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Spirit Levels

Is Vipassana Dangerous or an Antidote to Tech?

Season 2

Vipassana is an intensive, 10-day form of meditation often likened to taking a heroic dose of a psychedelic trip, in terms of the profound realisations an individual can reach. And just like with hallucinogenic drugs, those with a predisposition to mental health issues, or who are at a vulnerable point in their life, can experience adverse effects – as the podcast Untold: The Retreat has found. Frank and Jenny talk to three people who completed a 10-day retreat and had very different experiences. Our lead interviewee is neuroscientist, AI engineer and 'extremophile' Dr Jack Allocca, who has found himself completely reassessing his life.


LINKS

 

Jack Allocca in Jenny Valentish’s book Everything Harder Than Everything Else.

Jenny’s Australian Financial Review article about Jack Allocca speaking to mastermind groups.

Jack Allocca on Instagram including a poignant post he made post-Vipassana retreat.

Untold: The Retreat podcast.

Vipassana subreddit.

Further reading #1: Homo Deus by Yuval Noah Harari. #2 Life 3.0 by Max Tegmark. #3: A romantic rebellion against the tech era (The Guardian).




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