I still have to look at your website more in depth, but I jumped on this post because what you describe are squarely my interests as well. I have a couple questions:
How do you feel the developer community has so far reacted to this meditation and mindfulness crossover?
You say you take a secular approach, yet have an interest in Buddhist philosophy. I personally like many ideas (philosophies) present in Buddhism as well, and reject others. I feel these ideas are important to learn about but would probably hesitate to call myself a Buddhist at any stage of the journey. What is your stance on this yourself, and how do you reconcile secularism and Buddhism?
If you only answer one question, I'd ask it to be this one: how can I help? As a programming student, my ultimate goals are to teach not only code skills but effective self-care and altruism as well. My mission is to empower people to be healthy and happy, give them the skills to make a difference, and encourage them to use these newfound skills for good. I feel your project aligns well with my values, so if you have advice, I'd love to hear it!
What a wonderful intention you hold! This space needs voices who will guide it toward psychological safety and mental health, so figure out your way to do that and I'll certainly help where I can! I'll start with your questions.
I'm consistently amazed by how the world at large, and the tech community in general, has become sympathetic to, and curious about, meditation. There's a growing interest in the benefits of meditation - high performance, stress management, presence, emotional regulation. I've had conversations with tens of humans via Instagram (@codingmindfully, nearly 1k followers at the time of writing), received comments from many others, written articles that have been applauded many times, and started receiving signups to my website. So I think the answer is - yes, there's an interest in this material. To back it up, I spoke at a conference a couple of years ago about mindfulness, neuroscience and so on, and it was one of the busiest streams of the event.
I don't know that I have reconciled my secular worldview and Buddhism - it's a process. I think it's wise to try on the ideas you are interested in for size, and accept and reject as you see fit. I reckon the Buddha himself would have recommended his approach. Part of the interest in this type of exploration for me is the dance between my rationalist worldview (my education was in Physics and Mathematics, with coding as an add-on), and spirituality (I'm an extremely lapsed Catholic with agnostic, anti-religious tendencies and an abhorrence of cults) - teasing out the elements of what I truly believe - my own personal spiritual quest - has been part of the fascination. It's a validation cycle as well - Buddhism says something about meditation, I do some experiments (retreats, practices, mindsets and so on) and I find out whether they are true (mostly) or false - which appears to the empiricist in me. And whatever way you shape it, when I meditate regularly my life appears smoother, and that's enough for my cynical brain to be satisfied. There are parts of it I'll probably never adopt - the more ritualistic, cultural specific Buddhism will never sit well for me, for whatever reason. And the supernatural claims leave me a bit dry too.
In terms of helping - email me! daragh @ my domain. We are definitely on the same mission so let's talk about mutual support. If you have ways to publicize my Ultimate Guide to Meditation for Programmers - please put it out there!
I still have to look at your website more in depth, but I jumped on this post because what you describe are squarely my interests as well. I have a couple questions:
How do you feel the developer community has so far reacted to this meditation and mindfulness crossover?
You say you take a secular approach, yet have an interest in Buddhist philosophy. I personally like many ideas (philosophies) present in Buddhism as well, and reject others. I feel these ideas are important to learn about but would probably hesitate to call myself a Buddhist at any stage of the journey. What is your stance on this yourself, and how do you reconcile secularism and Buddhism?
If you only answer one question, I'd ask it to be this one: how can I help? As a programming student, my ultimate goals are to teach not only code skills but effective self-care and altruism as well. My mission is to empower people to be healthy and happy, give them the skills to make a difference, and encourage them to use these newfound skills for good. I feel your project aligns well with my values, so if you have advice, I'd love to hear it!
What a wonderful intention you hold! This space needs voices who will guide it toward psychological safety and mental health, so figure out your way to do that and I'll certainly help where I can! I'll start with your questions.
I'm consistently amazed by how the world at large, and the tech community in general, has become sympathetic to, and curious about, meditation. There's a growing interest in the benefits of meditation - high performance, stress management, presence, emotional regulation. I've had conversations with tens of humans via Instagram (@codingmindfully, nearly 1k followers at the time of writing), received comments from many others, written articles that have been applauded many times, and started receiving signups to my website. So I think the answer is - yes, there's an interest in this material. To back it up, I spoke at a conference a couple of years ago about mindfulness, neuroscience and so on, and it was one of the busiest streams of the event.
I don't know that I have reconciled my secular worldview and Buddhism - it's a process. I think it's wise to try on the ideas you are interested in for size, and accept and reject as you see fit. I reckon the Buddha himself would have recommended his approach. Part of the interest in this type of exploration for me is the dance between my rationalist worldview (my education was in Physics and Mathematics, with coding as an add-on), and spirituality (I'm an extremely lapsed Catholic with agnostic, anti-religious tendencies and an abhorrence of cults) - teasing out the elements of what I truly believe - my own personal spiritual quest - has been part of the fascination. It's a validation cycle as well - Buddhism says something about meditation, I do some experiments (retreats, practices, mindsets and so on) and I find out whether they are true (mostly) or false - which appears to the empiricist in me. And whatever way you shape it, when I meditate regularly my life appears smoother, and that's enough for my cynical brain to be satisfied. There are parts of it I'll probably never adopt - the more ritualistic, cultural specific Buddhism will never sit well for me, for whatever reason. And the supernatural claims leave me a bit dry too.
In terms of helping - email me! daragh @ my domain. We are definitely on the same mission so let's talk about mutual support. If you have ways to publicize my Ultimate Guide to Meditation for Programmers - please put it out there!
Have a wonderful weekend!
Hey! Did you ever try to email? Daragh at codingmindfully !