Amr's Case Study Thread

On this thread, Amr and Kenneth continue their dialogue. This is a private thread, meaning only Amr's and Kenneth's responses will be posted here, but we are making it public in the hope the others can benefit from reading it.

Members, please don't hesitate to post a new thread in the discussion area to discuss anything you read here.

-Kenneth

Hi Kenneth

I'm still not sure how to report in a non experiential terms, I'm still used to vipassana. But here it goes...

I sometimes start my session with the surrender meditation. But I find that when I start with the witness meditation it leads naturally after a while to the surrender one.

I have this nagging thought that what I'm identifying with is not really the witness. As I mentioned in earlier reports, I identify "I AM" sometimes with a sensation deep in the chest and sometimes the lower part of the front of the neck. But recently I found that identify myself more with the head. What bothers me is that has happened after I read Anadi's article in which he said the "I' is identified with the head space. I keep questioning myself if I am truly observing what is or just having expectations.

When I stay more with the "I", sometimes I find that I identify with my whole body. And sometimes I just become the "I" and my meditation turns to the surrender meditation. I'm not sure if this is OK. Should I try to solidify the "I" as an object of concentration?

I can surrender to a certain extent. But then I find myself straining to surrender. Recently, I decided to let go of my attempt to surrender and I surrendered better It gets convoluted in that sense. But I think if I give it more time my sense of surrender will sink gradually.

I don't know if the energy (vibration) is a factor in this kind of meditation. I just find that when I'm surrendering that I'm pushing the energy to the outer parts of my body. May be this is manifestation of the straining I mentioned earlier.

I'm going for a vacation next week. I'll do my best to keep posting daily. In the mean time let me know if this is the kind of report you expect. If not, please help me with questions.

Thanks,

Amr

Hi Amr,

Do you get the feeling that we're moving away from vipassana/samatha too soon? We want to have a bridge from each practice to the next, so that the transition feels natural instead of forced. Let's keep doing some kind of concentration/insight practice. It will be easier for you to report in the way you've become accustomed to doing, and you can build up a head of steam again before we throw you to the wolves with practices you aren't sure about.

I think we're introducing too many new things at once; you are trying to figure out the Witness practice while also surrendering and having to deal with the new public reporting. It's too much. My fault, not yours. But let's slow down.

In your next sitting, do vipassana/samatha using the breath as object. Let me know what happens and we'll adjust from there. The important thing now is to regain some momentum of concentration.

Kenneth

I'm afraid I'm having too much fun here for me to do some serious concentrate meditation.

We're 4 families with 13 kids.

I managed to sneak to my room for 40 minutes. The first 10 minutes were going well. I felt how unintentionally I try to sync my breathing with contraction and expansion of the energy. But before I got any deeper I heard people asking where I were and it was down hill from there.

I don't have a problem with the witness or the surrender meditation, unless you saw something in my reporting. It's only the reporting part that I'm still not sure about yet.

I'll do my best to keep posting daily.

Hi Kenneth,

OK, I'm back. Sorry for not reporting during my vacation. It was hard to find a quiet time or place for concentration meditation. On the upside, it was one of the best vacations I ever enjoyed.

I had a 40 minutes session today:

The way I do it now is to observe my breath counting till 10 then I stop counting and just observe until I get lost in my thoughts and I restart counting and so on.

I found that I can easily drop my thoughts and focus on my breath but it's not easy to sustain that for more than 15-20 breaths and it took me 15-20 minutes to get to that number. When I get close to the sensation of the breath and absorbed in it I found that there is energy flow in the head area.

One thing I'm experimenting with now is to relax the tension whenever I find it, especially in the head area. Usually I just observe the tension trying not to interfere. But I find that relaxing the tension eases the discomfort and facilitates the concentration. I hope this is OK.

I also noticed a certain pattern: at the end of each exhale there is a final push to empty my lungs. This push is driven by the energy sensation in the abdomen.

Over all the meditation was enjoyable especially toward the end, I felt I was going in and out of a trance state.

Status of the day:

Peaceful and calm. I can easily drop my thoughts and be present with my sensations.

Amr

Welcome back, Amr. I'm glad you had such an excellent vacation!

"The way I do it now is to observe my breath counting till 10 then I stop counting and just observe until I get lost in my thoughts and I restart counting and so on."-Amr

Good.

"I found that I can easily drop my thoughts and focus on my breath but it's not easy to sustain that for more than 15-20 breaths and it took me 15-20 minutes to get to that number. When I get close to the sensation of the breath and absorbed in it I found that there is energy flow in the head area."-Amr

Good.

"One thing I'm experimenting with now is to relax the tension whenever I find it, especially in the head area. Usually I just observe the tension trying not to interfere. But I find that relaxing the tension eases the discomfort and facilitates the concentration. I hope this is OK."-Amr

Yes, good idea to relax when you notice excess tension.

