What happens when an ancient discipline built to remake the self in the context of a way of life and normative map gets sold back to us as lifehacking for stress relief and optimization? Experimental psychologist Miguel Farias, co-author of *The Buddha Pill* and founding director of the Brain, Belief, and Behaviour Lab at Coventry University, has spent two decades studying what meditation actually does to people, and what modern appropriation has forgotten about ancient tradition. “The possibilities of self-deception are endless. … The mind is clever, so you have to move beyond that level of cleverness.” In this episode with Evan Rosa, Farias returns to the oldest question in the contemplative traditions: What is this self, and how might it change? He moves from the Delphic command to “know thyself,” through the charioteer of Plato and the Katha Upanishad, to Teresa of Ávila’s interior castle and the delights of prayer that arrive as gift rather than achievement. Along the way he argues that modern meditation, including much Western Buddhist practice, rests on a naive confidence that we can do this alone, when nearly every tradition insists on the opposite: you need guides, community, and a map, because our capacity to fool ourselves runs deep. Together they discuss why insight alone rarely changes anyone, the difference between change and transformation, how cognitive psychology misread Pascal’s reasons of the heart, and the paradox of rigorous self-mastery practiced in order to let go. They also take up the question of Freud’s lasting relevance, mindfulness as a placating opiate rather than a rupture of conformity, why hours of daily meditation can coexist with selfishness, suffering as fuel for transformation rather than something merely to soothe, Francis of Assisi’s gratitude for Sister Death, and what a seeker without a tradition’s map can do when meditation stirs up more than expected. The conversation closes on Ezekiel’s promise of a heart of flesh in place of a heart of stone, a week spent caring for the sick at Lourdes, and the claim that sudden awakenings come more often from encounters with other people than from sitting alone. Episode Highlights - ”Here you do indeed have a major difference between all these spiritual traditions and modern meditation, including Western Buddhist meditation, which is very new in the sense that it has this exceedingly naive idea that you can do this by yourself.” - ”No, no, no, no, do not trust yourself. That’s actually a major thing. You need other people… the possibilities of self-deception are endless.” - ”You can meditate for 23 hours a day and have all these wonderful, blissful experiences. And then for the one hour that you’re not meditating, you can be the most selfish bastard on earth.” - ”The mind is clever, so you have to move beyond that level of cleverness. And in many, many ways, what’s the best thing that meditation is doing for many people today is to help them learn how to unlearn many of the stupid things we have learned.” - ”You exert this astonishing level of control so that you can entirely let go of it.” - ”Now I tell my colleagues who do mindfulness, the way to hell is paved with good intentions. There’s a deep wisdom in this.” - ”What these traditions… are talking about is really the transformational possibility of suffering. How suffering can be a tool, can be an energy, can be an oil, fuel for something deep.” - ”If you start moving across too many wells, because you’re thirsty and you’re looking for water, if you move from well to well… and as you just sip from it, you may end up dying of thirst.” - ”Most tales we have of sudden enlightenment are not the outcome of meditation, they’re the outcome of encounters with others.” - ”What matters is that your heart is pure. It is a heart of flesh. It is a heart that allows light in. It is not a heart of stone.” About Miguel Farias Miguel Farias is an experimental psychologist, associate professor, and founding director of the Brain, Belief, and Behaviour Lab at Coventry University. He studied psychology and psychotherapy at the University of Lisbon before earning his doctorate in experimental psychology at Oxford, where he lectured. He co-wrote, with Catherine Wikholm, ”The Buddha Pill: Can Meditation Change You?” and is lead editor of ”The Oxford Handbook of Meditation.” His research spans belief, ritual, pilgrimage, and meditation, including the first randomized controlled trial of yoga and meditation in prisons. In 2026 he launched ”The Buddha Pill Podcast,” a documentary series on meditation. Special thanks to Steve Porter and the Martin Institute for Christianity & Culture at Westmont College. For more information visit https://www.westmont.edu/about/institutes-and-centers/martin-institute. Made possible in part by the Templeton World Charities Foundation Helpful Links and Resources - Miguel Farias website: https://miguelfarias.co.uk/ - Miguel Farias, Coventry University research profile: https://www.coventry.ac.uk/research/researchers/dr-miguel-farias/ - The Buddha Pill: Can Meditation Change You?, by Miguel Farias and Catherine Wikholm: https://www.amazon.com/Buddha-Pill-Can-Meditation-Change/dp/1786782219 - The Oxford Handbook of Meditation, edited by Miguel Farias, David Brazier, and Mansur Lalljee: https://academic.oup.com/edited-volume/40700 - The Buddha Pill Podcast, Part 1, via Templeton World Charity Foundation: https://www.templetonworldcharity.org/blog/the-buddha-pill-with-miguel-farias-part1-what-is-meditation - The Interior Castle, by Teresa of Ávila (Christian Classics Ethereal Library): https://www.ccel.org/ccel/teresa/castle2.html - Pascal’s Pensées (Project Gutenberg): http://www.gutenberg.org/files/18269/18269-h/18269-h.htm - Canticle of the Creatures, by Francis of Assisi (Franciscan Friars): https://friars.us/article/2025/01/11/franciscans-celebrate-800th-anniversary-of-canticle-of-the-creatures Show Notes - Colossians, Freud, and the old