Comment by metabagel
3 days ago
It's a practice. There are benefits. It's not a cure-all. The goal is to be more in control and aware of your own thoughts and feelings. You achieve that by learning to turn off the "monkey mind" - the continuous stream of distracting thoughts and feelings which can lead us down paths which are not of our deliberate choosing and not necessarily beneficial to our wellbeing.
It is often said that if you go into meditation with a goal to improve yourself that you will probably be disappointed. I guess I would say that meditation is as much about unlocking your intuition as it is about anything else, so consciously trying to improve yourself through meditation does seem to miss the point of the practice.
> The goal is
That may be your goal and it’s a fine one. It’s a not accurate as a blanket statement.
For context I am speaking in the context of being a practicing Zen Buddhist. But that’s only one other of many perspectives.