"I also noticed a certain pattern: at the end of each exhale there is a final push to empty my lungs. This push is driven by the energy sensation in the abdomen."-Amr

If this happens spontaneously, OK, but never try to control or change the breath.

"Over all the meditation was enjoyable especially toward the end, I felt I was going in and out of a trance state."-Amr

Good. You may be moving toward greater stability in equanimity. Let's see how it shapes up over the next few days now that you are back from vacation.

"Status of the day: Peaceful and calm. I can easily drop my thoughts and be present with my sensations."-Amr

Three possibilities: could get better, could get worse, could stay the same. Steady as she goes. Notice whatever arises and don't expect anything.

Kenneth

I had about 50 minutes session tonight:

My concentration was not that great today. I manged to stay with my breath for 20 cycles or more few times. But I had this urge to stop meditation that I haven't noticed as pronounced as today. I had to switch to vipassana investigation few times.

I found that the energy is swirling in my body. I could feel the channel in the middle of my head and forhead pushing outward like a line. There was tension in the back of the head and neck. I could feel the energy all over the body especially my thighs. It was mainly expanding.

This intensified whenever I tried to focus on my breath.

I decided to stay longer with the meditation hoping that I'll ride the wave to the end. But the urge to stop didn't go away until I stopped.

Generally speaking my concentration wasn't deep in this session.

Status of the day: Dark Night.

This is good, Amr. Vipassana is a very dynamic practice. It's a dance. You are constantly shifting and adjusting, according to what arises in your experience.

Predictable that you would have a bit of a rough spot after returning from vacation. Three possibilities: could get better, could get worse, could stay the same.

Stay loose.

Kenneth

Hi Kenneth,

Yesterday was another Dark Night of the "Desire for Deliverance" flavor. It didn't stop until I stopped trying to stop it. I think I'll never learn that lesson.

Today, I'm in contemplative mood. But my concentration is terrible. I don't think I even was able to focus up to 10 breaths. However I didn't get lost in my thoughts for long, I was able to come back relatively quickly to my breath. There is lots of pressure especially in the back, back of the neck, forhead and nose areas. It intensified once I started meditation.

I wasn't even close to getting absorbed in my breath today.

This is good practice, Amr. As long as you are sitting each day and paying attention, you are doing it right. Some days will be pleasant, some days not so pleasant.

"The good sitting is the one you did." (I think Shinzen Young said that.)

Beginning tomorrow, I'll be on retreat and away from email until the 1st of September. If you don't mind, just keep posting your daily reports here so we'll have a record of your progress and I'll have lots of good information to comment on when I get back next month.

All the best,

Kenneth

I hadn't have the chance to do formal meditation in the weekend.

Yesterday's meditation was again marked by a weak focus. I don't think I was able to maintain focus on my breath for more than 10 breaths then I found myself drifting with my thoughts. The sensations where not as distracting as I last reported.

I'm starting to relax and let the breath sensation come to me instead of me making the effort (straining) to sense it.

Today's session was better. It was more vipassana than concentration though. I allowed myself to stay with thoughts, images, sounds until they vanished. But rarely I got lost in my thoughts. I think I went through certain stages of sleep without actually sleeping. I sensed the slightly burning sensation behind the eyes and inside the head and went along with it. Then I watched incoherent images flooding in and how they trigger incoherent thoughts. By the end of the sessions it was as if I was trying to awake from sleep.

Status of the day: Yesterday was more on the dull side. Today is OK so far.

In addition to the lack of concentration, today's sitting was marked by a lot of sensations in the head area that I couldn't continue focusing and switched to vipassana.

The distracting sensations where in the head area. First there was expansion in the forehead and nose area. When I started paying attention there was vibration in both of my eye balls. I stayed with that vibration until it subsidized then I noticed that the expansion in the forehead and nose area is replaced by contraction. The contraction feels as if the energy (vibration) moving inward toward the center of my head.

I meditated for 40 minutes today.

Status of the day: OK, nothing to complain about.

This is a 3 days report.

Friday Session: I can't recall clearly what happened in that session. But what I remember is that I discovered that it takes an effort to separate my sense of my body from my surrounding. When I relaxed that effort/tension, my sense of self becomes ambiguous and there is some anxiety and thrill. I couldn't focus on the breath more than 10 breaths during that session.

Saturday Session: Couldn't focus more than 10 breaths then I got lost in my thoughts. I had pressure in my head area. I relaxed the tension when I found it and I used a broad focus to observe it. After a while the energy movement stopped and I can only sense the vibration spread uniformly all over my body. The sense of separateness of my body from the surrounding seemed to blur. I felt anxiety and thrill as I felt my sense of self being threatened. This didn't disturb the uniformity of vibration and was maintained till the end. I tried to investigated the slipperiness of my mind and found that there is a light vibrating sensation that spread from the forehead to the eyes and causes something like sleepiness.

