Do you think secular mindfulness programs are valuable in and of themselves, or do you think that mindfulness is only valuable within a larger Buddhist framework?
He crashed his computer doing that.
It was such a profound thing that it just, the weight of it.
That was karma in effect, yeah.
It was Google suppressing the revelation.
Censorship.
No, don't give them the answer.
OK.
I guess I'll start answering this one if no one else is going to.
I think secular mindfulness programs are great.
I think Buddhism is a great program, right?
Is anyone with me?
Buddhism is a secular mindfulness program.
It's a secular religious mindfulness program.
Secular because it has nothing to do with belief or dogma, but it's religious because you have to take it seriously.
It's meant to be taken seriously.
Religions as opposed to negligence.
Religions is the opposite of negligence.
And it's, yeah, I mean, what else do you need?
If you're practicing mindfulness, what do you need?
The problem is they often water it down, and they're not really pushing mindfulness as hard as monks will, because a monk will say, oh, you're bleeding to death?
Well, be mindful of it.
You know, the secular programs can get sued for saying such things.
You're dying of a...
Oh, you're throwing up and you're, oh, well, be mindful.
Remember that all things are impermanent.
The more civilized society is.
Yeah, the things we can do to our meditators here, it's like, yeah, yeah, well, you know, you could go see a doctor if you want, but you could also just be mindful of it.
What if I die?
Well, you know, if you die, I promise I'll do the chanting at your funeral free.
That's what my teacher says, actually.
When people start worrying, he says, don't worry.
If you die, I'll do the chanting for free.
And he said, I haven't had anyone die yet.
But that's the difference, really.
It's not so extreme.
A lot of people, I only know this from second-hand experience, people say it's very watered down.
You've got people sitting up on their zafus and whatever these croissants that they sit on, and teachers telling you not to sit through pain, not to be mindful of pain, not to that extent, but be gentle with yourself.
There's that one aspect that it tends to be more watered down, because monks are like do or die, nibbana or bust.
If I die, that's a great experience, or sickness is cool and stuff.
I mean, that's generalization, but I think it's a valid one.
But certainly, if a secular mindfulness program has all the potential to be just as valuable as one placed in Buddhist cosmology.
I mean, we did talk earlier about rebirth, and I do have personally this belief that ideas like karma and rebirth
can help if you quote unquote believe in them they tend to steer you in the right direction because they tend to complement reality and you'll see it from and so if you take it from the other end where you believe in karma and rebirth you'll start to see it from the experiential end as well and they'll meet up together if on the other hand you believe in a death there's nothing that can actually interfere with your observation of the truth but so you can
I don't know.
You don't have to take it, but it can be helpful because it happens to be true.