self - Know yourself: the Delphic inscription behind philosophy and religion - Plato and the Katha Upanishad on the charioteer and the horses - Not a perennialist: where the Buddha departed from his Hindu context - Embodied ascetic practices for mastering the passions - Teresa of Ávila’s Interior Castle: https://www.ccel.org/ccel/teresa/castle2.html - Delights of prayer, and what effort achieves versus what arrives as gift - Pascal’s reasons of the heart, misread by cognitive psychology - A Thai temple advertising willpower, with an inner sanctuary for asking grace - Why the traditions distrust solo practice and insist on guides and community - A Hindu priestess on long hours of meditation coexisting with selfishness - Insight versus assimilation - Change versus transformation - Unlearning what a clever, overeducated mind has absorbed - Conformity and obedience in the most individualistic culture - The paradox of rigorous self-control practiced so control can be surrendered, the margin where real creativity and uniqueness begin - Thérèse of Lisieux’s garden of saints against spiritual monoculture - Freud taught in Oxford literature degrees, not psychology - Therapeutic meditation as placebo or opiate rather than a rupture of conformity - Why alleviating suffering and being transformed by it are different goals, with Christianity treating suffering as fuel for drawing closer to God - Francis of Assisi’s Canticle and gratitude for Sister Death: https://friars.us/article/2025/01/11/franciscans-celebrate-800th-anniversary-of-canticle-of-the-creatures - An unsettled atheist after a retreat, and an Iranian exile angry at religion - Moving from well to well without drinking deeply - Enlightenment through encounters with others, not solitary sitting - Ezekiel’s heart of stone and heart of flesh - A first week caring for the sick at Lourdes and a heart slowly exercised into new sensitivity #ForTheLifeOfTheWorld #Meditation #Mindfulness #Contemplation #ChristianSpirituality #PsychologyOfReligion #TeresaOfAvila #SpiritualFormation #Podcast Production Notes - This podcast featured Miguel Farias - Special thanks to Steve Porter and the Martin Institute for Christianity & Culture at Westmont College - Made possible in part by the Templeton World Charities Foundation - Edited and Produced by Evan Rosa - Hosted by Evan Rosa - Production Assistance by Noah Senthil - A Production of the Yale Center for Faith & Culture at Yale Divinity School https://faith.yale.edu/about - Support For the Life of the World podcast by giving to the Yale Center for Faith & Culture: https://faith.yale.edu/give
What happens when an ancient discipline built to remake the self in the context of a way of life and normative map gets sold back to us as lifehacking for stress relief and optimization?
Experimental psychologist Miguel Farias, co-author of The Buddha Pill and founding director of the Brain, Belief, and Behaviour Lab at Coventry University, has spent two decades studying what meditation actually does to people, and what modern appropriation has forgotten about ancient tradition.
“The possibilities of self-deception are endless. … The mind is clever, so you have to move beyond that level of cleverness.”
In this episode with Evan Rosa, Farias returns to the oldest question in the contemplative traditions: What is this self, and how might it change? He moves from the Delphic command to “know thyself,” through the charioteer of Plato and the Katha Upanishad, to Teresa of Ávila’s interior castle and the delights of prayer that arrive as gift rather than achievement. Along the way he argues that modern meditation, including much Western Buddhist practice, rests on a naive confidence that we can do this alone, when nearly every tradition insists on the opposite: you need guides, community, and a map, because our capacity to fool ourselves runs deep.
Together they discuss why insight alone rarely changes anyone, the difference between change and transformation, how cognitive psychology misread Pascal’s reasons of the heart, and the paradox of rigorous self-mastery practiced in order to let go. They also take up the question of Freud’s lasting relevance, mindfulness as a placating opiate rather than a rupture of conformity, why hours of daily meditation can coexist with selfishness, suffering as fuel for transformation rather than something merely to soothe, Francis of Assisi’s gratitude for Sister Death, and what a seeker without a tradition’s map can do when meditation stirs up more than expected. The conversation closes on Ezekiel’s promise of a heart of flesh in place of a heart of stone, a week spent caring for the sick at Lourdes, and the claim that sudden awakenings come more often from encounters with other people than from sitting alone.
Episode Highlights
About Miguel Farias
Miguel Farias is an experimental psychologist, associate professor, and founding director of the Brain, Belief, and Behaviour Lab at Coventry University. He studied psychology and psychotherapy at the University of Lisbon before earning his doctorate in experimental psychology at Oxford, where he lectured. He co-wrote, with Catherine Wikholm, ”The Buddha Pill: Can Meditation Change You?” and is lead editor of ”The Oxford Handbook of Meditation.” His research spans belief, ritual, pilgrimage, and meditation, including the first randomized controlled trial of yoga and meditation in prisons. In 2026 he launched ”The Buddha Pill Podcast,” a documentary series on meditation.
Special thanks to Steve Porter and the Martin Institute for Christianity & Culture at Westmont College. For more information visit https://www.westmont.edu/about/institutes-and-centers/martin-institute.
Made possible in part by the Templeton World Charities Foundation
Helpful Links and Resources
Show Notes
#ForTheLifeOfTheWorld #Meditation #Mindfulness #Contemplation #ChristianSpirituality #PsychologyOfReligion #TeresaOfAvila #SpiritualFormation #Podcast
Production Notes