Sunday Session: Again, I couldn't focus for more than 10 breaths then my mind start wandering. Initially the vibration was uniform all over my body except the head area which had a light pressure around the forehead. Then there were stinging sensations in my legs. A little bet after that I felt the energy moving gently in my body.

Status: the last 3 days were OK.

Today's (Monday) Session:

I started with, the now usual, slippery mind. Before I could count 10 breaths my mind started to wander. After about 10 minutes I decided to investigate where and how this happened. I found that at the end of exhaling, and sometimes inhaling, a sensation of emptiness settled in the eyes area causing vagueness. As I noted whenever that happened I was able to stay with my breath for a longer time. I think I was able to stay with my breath for 30-40 breaths at times.

There was a lot of tension in the head area. I investigated that as well. I noticed that the discomfort of the contraction and expansion in the head unintentionally limited the range of my breath causing shallow breathing.

Initially I tried to relax the tension directly. But that caused tension elsewhere. I tried to have a broad focus on the discomfort while relaxing. That seemed to work but when I reached a certain point of relaxation I found that I have some anxiety that pushed me back. Then I started to breath through the tension seeing how it contracts and expands with my breath. While doing this I was lost in my thoughts. When I returned I found that the tension was beginning to ease.

Status of the day: OK.

Session: the worst so far in terms of concentration. I don't think I even made it to 5 breaths. My mind wandered most of the session. I was able to observe that vague sensation around the eyes and the forehead. I think that sensation is the early stage of dozing off.

Status: OK.

I didn't have a formal sitting on Wednesday nor Thursday.

Yesterday's sitting:

Again very bad concentration. I just got lost in my thoughts most of the sitting.

Status: OK.

Todays' sitting:

I started with bad concentration. Then I pushed myself hard (the thought of Kenneth coming back from the retreat with a stick in his hand) and I managed to concentrate for about 20-30 breaths in one stretch. After that my concentration improved little bit. I notice that I'm hunched and straightened my back. I noticed that when I pushed myself my focus was narrow. That's something I haven't done for a while. I also noticed that the pressure around the eyes and forehead wasn't bad. This might explain why I was able to have narrow focus without discomfort.

The energy is smooth, moving relatively fast and light in its pressure.

I think I recycled through the dark night during the sitting. I remember at least anger and disgust. My body felt relaxed at the end of the session.

Status of the day: OK till the meditation session. Now I'm sensitive.

Sunday's Session:

I started again with bad concentraion. But towards the end I was able to focus for 20-30 breaths in one stretch. The vibration was evenly distributed with light pressure in the forehead, eyes and nose area. The breath was in sync with the breath sensation in abdomen. I was little more relaxed by the end of the session but sensitive afterwards.

Status: OK, with short episodes of dark night.

This is excellent practice, Amr. You are working your way through the 11th ñana, Knowledge of Equanimity. There is a lot of ground to cover here (one of my teachers remarked that Equanimity is a "long ñana.") Just settle in and enjoy it. As you've seen, "slippery mind" is a big factor. Equanimity is still part of the dissolution phase, so objects run away when you try to single them out. All you can do is keep coming back to a diffuse focus. You will be able to review lower ñanas (as you've also seen) by changing the field of focus. For example, if you bear down and look tightly at an object, you'll go into 1st jhana/1st ñana. You may think that you have made some progress because you'll suddenly be able to see objects clearly again with pinpoint focus. But it won't last and will probably just cause you to revisit the dukkha ñanas on your way back up to equanimity. Better to just stay loose, accept the occasional dullness and sleepiness along with the exasperating "slippery mind" and allow your mind to adapt to this new way of being with objects. When the borders of the body disappear and it feels like a bunch of sensations floating in space, you know you are in 4th jhana/11th ñana. There is nothing further to be done at that point. Let nature take its course and eventually the next phase in the sequence will arise. Any attempt to control the process will just slow you down. You can't outsmart nature.

Keep up the good work!

Kenneth

Welcome back Kenneth!! Your post came in the right time. I do lots of informal meditation but I was losing some steam in the formal sittings. Actually I haven't practiced in a formal session for the last two days.

'accept the occasional dullness and sleepiness along with the exasperating "slippery mind" and allow your mind to adapt to this new way of being with objects.'

Seeing it in this light is encouraging. I'll keep posting.

Amr

Ok, this is a very fresh report. I was able to sit for about 40 minutes here at work.

I started with the usual slipperiness of mind. As I was trying to focus I noticed that I'm squinting in attempt to stop certain expanding sensation in my head. When I allowed that sensation to expand, it seemed impossible to continue focusing on my breath or anything else. I just followed that expanding sensation and noticed it comes and goes in my head in cycles.

