Why meditators are easily fooled by mental illusions?

Lankeshwara

Why meditators are easily fooled by mental illusions?

Some meditators claim to gain supernatural powers such as out of body experience, past life awareness, astral travel etc… while it is not disputed these phenomena do occur to mediators, they are just mental illusions, unfortunately some meditators fall for these illusions and self destroy their meditation, why do they do that, is it desire or is it greed?

Bekenze

I am sorry, but that post seems to me to be wreaking with negative judgements of people (albeit I am doing the same).

pweic

I remember a discussion of hallucination in the book "Phantoms in the Brains" by V.S. Ramachandran which is quite relevant. It discusses why some blind people can have very vivid hallucination.

The scientific explanation is that our brain is constantly hallucinating all the time unconsciously. These hallucination are fitted against our sensory inputs (visual, touch etc.) and only the best fit result is output to our consciousness as our final perception. The science is rather detailed, so plz refer to the book for further understanding.

I guess that in deep meditation, sensory info from outside are cut off or attenuated, so it is more likely for our consciousness to take some unverified hallucination as real.

federica

For the same reasons you see fit to condemn them.
It's an illusory state with no apparent beneficial kammic consequence.

What's it to you?

Jeffrey

"they are just mental illusions"

How do you know this? I know there isn't proof for the positive, but definitively it is impossible to prove the negative because there can always be *some* meditator that is outside a study or whatever.

But entertaining your question the reason *some* meditators fall for illusions is indeed due to greed and so forth. For this reason it is better to do a self sealing meditation which does not grant any special states before the meditator is ready. Such meditations as tantric are not done until the meditator has done preliminary practices to protect them against the greed and so forth.

But there is nothing wrong with power. Misuse of power is what is wrong.

zenff

Why meditators are easily fooled by mental illusions?

Some meditators claim to gain supernatural powers such as out of body experience, past life awareness, astral travel etc… while it is not disputed these phenomena do occur to mediators...

It is disputed. You must have missed something.

person

Well, from my own experience, I've had a psychotic break and was clinically delusional. I also have experiences of a 'supernatural' sort. I can say for myself that these two experiences are different.

As a side note, I don't believe in supernatural phenomena that exist outside the rules of nature. I only believe that we don't understand all natural phenomena or all the rules of nature.

AMH

Hmm, so I believe this type of experience can be true or can be a delusion. In fact at thanksgiving dinner (at my friends the mormons house) the mother in law (we nick named her Star Mom years ago for her new agey style) told us all about her out of body experience. It was interesting, probably not the righ crowd, however I left thinking that it really isn't a big deal. Every 'experience' I have had over the years has been answered by a good teacher 'okay so what, don't cling'. The first time I recall clearly being outside my body was when I was 5, after that i think i learned to 'stick' better or at least do not recall these things. Just not a big deal I guess, doesn't make anyone more spiritually 'advanced' (I don't believe in 'advanced') or special, and feeling super special actually gets in your way therefore all the teaching against being caught up in these experiences (sorry don't have references off the top of my head). I don't think teachings say they are not true so much as they emphasize they are not to be held onto.

patbb

Why meditators are easily fooled by mental illusions?

Some meditators claim to gain supernatural powers such as out of body experience, past life awareness, astral travel etc… while it is not disputed these phenomena do occur to mediators, they are just mental illusions, unfortunately some meditators fall for these illusions and self destroy their meditation, why do they do that, is it desire or is it greed?

only one way to find out.

meditate hard and experience those for yourself.

to do so if you need guidance, i suggest the book "Mindfulness, Bliss & Beyond" by ajahn brahm in which he guides you toward experiencing all including the highest stages of concentration (samadhi) meditation (altered sates of consciousness).

http://www.ajahnbrahm.org/books.html

driedleaf

The important thing to remember is that you do not have to believe or not believe right away. You can leave that option open. Meditation is very useful because of the various insights you can achieve. You can even find answers to life without having to leave our body or perform miraculous stunts imho.

KnightofBuddha

Whatever makes them happy. I meditate before sleep each night to reflect on the day and let go of all the stresses of the day. Can't say I've ever had visions, but if I did, as long as those visions weren't commanding me to do bad things, what's the big deal?

shanyin

Well, from my own experience, I've had a psychotic break and was clinically delusional. I also have experiences of a 'supernatural' sort. I can say for myself that these two experiences are different.

As a side note, I don't believe in supernatural phenomena that exist outside the rules of nature. I only believe that we don't understand all natural phenomena or all the rules of nature.

yeah im kinda going through that still

To answer your question... I would have to ask what makes you so sure?

Also, If/when it does, perhaps it is linked to religious beliefs? For example I have a book in which the Buddha is quoted as saying roughly: when cultivating and when mindfulness of breathing becomes a foundation of ones life one can expect 10 supernatural or magical abilities.

shanyin

now if someone like a cave Lama I saw on youtube says what he said "If I told you I can remember all my past lives, who is going to believe me". I really don't care to dispute his claim. It would be indeed very strange for anyone in 'the west' to claim supernatural abilities, as they would probably be refered to a mental institution. It would be a strange situation to hold those religious beliefs, expecting to be able to "recall previous existences" or "aquire beautiful speech" or "levitate" or whatever and still want to practice mindfulness of breathing everyday! haha

I donno

seeker242

Why meditators are easily fooled by mental illusions?

Some meditators claim to gain supernatural powers such as out of body experience, past life awareness, astral travel etc… while it is not disputed these phenomena do occur to mediators, they are just mental illusions, unfortunately some meditators fall for these illusions and self destroy their meditation, why do they do that, is it desire or is it greed?

Why are ordinary people so fooled by mental illusions? According to Buddhism, there are plenty much more dangerous illusions to worry about. Especially one's own illusions because those are the only ones that really matter.

Dakini

Why meditators are easily fooled by mental illusions?

unfortunately some meditators fall for these illusions and self destroy their meditation, why do they do that, is it desire or is it greed?

I've never heard of meditators "falling for these illusions and self-destroying their meditation". Most meditators know the teachings about these "siddhis", as they're called, being a phase in the meditation skill-growth process, and they know not to cling. (When this comes up at all. I don't think most meditators get that far.) We had one member ask what to do about these distractions, admitting he was becoming attached to them, and he took everyone's advice to just keep meditating, and the phase would pass.

So maybe you could tell us where you got the impression that some meditators fall for these siddhis. I suppose it's natural that some might, people are human, you know. Who cares? Focus on your own process. :om: