Meditation practices only "work" in specific cultural settings

Some people claim that specific sorts of meditation practices are akin to a science that produces the same results, no matter who is doing the meditating or where the meditation is being done.

A thoughtful piece by David L. McMahan, "How Meditation Works: Theorizing the Role of Cultural Context in Buddhist Contemplative Practices," casts doubt on this claim.

I came across McMahan's essay in a re-tweet by David Chapman of someone else's tweet:

I had to jump through some online hoops to download the PDF file. Here it is:
Download How_Meditation_Works_Theorizing_the_Role

The general thesis seems totally believable to me.

People who meditate are influenced by the culture in which they live, which includes the context of the religion or spiritual approach that their meditation practice is embedded in. So there's no such thing as a "pure" form of meditation that stands apart from the mind of the meditating person.

Here's some quotes from the essay that will give you a feel for McMahan's approach. His "Two Meditators" introduction sets the stage for later arguments.

I would like to begin with a simple proposition: meditation works. Now to a qualification that makes things more complicated: what it means for meditation to work—the work meditation does—is different, sometimes radically different, in diverse contexts.

Let me illustrate this by imagining two practitioners of the basic Buddhist meditation practice of mindfulness of the breath. One is a contemporary American female professional who practices modern insight meditation (vipassanā) and modern secular mindfulness practices.

The other is an ancient monk—let’s say around the beginning of the common era—in the movement established by Gautama the Buddha. Both are serious practitioners, and both are drawing from the same text, the locus classicus of Buddhist meditation, the Sutta on the Four Foundations of Mindfulness.

They both sit down in the same posture—legs crossed, back straight, hands in the lap—and bring their attention to the movement of their breath. If we could secretly scan their brains, the same parts might be lit up with activity, while blood flow to other parts is slowed to a trickle.

The goals of these two meditators are very different. The modern woman is trying to relieve stress, get along better with other people, achieve more mindfulness in her daily life, and so on, all within her family life. The ancient monk is seeking to enter a transcendent state beyond rebirth and suffering while living in a monastery and being celibate.

But more to the point, similar meditation practices are apparently accomplishing aims—for example, “engag[ing] the world rather than withdraw[ing] from it”—nearly the opposite of the ideals of ancient meditation practices, which explicitly recommended withdrawal from the world. The work meditation does, therefore, is determined by the surrounding ideas, aims, attitudes, and cultural context of the practitioner.

Again, such practices do not simply produce particular, precisely reproducible mental “states” that are the same across time and space. They are part of larger complexes of ways of being in the world in particular social imaginaries.

We all make maps of the world. Not geographic maps, but a mapping of how reality is and how we fit into it. Meditation isn't separate from these maps; it is part and parcel of how we view the world. So the idea that meditation shows us reality "as it is" is false. 

As McMahan says, there's a strong inclination to have experiences that conform to our map of reality. How often do Buddhist meditators have a vision of Jesus and convert to Christianity? How often do Christians have a meditative insight that leads them to convert to Islam?

Very rarely, if ever.

Most meditators have likely considered their maps to correspond to a pre-existing architecture of the mind and reality; therefore, they have considerable incentive to interpret and produce experiences that conform to the map.

Buddhist meditators, therefore, have striven to identify the markers of transition between the first jhāna and the second, to look for signs that they have attained stream entry, or to discern whether they have truly had insight into the Buddha’s teachings on impermanence.

They have questioned basic intuitions, like that of a continuing, enduring self, and instead have tried to isolate and identify the five aggregates in their own experience. In later traditions that insist that all phenomena are illusory, practitioners must train their minds to see the world itself as a dream. In some traditions, they must try to imagine the world and themselves as having Buddha nature, perfect and already awakened, despite the ample evidence to the contrary.

They must, in other words, reimagine themselves and the world in ways suggested by these maps, not only interpreting but also cultivating their experiences accordingly.

Near the end of his essay, McMahan revisits the two meditators.

Are the modern professional and the ancient monk doing something utterly different? Certainly there is overlap: both follow their breath, calm their minds and bodies, try to cultivate compassion and avoid hatred, greed, and delusion. But the familial, institutional, social, cultural, civilizational, and cosmic contexts in which they enact these values could hardly be more divergent.

The modern professional has a family to which she is deeply committed, a job that sustains her, arts and entertainment, and broader commitments to gender equality, human rights, individual choice, and many other non-negotiable goods. She lives, in other words, in an entirely different social imaginary with different default intuitions and a different repertoire of possible ways of being.

