i need help

i love this site, and all of the people dedicated to help others.

i have been meditating for years but unable to pass A&P.

the usual scenerio is as follows: wake up and sit at 430 am for 75 minutes. Mind settles into decent breath watching after 10 minutes. Relatively settled state for 5 min then my left leg states spasming the right leg spasms at about 5Hz. then all the toes may drum in order (like you would drum your fingers on a table) over and over again for about 20 min. I just observe...impermanent, unsatisfactory and absolutely not self. If i leave my meditation, of course it stops. This bilateral lower extremity spasms lasts about 20 min. i continue noting. occasionally hop into the 3rd jhana for a few minutes. then the bilateral lower extremity fasciculations may reoccur but last shorter. then i continue sitting for another 15 min or so, then have to get ready to go to work.

these kundilini like lower extremity spasms really seem to prevent me from going deeper into the nanas/jhanas i think. i don't know what to do.

please help

Hi,
I cannot help you much with your practice, but welcome to the site!

In what manner do you think the kundilini like spasms are preventing nana/jhanas? As a general rule that may assist Gozen has commented the energy follows attention.
Anyway I mainly wanted to welcome you.

Gary

Hey there brother!

Have you tried meditating lying down? Just an experiment to see if it has any effect. Make sure you set an alarm for the end of the session in case you fall asleep - wouldn't want to miss work.

Perhaps consider using a different object of meditation. Instead of the breath consider the mind itself; or the nimitas. This takes the focus off the body, and one can naturally go deeper into absorption and have awareness open up into the nature of mind. Just be 'undistracted' in your gentle focus on the object and thus, ignore the leg kriyas.

These are merely ideas for your experimentation. Kenneth and others will have more, but it is up to you to apply and get results. You can. So just do. Be self-empowered to know your own nature!!

In kind regards,

Adam.

Hi HDLA,

Interesting challenge. Let's take a systematic approach to this. You say that you can attain third jhana, so your concentration must be quite good. Let's try something radical: instead of sitting meditation in the morning, I'd like you to try walking. The objective will be to try to attain 3rd jhana while walking. You don't need a lot of room. Even ten feet of clear space would be enough. Just walk back and forth while counting your exhalations 1-10. When you get to 10, start again at 1. If you lose count, just start again at 1. Simple. You don't have to do anything else for now.

Report back to us in this thread. Don't be discouraged if you don't get to third jhana the first few times. Just be patient and do the technique.

Kenneth

Hello and welcome!
I read your post earlier today, but couldn't reply at that moment... My thoughts and suggestions would have been similar to what Adam suggested. In addition to modifying posture (sitting diff way or laying down), and redirecting focus... perhaps trying a few warm up exercises, stretches, or even a few yoga asanas, qigong, etc. to aid in smoothing and circulating energy.

Are you prone to such spasms at other times, particularly when you're really relaxed?

At the risk of sounding redundant to what I've said elsewhere on this site, perhaps just allowing yourself to "let go" and open to effortlessness. Sometimes, desiring progress can create tension and blocks in energy.

Caring thoughts to you,
- Tina

Just out of curiosity, do you go on retreats?
It seems like that would be a good thing to do if you're stuck. Personally, I'd like to see what would happen if you had more than 75 minutes and were able to stay with the sensations, for say, 4-5 hours. That would give you more time in 3rd jhana for sure.
The other option might be to do an "at home retreat." Take a long weekend, and meditate your ass off. Gurdjieff's idea of providing a "shock" to the system is sound, and if you've been meditating for 10 years for exactly 75 minutes with no progress, then you need to disrupt your routine.

