"Mindfulness meditation is... a tool for examining our stories carefully, from the ground up."

Buddhism teaches that the self is an illusion. Understanding this can free us from ego-driven desires and fears.

The Not-Self Doctrine

"There is no CEO self, no self that is the 'doer of deeds,' the 'thinker of thoughts.''

"Natural selection didn’t design your mind to see the world clearly; it designed your mind to have perceptions and beliefs that would help take care of your genes."

Our perceptions are filtered through cognitive biases. Mindfulness can help us see things more clearly, reducing misinterpretations and emotional reactions.

The Role of Perception

We often believe we have more control over our thoughts and actions than we actually do. Acknowledging this can lead to greater compassion and less judgment.

The Illusion of Control

"Everything meaningful about the world is something we impose on it."

"Enlightenment and liberation are mutually reinforcing."-

"Feelings are designed by natural selection to mislead us."

Cultivating compassion through mindfulness leads to greater well-being and improved relationships, countering our innate self-centered tendencies.

Embracing Compassion

Wright introduces the concept that our perceptions are shaped by evolutionary biases, leading to a distorted view of reality. He suggests that Buddhism offers tools to see through these illusions and reduce suffering.

Introduction: The Illusion of Reality

"Seeing the world more clearly can make you not just happier but more moral."

By understanding the illusions of self and reality, and through consistent mindfulness practice, we can achieve a state of enlightenment characterized by peace and clarity.

The Path to Enlightenment

"The conscious self doesn’t create thoughts; it receives them."

Our mind comprises various modules that often conflict, creating the illusion of a unified self. Recognizing this can help us understand our behaviors and reactions.

The Modular Mind

"We are, metaphorically speaking, living in the Matrix."

Emotions evolved to promote survival, not truth. They can mislead us in modern contexts, causing unnecessary suffering.

Feelings as Illusions

Meditation helps us observe our thoughts and feelings without attachment, revealing their transient nature and reducing their grip on us.

The Power of Meditation

New York Times Bestseller From one of America’s greatest minds, a journey through psychology, philosophy, and lots of meditation to show how Buddhism holds the key to moral clarity and enduring happiness. 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. At once excitingly ambitious and wittily accessible, this is the first book to combine evolutionary psychology with cutting-edge neuroscience to defend the radical claims at the heart of Buddhist philosophy. 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.

Understand yourself and those around you.

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Psychology

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Philosophy

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Religion & Spirituality

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Books

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Meditation

ROBERT WRIGHT is the author of The Moral Animal, Nonzero, and Three Scientists and Their Gods. The New York Times selected The Moral Animal as one of the ten best books of the year and the other two as notable books of the year. Wright is a recipient of the National Magazine Award for Essay and Criticism and has been a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award. A contributing editor at The New Republic, he has also written for Time, Slate, The Atlantic Monthly, and The New Yorker. Wright has taught in the philosophy department at Princeton and the psychology department at the University of Pennsylvania, and is now a senior fellow at the New Ame