Review: Meditation from Cold Start to Complete Mastery

I think Mark’s book can probably get you to stop being narrow and dogmatic if you’re on a meditation path that’s sub-optimal, and it can help you think about contemplation in a new way. That’s what it did for me, which was invaluable.

There’s something weird I increasingly encounter on the contemplative path. Which is: if you don’t accidentally fry your brain with meditation, at a certain point, the mind starts to guide you somewhere . The contemplative path reveals itself. And it seems like everyone’s path eventually goes to a similar place, although the trips are different. My... See more

Maybe you don’t need direction, because, ultimately, you are already going the right way. Maybe, somewhere, your being/mind/heart/intuition already knows everything it needs to know about how to come home to itself. If you just look inwards, lovingly, perhaps you will come unbent, in some ways, or fully, eventually.

According to Mark, nobody can tell you how you should meditate, fully. The way your mind is fucked up will be radically specific. You will thus have to throw out the rules and make your own at some point. Following instructions too rigidly will lead to useless mental play-acting.

We’re trying to safely, slowly find our way around every square inch of our consciousness, and, sensitively, work through every jagged subroutine, every shitty memory, every unnecessary bit of clenching and grasping we locate.

Most meditation systems are depth-first : you plunge, deeply, into one area of your mind—by, say, learning how to concentrate on your breath with heroic clarity—and then you take the mental machinery thus developed and try to iron out your life with it. Mark’s is breadth-first : he wants you to mindfully do a whole bunch of different little things—... See more

Many people, me included, ask the question ‘what is it like to be me’ surprisingly infrequently. Asking yourself this, a lot, can stop you from falling into a bunch of varieties of self-destruction, and lead you towards a more self-authored and less self-inflicted life.

Mark’s conception of meditation is quite different than that of other teachers. Perhaps the main distinguishing feature is, I think, also the best part of his system: the Meta Protocol. The Meta Protocol is simple. As part of your meditative life, frequently ask yourself—in writing or in your head—what, concretely, is going on when you meditate, an... See more

At one point, Mark memorably summarizes the goal [of meditation] as “happiness dependent on exquisitely and flexibly handling your shit.”

try to keep the essence of your gifts while you work on the curses furnished in their acquisition.