Certainly do what Kenneth suggests, though if you encounter serious difficulties, then you should slow it down considerably progressing from doing that with eyes half open to standing to walking. When I read your description of what you're doing though, you don't mention 1st or 2nd jhana - so that makes me think that you have identified 3rd jhana, but don't have a method for getting there - you arrive there after you've spend enough time noting. You need to be able to go there directly, particularly if you're going to try do it walking. Try this: Screw noting. You've noted the hell out of this territory. Get to third jhana ASAP when you start meditation. Concentrate on getting deeply absorbed in your breath until you recognize that you are in third jhana, When you are comfortable in this state, then start noting.

"If you've been meditating for 10 years for exactly 75 minutes with no progress, then you need to disrupt your routine."-Haquan

Yes, I think this is a key point. Vipassana/samatha is a results-oriented practice, so when results don't come quickly it's a good idea to try something completely different. I like the idea of a "shock" to the system (or at least a good gentle shake).

Kenneth

Gary, Adam, Kenneth, Tina, Haquan:

First of all, thank you all for your thoughtful responses. Without belaboring the reasons i am so grateful to you, you all provide a much needed service and selfless guidance to people who have poor access to mentors. In my case, i am a physician who sees so much suffering every day, it is hard for me to keep centered and have a renewable source of compassion that every living soul needs and deserves day after day. My 75 min every AM is/was my time for me to reenergize and center. But in the last 4 months these kriya/kundilini episodes have kept me from reenergization.

i followed all of your kind recommendations this weekend.

It appears that when lyng/walking i dont have these leg spasms, only sitting. i have always sat in full lotus (most confortable and stable for me) but any sitting (although i did not try a chair) results in these "drum spasms". The spasms are really not all that uncomfortable, and can easily live with them until they decide to spontaneously subside, but alter my ability to progress up and down the jhanas.

This weekend as per all of your wonderful suggestions, i tried lying down for 3 hours, ran up and down 4 jhanas roughly 5 cycles per hour, sometimes skipping over jhana 1 or 2. i tried walking, and have not perfected that, could get to jhana 2 only...but i will continue trying over time.

bless you all.

tim

Wonderful! It sounds like the info we all offered was helpful for your practice. I'm so happy to hear that you were able to smoothly move through the 4 jhanas and cycle up and down with seemingly ease. I hope you're now experiencing that reenergization and centering that you find so beneficial in your life... as well as renewing your ability to be compassionate and of benefit to others. I have great appreciation for the work you do as a compassionate physician.

As an aside and a bit off topic here: Being of benefit to others and having a heart/mind of unconditional compassion (conventional/relative) united with Wisdom/emptiness (ultimate) are essential on the path of bodhichitta. It sounds like you are bringing these key ingredients together beautifully.
Metta, Karuna, Mudita,
& Upekka,
- Tina

Hi friends.

Do any of you get overwhelmed with all of the suffering in the world?

An example: a patient is diagnosed with multiple myeloma or lymphoma. The diagnosis is devastating to his/her family. He is young, tries hard his whole life to feed his wife and kids. Is contributing to society. He elects to undergo chemo. Suffers through all of the adverse events associated ith it. Lymphoma reoccurs. Gets another round of chemo. Reoccurs again. Gets higher dosing. Suffering. Dispair. At the worst possible time, is told alternatives are death vs stem cell transplant. Elects stem cell transplant. Recieves total body irradiation, high dose chemo, is in the ICU for 8 weeks on a vent. Develops graft vs host disease and starts rejecting his skin, lungs and GI tract. More suffering of himself and for his family.

As an enlightened group how do you visualize all of this suffering for sentient beings?

tim

"

Do any of you get overwhelmed with all of the suffering in the world?


As an enlightened group how do you visualize all of this suffering for sentient beings?"

Hi Tim,

You're an oncologist? Tough job. I'm a psychiatrist - also a tough job sometimes, but my patients don't die as much. That's kind of why I went into the field. I don't like it when they die. When I rotated through pediatric oncology as a student, I cried every day, literally. So far, I've only had two die. It's a very small consolation to know that it was not due to error on my part. I'm sorry to hear about your patient, I'm sure you have many like that.

