188: Evolutionary Psychology versus Meditation

Why Buddhism is True written by Robert Wright 'Why Buddhism is True' looks at the science and philosophy of meditation and enlightenment.

Robert Wright is a devout non-meditating anger prone evolutionary psychologist and writer. He dives headlong into the world of meditation with surprising results, and explain why it works from an evolutionary standpoint.

Robert Wright famously explained in The Moral Animal how evolution shaped the human brain. The mind is designed to often delude us, he argued, about ourselves and about the world. And it is designed to make happiness hard to sustain. But if we know our minds are rigged for anxiety, depression, anger, and greed, what do we do?

Wright locates the answer in Buddhism, which figured out thousands of years ago what scientists are only discovering now. Buddhism holds that human suffering is a result of not seeing the world clearly—and proposes that seeing the world more clearly, through meditation, will make us better, happier people.

In Why Buddhism is True, Wright leads readers on a journey through psychology, philosophy, and a great many silent retreats to show how and why meditation can serve as the foundation for a spiritual life in a secular age. With bracing honesty and fierce wisdom, it will persuade you not just that Buddhism is true—which is to say, a way out of our delusion—but that it can ultimately save us from ourselves, as individuals and as a species.

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On the growth mindset podcast with Sam Webster Harris, we explore the psychology of happiness, satisfaction, purpose, and growth through the lens of self-improvement. Success and happiness is a state of mind unique to ourselves and is our responsibility to create.

Through a process of honest self-reflection of what is holding us back and what is driving us forward, we can lose the ego and build awareness of how to be our best.

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Show: Growth Mindset, psychology of self-improvement

Episode: Evolutionary Psychology versus Meditation

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