In one of those cycles, I decided to do my best to focus in the breath without interfering with the expansion. When I did that I sensed and heard something like a subtle crack inside my head.


Status of the day and previous two days: OK.

Beautiful. Let it be.

Kenneth

Sorry for not reporting the past few days. I've been meditating though.

I saw improvement in concentration in the past few days. But it took some will power to do it. And It usually started narrow then I could relax after I got good focus for a while.

I felt a shift in my awareness few times. At one time I was meditating in bed after I woke up and I got to a stage where I felt the mind is left behind. I felt I'm losing control and mild anxiety struck and I pulled back. Then I took my anxiety is an object for meditation. A lot of energy started to move in my body when that happened and at that moment my wife started to whimper for a minute or so while sleeping until she woke up. It might be a coincident but I felt guilty about it.

Today's session was a reversal back to a very little concentration. Whenever there is pressure in forehead, eyes and nose areas my concentration goes down the drain.

Status of today and past few days: OK.

"Whenever there is pressure in forehead, eyes and nose areas my concentration goes down the drain."-Amr

In any given moment, whether sitting or going about daily life activities, you are either expanding or contracting. It can be especially noticeable during sitting meditation, so I'll talk about it from that point of view.

During expansion, the body feels light and comparatively pleasant. You feel as though you are rising up. Perception is getting more subtle with each passing moment. It feels like inhalation. It's exhilarating. You never want it to stop. But you can't inhale all the time; eventually you have to exhale. Exhalation is analogous to the normal, cyclical contraction of energy experienced during meditation.

These cycles can vary in length, but let's say a typical cycle is from 5 to 15 minutes in length. This would be a complete cycle, including both expansion and contraction. The reason we have trouble meditating is that we are addicted to expansion. We don't like to contract and we resist it. We subconsciously hold onto expansion and try to extend it beyond its natural lifespan. As soon as we start to contract, we think we are doing it wrong and that our concentration has deserted us. If we were doing it right, we reason, with proper concentration, it would feel good. In fact, it would feel light and expansive. Do you see how that is not possible? Fully half of our lives is spent in contraction. That is the natural rhythm of all things, from the heart pulse, to the breath, to the energetic cycle I'm describing here, to the full arc of a human life, to the expansion and contraction of the universe. In order to live fully, we have to learn to embrace the contraction just as we welcome the expansion.

(cont)

(cont from above)

When you contract during meditation, the body feels heavy, as though it were sinking into the ground. It's uncomfortable. Where previously you felt like toothpaste being mercifully liberated from the confines of its tube, the toothpaste is now being compressed and forced back into the tube. Every passing moment brings a grosser level of perception. Muscles tense up as if in protest. "I've lost it!" you think. "May as well get up and do something else." All of that is based on the misconception that infinite expansion is possible or desirable.

If you can master this one principle of expansion and contraction, a whole new world of meditation will open up to you. When the contraction is allowed to proceed without a fight, it feels just as deliciously right as expansion. And where previously the contraction was impeded and obstructed, it now flows freely. It's a great relief to contract after having expanded. It's natural and right. And as soon as contraction is allowed to complete itself, a new expansion phase begins. It's beautiful.

See if you can get in touch with the moment when expansion changes to contraction, and when contraction changes to expansion. An exercise that can help with this is to say look at your own mind during walking or sitting meditation, and feel whether the energy is going in or out. You can mentally label this as "in" and "out." At first it may seem very subtle, or you may think that you are imagining it. Keep practicing, though, and it will become as obvious as breathing.

(Thanks to Sasaki-roshi and Shinzen Young for the "in"'-"out" technique of monitoring the expansion and contraction of energy.)

I've been watching the expanding and contacting energy for the last two days. I had the impression that the cycles happen in regular intervals like a clock. But the few times (I think) I was able to see the change were not always the same. One time the change from expanding to contracting was like relaxed breathing: expand, slow, stop then contract. The second and third time the change was abrupt and fast like sighing. Also I only notice the change in the head area. I don't feel it over my whole body.

Still, in today's session I had that pressure and I switched to vipassana, observing the pressure. First I noticed that the pressure intensifies when I exhaled. Usually when I exhale I feel that I'm pushing the energy outward and when I inhale I feel I'm contracting the energy. When I exhaled more gently the intensity of the pressure was less bothering.

I noticed also that there is a general tension in my body. I couldn't locate the exact part but it was there. I focused on that tension and thoughts started streaming and the body reacting. The more I observed the three characteristics the more tense the sensations initially became then the faster they were released. I think it was a good exercise in equanimity.

Status of the day: OK.

Kenneth, I'm going for 2 weeks vacation overseas starting this Saturday. I think I'll have amble time for meditation the first week but not sure about the second. I think I'll have access the internet and I'll try to keep posting from there.