliday, Resnick, Walker

   - Cryptonomicon by Neal Stephenson (changed my outlook, attitude)

   - Quantum Computation and Quantum Information by Nielsen, Chuang

   - Meditation by Aurelius

   - (some other deep, high quality novels)

   - Books by Steven Strogatz

   - Classical Indian Philosophy by Ganeri

   - Not a book, but Andrew Ng's old ML MOOC, also LeCun's MOOC.

   - nand2tetris, SICP

   __________

   Meditation and mindfulness have fundamentally changed my level of effectiveness. They have made me smarter, and fixed some serious problems I had. Regular practice is essential. These books were great:

   - The Mind Illuminated by Culadasa

   - Mindfulness in Plain English by Bhante Gunaratna

   - The Wisdom of No Escape by Pema Chodron

   - Why Buddhism is True by Robert Wright

   - What the Buddha Taught by Walpola Rahula

   __________

   There are many books from many fields that has made me less dumb. I cannot list all of them.

   You too, should pursue directions of your interest and genuinely enjoy what you do. Enlightenment is choice-of-books invariant.

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2. __rito__Nov 2022
   1. Machine Learning by Andrew Ng on Coursera.

   2. Linear Algebra from Imperial College course on Coursera. Course name: "Mathematics for Machine Learning: Linear Algebra".

   3. Eigenthings from Ella Batty's lectures on Neuromatch Academy.

   4. Vector Calculus from Eugene K's YouTube.

   5. Much of Physics from Halliday, Resnick, Walker's book.

   6. How to actually do knowledge work and grow, and productivity in general from Cal Newport's book "Deep Work".

   7. Economics from "The Economics Book" and "How Money Works" from DK Publishers.

   8. Meditating from "The Mind Illuminated" and "Meditation in Plain English".

   9. Differentiation from MIT Opencourseware course.

   10. Buddha's teachings from "What the Buddha Taught" by Walpola Rahula.

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3. rg111Jul 2022
   Please read two books, in this order. After reading these, you will know:

   1. Mindfulness in Plain English by Bhante Gunaratna [0]

   2. The Mind Illuminated by Yates et al. [1]

   And plese steer away from awful sources. People, the modern day "influencers" are piggybacking on Meditation to sell their own stuff. And it is related to a lot of stupid concepts that higher practitioners of Eastern Spirituality themselves reject. "Kundalini"... My ass.

   Meditation, when reduced to the physical technique itself, is utterly worthless, I assure you. There are several 5-minute videos that teach you meditation are shit.

   ________

   Since you want to know about personal experience, let's do that.

   I also fell prey to the snake-oil salesmen at first, who taught meditation in five minutes.

   I tried for months and years, and nothing came out of it.

   When I was going through a list of books recommended in Hacker News, I learned about The Mind Illuminated by Yates.

   I bought it and started studying, and practising.

   And, I promise you it changed my life.

   I meditate from 15 to 45 minutes a day. Everyday.

   I will list here some aspects of it.

   I sit there, I observe my thoughts, and gently bring my mind back to my breaths.

   Primarily, it is like "intuition training" for attention holding.

   Whenever I am doing work or studying for my research, whenever my mind deviates, this training kicks in, in an automated way. I can very quickly bring it back. And it does get better with time.

   My fully-sanctitious Pomodoro cycle went up from 20 minutes to 90 minutes. I can hold my attention, unadulterated, for that long.

   This was the first benefit.

   Secondly, I am much better at processing my own emotions. Every kind. I am much saner and calmer for it. I can process and handle and deal with all my emotions.

   Thirdly, I am a much better decision maker from meditating. Before, I often suffered with my options. I could not decide what to do- from small decision to big.

   Now, it's like my emotions are wiretapped and I know better what I want. And I can act accordingly.

   And I am able to enjoy pleasurable activities more. Swimming, walking through the forest, eating favorite dishes, sex- all are much more pleasurable for me.

   I feel the "training" from meditation kicking in when I want to have deep experiences.

   I am also a better learner now. This could be a placebo. I always was a good and fast learner, but, I have more experience with myself now, but I feel this happened from meditation.

   Meditation is hard. I always was interested in Buddhism (the non-spiritual kind. Read: What the Buddha Taught by W. Rahula [2]). And Buddha was a total no-BS guy. He asked people to experiment and if they didn't find the results alignigning with what he said, he said that he should not be listened to [3]. So, if he asked to meditate, and talked about its benefits, there must be something in it- that's what I thought. That's why I prevailed.

   Learning coding took time. Learning Math and Spanish took time. Meditation should take time to be learned properly. Buddha, an athiest, an unorthodox, an uber-debater, and rationalist talked about benefits of it, and that made me prevail.

   I am so happy for it.

   Please reply to my comment if you have further questions.

   I am currently on the deep peace stage. Seven times out of ten, when I try to be in the deeply peaceful state, I can be.

   [0]: https://www.amazon.com/Mindfulness-English-Bhante-Henepola-G...

   [1]: https://www.amazon.com/Mind-Illuminated-Meditation-Integrati...

   [2]: https://www.amazon.com/What-Buddha-Taught-Expanded-Dhammapad...

   [3]: https://becoming-buddha.com/ehipassiko-come-and-see-for-your...

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4. rg111Jul 2022
   Read Walpola Rahula's "What the Buddha Taught". You will know how far deviated incense burning and bowing to pictures are from Buddha's teaching.

   Buddhism is a very rational philosophy. If you study Buddhism in the light of it being a protest against established thiestic, ritualistic religion in India, these will start making much more sense.

   As far as McMeditation is from Buddhism, the same is true for regular people worshipping Buddha like a god.

   Religion might have democratic elements, but truth isn't democratic.

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5. rg111Jul 2022
   This is just an answer to one person's enquiry.

   I have read another which I cannot remember the name for.

   Buddha, with the help of ten directions, tells a layman to do his ten-fold duties.

   One of them is keeping his wife happy, another one is about having friends, another one is about earning money and growing wealth.

   Please read Walpola Rahula's "What the Buddha Taught".

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6. rg111Jul 2022
   The modern Buddhism and related meditation practice would fit you nicely.

   Read:

   1. What the Buddha Taught by Walpola Rahula

   2. The Mind Illuminated by Culadasa et al.

   Also:

   3. Why Buddhism is Right by Robert Wright.

   4. Mindfulness in Plain English by Bhante Gunaratana

   _____

   Buddha did have hacker mentality: this is what has been clear in my reading of Buddha and his teachings.

   He wad given the name Ehipassiko meaning he told everyone to forgo blind faith in anything- also to his own teachings. Listeners were supposed to try things for themselves and verify by themselves.

   And many people now like to sound hip by saying the corporate meditation and spirituality practices (by the likes of Jobs) are not real Buddhism. Do not listen to them and steer away from Buddhist religion. Corporate meditation, american retreats are more close to the Buddha's teachings than the incense burning and bowing to statues in SE Asia.

   Study of Nyaya-Vaisheshika and Nagarjuna could be beneficial, but these require more background.

   ____

   (This comment is not an invitation for debate.)

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