Tow #5- Can we End the Mediation Madness?

Meditation is no longer something only done by Buddhist monks, it is now something that many people do today. Everyday life can cause a lot of stress, so people will meditate in order to relieve some of that anxiety. Adam Grant, a professor of psychology at Penn and an author, believes that the public is becoming too interested in mediation. He has found that people who meditate automatically assume everyone else does, and they are rude to the people who don’t. He wrote and article for the New York Times, Can we End the Mediation Madness?, in hopes to convince the people who meditate that it is ok not everyone else does. He sees the good things meditation can do, but feels it is not necessary as all of the good outcome can come from doing other things. The way he proves this in his article is first by using humor. Grant shares that his friends will argue he should meditate because Steve Jobs did, he replies with,”yeah, and he also did L.S.D. - do you want me to try that, too?” The humor helps to not directly offend the people who meditate. The jokes allow Grant to call them out without them feeling victimized, while the people who don’t meditate can agree with him. Grant also uses logic and credible sources to prove his purpose. Grant starts his argument with, “Before we’re all swept into this fad, we ought to ask why meditation is useful. So I polled a group of meditation researchers, teachers and practitioners on why they recommend it.” This was a very smart thing to do as is showed his audience he knows what he’s talking about as he learned from credible sources. I believe he achieved his purpose. Grant convinced me that meditation is not “all that.” He gave many other alternatives to meditation and even explained how meditation can be bad in some cases. If I ever hear criticizing for someone who does not meditate, I will have to show them this article.