Some of the things that mindfulness helps her with are expressly forbidden the monk: parenting, money-making, love-making, play-watching. So mindfulness and meditation help to cultivate a very different kind of person in this case than in the earliest contexts (as well as monastic contexts today).

Moderns have discovered new uses for ancient tools. Clearly these are flexible practices that have been adapted today to quite different ends within very different lifeworlds.

Of course, if you really want to understand the subtleties of McMahan's excellent essay, read the entire piece.
Download How_Meditation_Works_Theorizing_the_Role
I've just shared an overview of some key concepts. Here's a quote from the end of the essay that points to McMahan's emphasis on looking at both the "inside" of the meditator and the "outside" of cultural influences to grasp what works and doesn't work in meditation.

By all means we should measure what is measurable, but we should not think that such measurements—be they oscillating brain-waves, blood flow to various parts of the brain, respiration, and so on—get down to the real “facts” about meditation to which all other “data” (beliefs, social situation, cultural factors, relations of power) are extraneous.

We must understand all of these factors together systemically. The study of meditation should not succumb to the modern cult of calculability in which something is only real when it is measurable and measured. 

Comments

[Jim Sutherland]

Meditation does not always have the same effect on people, even when practicing the Sant Mat Technique, as is proven by reading posts by various Long term meditators in this Church, started by a Charan Singh Initiate.

If the Technique of Meditation shared by Master Charan Singh to all of his Initiates resulted in the same eventual experience, than all of Charan’s Initiates would be one happy family in the Sanghat singng the same Shabds.

Yet, there doesn’t seem to be much similarity between Charan Initiates, at least in this Church.

For an extreme result of a Charan Initate’s growth after years of Meditation, Dr. Richard Alan Miller is another Charan Initate, initiated in the early 70s.

https://richardalanmiller.com

[vinny]

There are levels & contexts of every reality. The 12th grader cannot do atomic explosions as an atomic scientist but then maybe he doesn't want to become atomic scientist. This doesn't mean , that level of atomic physics doesn't exist which can result in explosions.

[Appreciative Reader]

I can think of one analogy.

Music. Or for that matter, food. Or for that matter, art. Let's just take music.

When different people listen to some particular piece of music, I suppose for some people, some particular parts of the brain 'light up', so to say. That would be the 'objective' measurement.

But what do these listeners 'get' out of the music? That's wholly subjective, and we'd probably need to interview each subject separately and carefully (with all the usual precautions that this would necessitate). This will probably throw up some ...what's the word, trans-subjectivel isn't it? This will probably throw up some trans-subjective measures for listening to music.

Perhaps something along similar lines when "researching" meditation as well?

(Of course, this ignores the transcendental aspect. Not in the mundane sense, in the sense that being absorbed in music may let you transcend your immediate surroundings to some extent. But in the grand sense, in the sense of my becoming Superman-and-Dr-Manhattan-combined when I sit cross-legged, that's probably off the radar. Unless there really were some super-yogis, and they come forward. Until they do, we can safely ignore this last aspect I suppose.)

As to what purpose or motive some meditator has, or even what use they put the end result to, that will obviously differ from person to person.

Another analogy comes to mind. Working out.

One measure of working out : it brings you peace of mind, helps focus, probably lights up areas in the brain during and after.

Another measure : your biceps and triceps and what-have-you start bulging out gratifyingly! (Probably equivalent to the long-term effects of meditation that's talked of these days, like aging slowing down, etc.)

The end-result of the hours spent every day at the gym? Someone could become a self-absorbed narcissist in love with their mirror. And become a whole-time gym rat, constantly measuring body parts and weighing themselves. Someone else may use this to pursue some particular object, like some sport, or a career in show biz. Others may use it simply to make their daily, ordinary lives more meaningful and more healthy.

Thus with meditation too? As with practically any other 'skill'? I mean, meditation, in these ways, seems no different really from any other skill, does it?

(Again, the alleged transcendence of meditation has no analogy with working out. Probably we'll not find this analogy anywhere else. Perhaps because mediation is unique in this respect. Or else, the second possibility, because there is no such thing as transcendence at all.)

[777]

Nobody incapable of stopping
the thoughts at least 10 seconds
should judge meditation.

