The dialogue between Buddhism and neuroscience shows great promise. Buddhist ideas have the potential to expand our sense of what is possible for human well-being and scientific understanding of the mind. However, the “Buddhism” that Western scientists and authors interact with is subject to secularization, and neuroscientific studies of meditation are often animated by a materialist argument claiming that the mind is dependent upon the brain—a belief that contradicts the views of the Buddhist tradition from which these practices originate. Secularization and the materialist argument are necessary if practices from Buddhism are to become accessible to a scientific, non-Buddhist audience, but does this prevent Buddhism from offering novel ideas that might expand scientific understanding? The principles of skillful means, a Buddhist term describing any method by which sentient beings are helped to suffer less, can be useful here. Through a skillful means perspective, we can accept the secularization and materialist argument under which the scientific enterprise operates while maintaining hope that our understanding will continue to evolve.