From 89862ae6a0554870a7708ae73112f86d2d21fc8d Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: Holden Rohrer <hr@hrhr.dev>
Date: Thu, 10 Feb 2022 01:12:45 -0500
Subject: new teachers, new work

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+% Mastery Mailing 1
+\documentclass[12pt]{apa7}
+\usepackage[style=apa,backend=biber]{biblatex}
+\usepackage{graphicx}
+\setlength{\headheight}{15pt}
+
+% According to several sources, the following commands should be active
+% for an APA paper, but I just hate them.
+% \raggedright
+% \language255 % no hyphenation
+\parindent=.5in
+\linespread{1.85}
+
+\shorttitle{Mastery Mailing 1}
+
+\addbibresource{sources.bib}
+
+\leftheader{Rohrer}
+
+\begin{document}
+Hi Nana!
+\medskip
+
+I'm learning about meditation in psychology class, and I think you'd be
+interested in the subjective effects of ``open monitoring'' meditation.
+While some types of meditation focus on creating a ``trance'' state,
+many meditators report an increased sense of awareness of their own
+thoughts and surroundings \autocite[146]{textbook}.
+This really surprised me because I thought the medical effects of
+meditation---lowering heart rate, blood pressure, and stress
+levels---meant the conscious state of meditation was close to sleep.
+However, this may actually be true of some types of meditation.
+According to some psychologists, the term ``mindfulness'' has become
+conflated with so many different subjective experiences, news articles
+and new studies can't reliably mean 20-minute open-monitoring sessions
+or a global change in perception/awareness \autocite{doubt}.
+
+My textbook says that ``meditation involves using a mental or physical
+technique to induce a state of focused attention and heightened
+awereness'' \autocite[145]{textbook}.
+You're probably already familiar with some techniques of meditation,
+either from a religious (probably Buddhist) perspective or a secular
+perspective, but I'll examine a couple of techniques to see what
+psychologists are studying.
+There are two big categories: focused attention and open monitoring.
+Focused attention empties the mind of intrusive thoughts by thinking
+only about an object or your breathing or even movement (like in Tai
+Chi).
+Open monitoring is often transitioned to after focusing on breathing,
+but experts eventually can reach this state through ``effortless
+concentration'' \autocite{lutz}
+Open monitoring is acting as a passive observer of your own thoughts and
+external sensations.
+
+\begin{figure}[ht]
+    \begin{center}
+    \includegraphics[height=2.5in]{yang}
+    \par\emph{A Practioner of Tai Chi. Unknown author, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons}
+    \end{center}
+\end{figure}
+
+This leads into the qualitative study that I found about meditation and
+depersonalization.
+Depersonalization is usually treated as a disease where the subject
+reports feeling disconnected from their own actions, as if they were
+watching someone else live their life.
+If this is brought on unexpectedly, it can be very distressing, and in
+certain cases, people have experienced it from meditation and
+immediately sought medical help \autocite{castillo}.
+This study also includes interviews with long-term meditation
+practitioners (not monks, just typical Western workers and
+businesspeople) who all experienced depersonalization.
+They report feeling mildly content and entirely lack strong emotions,
+and many are totally accustomed to work happening outside of their
+``self.''
+However, as one Mr. A said, ``I don't want to leave the thing sounding
+better than it is, because it's not bad, but it's not wonderful.''
+They describe what Yoga psychology calls enlightenment, especially the
+less persistent experience of derealization.
+Some meditators said they saw every object as being conscious, having
+auras, and vibrating to some degree.
+
+I thought of you when I learned about this because I know you are
+interested in enlightenment and mystic symbols, so people achieving
+these states after only a year or a few days of consistent meditation is
+interesting.
+I was really intrigued that these practitioners weren't just
+recommending the experience to everyone.
+Even though meditators who experience this accept their experience, I'm
+afraid of the loss of strong emotions because I like emotional highs
+even if it means I have to experience some disappointment and
+depression.
+
+\vfil\eject
+\printbibliography
+\end{document}
-- 
cgit