I mean NOT contemplation or repeating what all do

They simple do not know a Iota, not a glimps

They are pré-toddlers theorizing gravity

777

[777]

After the thoughts had stopped sufficient time

the practitioner is awesomely capable°°
to maintain a kind of double, triple, quadruple state
of consciousness
F.I. read the Herald Tribune and at the same time
praising the Creator, answering questions, and more

This is how Charan functionned

777

°° is not a good word because it's a great Gift
as Rumi said

When The Ocean comes to you as a Lover,
Be quick, don't hesitate
Marry Her
No other experience is equal to This

The Kings Falcon, without reason, has landed on your shoulder and has become Yours

777

-

[Anita]

Personally , I agree that meditation experiences are influenced by social, cultural and other environmental influences. We can practice the same meditation technique but the experiences could be different. It is very important to consider" Faith" factor in our outcomes of meditation or Prayer practices.

I believe Faith in different Paths will change our brain cell activity and perception of our reality.
MRI scans of the brain cannot prove or distinguish this yet.

Religious or non religious themes often play through the same normal brain functions.
A prophet or a master speaking the words of God uses the same language area in the left hemisphere that we use in our everyday speech. He can be a great speaker with great leadership skills. The "how" of his brain -formed language is well established by neuroscience , but "why " the
prophet speaks lies beyond the brain , in the realm of faith.

Saint Teresa , a Spanish nun of the Carmelite order describes in her Interior Castle book the vision of a beautiful diamond or clear crystal globe that is shaped like a castle and represents the soul . Inside the castle are seven mansions , the innermost containing the "King". It is of course impossible to know what was going through St Teresa's brain during her mystical experiences.

I do agree that there is a strong inclination to have experiences that conform to our belief system and our environmental influences.

Anita

[vinny]

Whatever you have in your mind - forget it;
Whatever you have in your hand - give it;
Whatever is to be your fate - face it

[John]

Vinny why do you preach are you preacher? Why dont You do these things by yourself.

[Spencer Tepper]

What the mind does to meditation is interesting, creating its own context.

But what meditation does to the mind is much larger. Mind cannot contain meditation.

Meditation transforms mind.

[Spencer Tepper]

Most meditators have likely considered their maps to correspond to a pre-existing architecture of the mind and reality; therefore, they have considerable incentive to interpret and produce experiences that conform to the map.

So McMahon can read minds?
The only interesting experiences are the new ones.

[Spencer Tepper]

Meditation is a daily confrontation with all that is distracting and disturbing, and the internal act of focus, relinquishing our mental attachments.

Therefore, any significant experience with meditation is quite the opposite of McMahon's conjecture.

The cure for painting over our world with our favorite notions, justifications and excuses, is meditation.

Peeling off ones own skin is the opposite of what McMahon presumes long term meditation to be, and reveals his own culture bound projections.

Meditation, with love and devotion, can cure that.

[Turan]

It was the Dali Lama who recently said that what the world needs now is awareness. Perhaps the universal aspect of meditation is awareness training - regardless of the individual or culture.
Imagine the possibility of humanity being aware of its thoughts and actions as they arise and seeing how thoughts, beliefs and concept can be so divisive and ultimately the cause of much individual and worldwide suffering. To use Stephen Batchelor's take on Buddhism - to be free to respond rather than react.

[Appreciative Reader]

"I do agree that there is a strong inclination to have experiences that conform to our belief system and our environmental influences."

I do understand this, absolutely, at an intellectual level. That is, I understand what is being said. But at an experiential level, I absolutely don't get it, at all.

I meditate a fair bit myself. My own unequivocal experience has been that meditation tends to make the mind less cluttered (as well as more peaceful and centered, but that is irrelevant I suppose in the context of this discussion) and, well, clearer.

Personally, I'd be far less likely to be led to delusions or confusion in terms of just about anything (and that includes my 'experiences' at the time when I'm meditating), when I'm meditating regularly, than when I'm not. This I can attest to personally, unequivocally.

I don't know, am I missing something here? If your tradition tells you that you see X, Y, Z entities "within" or have A, B, C experiences, how does being told that make it any more likely that you'll see those X, Y, Z entities or have those A, B, C experiences? I mean, sure, your practice itself may perhaps lead you to seeing them and experiencing such, but why would being told that you might see them make it any likelier that you'll see them?

.

I'm afraid I haven't read the PDF proper, only Brian's summary, and my initial take on this was what I'd written in my original comment. That one might use one's meditation for different purposes, depending on one's "environment", just like one might use one's gym workouts for different purposes (e.g. to feed one's narcissism, or to help one in some particular endeavor like some sport or in show biz, or to help one to better lead a healthy normal regular life).

But apparently other commenters are interpreting this differently. I may, it seems, have been mistaken in interpreting Brian's main article in the way I did. Apparently what is being said is that the experiences themselves are different, depending on the "environment". I don't get that, at all.

Are we talking of some kind of self-induced delusion here, some kind of self-hypnosis, or what?