You're looking at everything through Zen-colored glasses.
> Questioning anything in this way, i.e. deciding if something belongs in the "Good Bucket" or "Bad Bucket" again simply shows that he doesn't get it.
What this shows, to me, is that he is an empiricist trying to decide if meditation is an effective path toward what he seeks to achieve. It might be that once you are "of the Eastern philosophy", you no longer accept empirical evaluations; however, you have to bootstrap yourself into that sort of thing. You can't evolve straight from a fish into a bird, you have to have a middle stage where your fins (empirical thought) assist your wings (seeking enlightenment) before your wings are strong enough that you can shuck the fins off.
Well, I wouldn't say I'm quite "there" yet either, but I understand it enough to realize that you can't find something you already have (e.g., a "path"). Empirical thought still assists me too, but the point is he's looking at meditation and everything else objectively: "People are miserable, they should meditate, it will help" when the real message should be "Try meditation. It'll work if you feel like it should and put forth enough of an effort to satisfy your own requirements."
Now that might make a newcomer wonder, "what on earth does he mean by that?" Then they can actually learn. Instead, they think "Okay, I will sit in silence listening to myself breath 2 hours a day and somehow that will help me be happier!" They're still waiting for "stuff" to "happen" to them. There is no "stuff"! Nothing "happens" to you! They're already on the wrong track.
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You're looking at everything through Zen-colored glasses.
> Questioning anything in this way, i.e. deciding if something belongs in the "Good Bucket" or "Bad Bucket" again simply shows that he doesn't get it.
What this shows, to me, is that he is an empiricist trying to decide if meditation is an effective path toward what he seeks to achieve. It might be that once you are "of the Eastern philosophy", you no longer accept empirical evaluations; however, you have to bootstrap yourself into that sort of thing. You can't evolve straight from a fish into a bird, you have to have a middle stage where your fins (empirical thought) assist your wings (seeking enlightenment) before your wings are strong enough that you can shuck the fins off.
Well, I wouldn't say I'm quite "there" yet either, but I understand it enough to realize that you can't find something you already have (e.g., a "path"). Empirical thought still assists me too, but the point is he's looking at meditation and everything else objectively: "People are miserable, they should meditate, it will help" when the real message should be "Try meditation. It'll work if you feel like it should and put forth enough of an effort to satisfy your own requirements."
Now that might make a newcomer wonder, "what on earth does he mean by that?" Then they can actually learn. Instead, they think "Okay, I will sit in silence listening to myself breath 2 hours a day and somehow that will help me be happier!" They're still waiting for "stuff" to "happen" to them. There is no "stuff"! Nothing "happens" to you! They're already on the wrong track.