A lot of thinking is really useless, you worry about things you can't do anything about right now or just flit from thing to thing, it is pointless. When the flitting around thoughts stop you can use your mind more willfully, more like a tool.
The brain is a product of an Evolutionary process. Dawkins described Evolution best as "The Blind Watchmaker". Evolution leaves a lot of room for improvement. It is like a terrible engineer who only ever gets things right by sheer luck. Evolution is probably a pretty sloppy process. This is why I believe the brain, although amazingly-awesome, is poorly put together.
So what does any of this have to do with meditation? If you had a poorly constructed computer with lots of bugs in the software that crashed all the time, what would you do? You would probably frequently save your work and then reboot your computer. By rebooting your computer you prevent errors from propagating through the software and the operating system. I am going to extend this analogy to the human mind. Without periodically resetting our minds, more and more errors may begin to accumulate. Perhaps neural circuits begin to feedback endlessly on themselves in an escalating positive loop . Perhaps mediation is a way to dampen down mental activity, allowing the mind to reset.
It is just a crazy, bat-sh*t crazy idea. So don't take it too seriously.
I think the best way to describe what these practices teach is a way to realize your mind is something else, and you can choose what to do with stimuli (external and internal) instead of just responding mechanically to it, or being dragged away by it.
This is what I've been taught about meditation anyway.
http://lifehacker.com/what-happens-to-the-brain-when-you-med...
So why would I want to shut off my brain?
I do wonder, though, whether the more advanced practices are worth the time. The states described in the article sound a bit alarming rather than helpful.
The first blaming statement is "who would want to stop thinking?". Logically this parses into asking a generalized question of whether there exists anyone at all who would want to 'stop thinking'. It seems obvious to me, based on personal observation, that I am someone that wants to "stop" my thinking process now and again.
Given I'm one person who desires this, your question then turns into this question: "why would kordless want to stop thinking". I can answer that quickly: I periodically enjoy damping the chatter that goes on non-stop in my brain while I'm awake. I get the most joy out of getting to a place where I'm thinking of nothing and just letting things be the way they are without my input. Now, the conclusion of that is that you might agree that I have the right to make this a rational choice, or you may not. The only way I could tell you meant one over the other is if you told me that already - which you did! The 'tell' was that you 'agree' with jostmey's statement that he "doesn't want to experience" it right before you ask the leading/blaming question.
For me, that indicates you don't agree with my choice to 'stop thinking'. And that is a blaming statement because it's my choice to make, not yours. :) A better way to put it would be "I'd like to understand why someone would want to stop thinking. I'm not sure I want it for myself and I have no data from anyone I know that helps me understand why I would." Or something along those lines. Those statements are more inline with being present and being receptive to other's thoughts.
The second blaming statement is "I'm sure we'll be told". That point is easier to make because clearly until someone says "trekky1700, you simply don't understand" (a blaming statement in and of itself) it won't be truthful statement. Even if they did that, they'd be wrong for doing it. Your blaming statement indicates you are expecting (simulating?) someone coming in and making their own blaming statements.
I learned about all this via exposure to non violent communications (NVC), which has it's roots in Buddhism. It's also why I bothered to write all of it in the first place. Listening and hearing others is the most effective when you turn down the volume of your own brain!
I hope I didn't make any blaming statements in my comment. I still screw it up at times...but I mean well.
http://art.harprakashkhalsa.com/exhibitions/true-nature.php
If people are interested in his meditation practice, he has some youtube videos up.
Steps to meditation http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZAUR0DNDnj8
Nature of the intellect http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tPrm7YaaU1Y
There will be the different stages of the mind, or the different parts of the brain, all of which is simply taxonomic and not in any way related to anything scientific. So the learning of the 'ancient' or 'revered' system becomes the method to which true meditation can be achieved. Naturally this process, this method is nothing but fiction. Compelling perhaps, but still fiction.
As for meditation, although it is the best path for enlightenment, turns out there's alot of benefits for common people. When you bring your thoughts to a halt, your true mind manifests. The true mind is unimpeded - it is effortless - and this true mind allows you to solve your daily problems more easily. You shut off your "stupid" brain, and the true wisdom starts to manifest. You won't become a zombie; you will naturally discard your stupid habits and become better focused at whatever is that you do.
What this means is that throughout the day we are able to gain a better understanding of ourselves and our environment; we will become gradually less scattered (due to the meditation process) and we will focus on what is important to us, wheter its programming or science or anything else. This is just the tip of the iceberg, but I think it's a good basic description.
Either the world and everything in it is accessible to empirical observation and the formation and validation of models (i.e., hypothesis formulation and testing, theory development) or it is not.
If there are things that are inaccessible to this process, then there is magic beyond the veil.
Where is the veil?
Given accessibility as described above, then there are those things that we have learned to measure and those things we have to learn to measure. Neuroscience is busily taking things from the latter set and placing them, slowly in the former.
