[Buddha-l] neuroscience: neural plasticity

[jkirk]

 Joy: "...Emotions are meant to motivate one, to push one to act in
situations that require action...."

That's a rather primitive view of the emotions, methinks. 

Emotions also occur when someone is simply ideating about something with no
intent of acting in any way (sort of like not walking the walk? :) Emotions
are reactive as well as motivating. Emotions often simply plague people--who
seem unable to stop them and achieve peace of mind. Dukkha aplenty even if
not motivating. 
If the arousing of compassion during meeditation produces feelings of joy,
that result could be construed as a motivator in itself to take some kind of
action beneficial to fellow humans. With skillful means in mind, a monk
would not be wasting his meditation time thinking of Darfur as an object for
the simple reason that he or she is not in a position to do anything about
it, in action terms. There is a practice of "extending" metta to the whole
world. Some do it. 
It might be more skillful for the monk you hypothesised to meditate on
compassion for his fellow monks, or for other objects within his area of
legitimate action.
Joanna

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