Status Updates From Buddha's Brain: The Practic...

“Us vs them” is deep in our evolutionary core. It’s extremely easy to spot differences to separate yourself from someone else. But what if instead you shift your own mindset to think about similarities between you and others?

- “Equanimity is neither apathy nor indifference: you are warmly engaged with the world but not troubled by it.”

“Emotional pain with no benefit to yourself or others is pointless suffering.” Also it makes it more likely for you to suffer again b/c you’re re-enforcement circuits of pain in your brain.

Also! Activating your stress system makes you constipated, dry mouthed so you aren’t salivating, lowers libido etc because if your body thinks you need to fight or flight, none of those systems are as important anymore, so it diverts resources away.

- “Second darts” are our reactions to a first dart, something we observe or has happened.
- Second darts are where we add our own suffering and it can domino effect quickly
- “Even if your pot isn’t boiling over, just simmering along with 2nd-dart activation isn’t healthy. It continually shunts resources away from long-term projects (building a strong immune system) in favor of short term crises.