Anna Lännström

About Anna Lännström

Anna Lännström is professor of philosophy at Stonehill College where she teaches philosophy of religion, Asian philosophies, and ethics, as well as a learning community course which integrates yoga, mindfulness and Indian philosophy. Her writing focuses on mindfulness. Why are we all increasingly stressed, distracted, lonely, and angry? How can techniques like yoga and meditation from the Hindu and Buddhist traditions help us live better lives, and how do we address the ethical challenges involved in borrowing such techniques? She blogs on Medium and Thrive Global.

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  1. The Re-imagining God unit is interesting.

    My sense is that if there is a problem, it might start with the word God. As a noun, the word God implies a ‘thing’, a phenomena separate from other phenomena. And so it is natural for us to wonder, “What are the properties of this ‘thing’ called God? What does it look like?”

    If I remember my Catholic upbringing correctly, I thought it was proposed that God is ever present everywhere in all times and places. If true, then God would be more like space, infusing all things at every scale, while itself being what we typically call nothing, or if you prefer, no-thing, not a thing.

    Space is clearly real, but it has no existence in the sense that it has no weight, mass, shape, form, color, or other properties which we typically use to define existence. Other examples of phenomena which are real but non-existent could be math and the laws of physics.

    A problem with all of the above is that such a theory is quite abstract. And religions are typically designed to serve all human beings, few of whom are philosophers. And so we arrive at nouns and imagery, which may distort the truth somewhat, but have the benefit of being far more accessible to far more people.

    Which reminds me of the wisdom of your article, “Starting Where They Are”.

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