Awakening from the Meaning Crisis || John Vaervaeke

The Psychology Podcast

Today we welcome John Vervaeke. John is an award-winning professor at the University of Toronto in Psychology, Cognitive Science and Buddhist Psychology. His academic interests include wisdom, mindfulness, meditation, relevance realization, general intelligence, and rationality. He is the author of Awakening from the Meaning Crisis Youtube series and co-author of Zombies in Western Culture: A 21st Century Crisis.

In this episode I talk to John Vaervaeke about the meaning crisis. There is a growing number of people who are struggling to find purpose in life. Society seems to be losing touch of its humanity. John argues that we can address the meaning crisis by appreciating and grounding ourselves in reality. We can find relevance by deepening our relationship with the world and the people around us. In turn, this reverence affords us peace of mind, while recognizing the interconnection of all things. We also touch on the topics of transcendence, mattering, narcissism, spirituality and artificial intelligence.

Website: patreon.com/johnvervaeke

Twitter: @vervaeke_john

Topics

03:30 Meaning and mattering

07:25 Relevance realization

13:33 Grounding and peace of mind

17:30 Horizontal and vertical transcendence

25:45 Wisdom is overcoming dichotomy

29:42 Measuring rationality

34:17 Zen Neoplatonism and Daoism

41:16 Spirituality is what remains

45:43 Care is essential to being human

49:20 The next Buddha is the Sangha

51:33 Reverence realization

58:45 The meaning crisis