Let Go Of The Woo-Woo
There is no need for any religious trappings in meditation or mindfulness practice. Practicing in several contemplative traditions over a couple decades, I’ve come to realize that it simply doesn’t matter what form the trappings take, as long as the essential wisdom is there. Understanding how that wisdom should look like is key to a healthy practice, and a healthy mind.
In Buddhism, we have the dharma seals, which I’ve talked about here: The Atheist Religion. All sects of Buddhism agrees that these seals indicate a true teaching, or Dharma. In theistic religions, one is supposed to somehow communicate with a god in order to know if a teaching is true or not. How do we test if our communication with god is real or in our minds? There is no empirical way to know the truth. As soon as we began to use magical thinking, we lose reasoning and rationality. These mental tools have allowed us to understand reality far beyond anything we could have imagined one hundred thousand years ago. At the same time, our cleverness has begun to divorce us from reality, which is easy to see if you log onto TikTok.
Some say this is the new reality, that we should get used to it. I’m not so sure. As someone who has worked on and with the land for a long time, I know that tangible nature how we survive. Nature is our only source of resource, from clean water to food, as well as shelter, clothing…