One thing that helps me is to know that you are really needed to do this kind of work, whether the individual patient dies or not. That patient really needs you - and he needs your compassion, needs to know that you care that this is happening to him and to his family. That's part of your job. Someone has to do the work you do, and it is a noble calling.

When you see a patient like this, and you truly have compassion for them, you feel their pain - at least temporarily.

As doctors we are taught to dissociate from their pain. Sometimes you have to do that to be effective. You don't want your surgeon to be so compassionate that he pukes during the procedure - or at least I don't. In my first two years at school, they projected thousands and thousands of the gnarliest photographs of human pathology and trauma. After a while you get desensitized. They also don't want you to break down. They want you to function like a well oiled machine. Because so many people need you...

But during the time you are with them, talking to them or their family, if you feel their pain, it's much more gratifying. Sometimes it helps to tell them how you feel about the information. Continued

"

Do any of you get overwhelmed with all of the suffering in the world?


As an enlightened group how do you visualize all of this suffering for sentient beings?
"

Having the perspective of being enlightened can be very helpful in knowing how to provide the things these people need, and to ease their suffering. At the very least, it's good to have made friends with your own mortality.

No, I don't become overwhelmed in the way you mean it - though it is overpowering. I feel all the suffering, but I do not suffer because of it. I accept it.

To understand this, it may be helpful to understand the nature of suffering and it's relationship to pain, emotional or otherwise. They are not equivalent. The second Noble Truth talks about the root of suffering being craving - but what is relevant here is a special kind of craving - aversion. Shinzen Young talks about suffering being caused by people resisting their pain, rather than from the pain itself. I'm going to provide some links, because it may be helpful to some of your patients: www.shinzen.org/shinsub3/artPain.pdf and also www.shinzen.org/shinsub3/artPain.pdf (three such videos in a series).

Shinzen suggests that you open yourself to pain, and that when you truly do, you can begin after a while to get what he calls "a taste of purification." Pain at times, can even become ecstasy - these are the times that you are truly overwhelmed or overpowered by it.

So more accurately I feel the pain of the world - but I cannot suffer from it, as the suffering part of it is really a function of the ego identification of the beings involved, which I've transcended - otherwise I couldn't really be experiencing their pain deeply.

When you think of all the "suffering of sentient beings" - how could it be different? It's a function of impermanence, and it's tragically beautiful.

"
When you think of all the "suffering of sentient beings" - how could it be different? It's a function of impermanence, and it's tragically beautiful. "

What if things *were* different? What if there was no possibility of death or injury for human life?

Aside from being out of a job, wouldn't that devalue human life?

Personally, I think it would get boring.

With kind regards,
David

"

Do any of you get overwhelmed with all of the suffering in the world?
As an enlightened group how do you visualize all of this suffering for sentient beings?

"


P.S. - So in summary, you deal with the experience of being overwhelmed with all the suffering in the world, or the suffering of each particular and all sentient beings, with mindfulness and equanimity, just as you would any experience.

"Do any of you get overwhelmed with all of the suffering in the world?

...how do you visualize all of this suffering for sentient beings? - tim"

I embrace those times when others suffering has an effect on me... we are indeed all interconnected, and I am glad that I'm not desensitized to others pain. Compassion (not pity) is essential. However, it is also important to be able to "let it go," and not make it another story for the ego to cling to. Optimally, Compassion and Wisdom (emptiness) need to be balanced. - This takes practice. This is something I'm personally working on... uniting compassion with emptiness.

Tibetan tonglen practice is beneficial for you and those suffering. It's the practice of sending & taking (contemplative intention): breathing in (taking) their pain, sadness, anger, etc., then breathing out (sending) comfort, happiness, love, etc. It can be done for one or many people or populations.

Stephen Levine has worked in hospice settings and has written numerous books relevant to terminally ill, spirituality, and living. Here's a transcript of an interview where Levine gives some good info. www.thinking-allowed.com/levine.html

- Tina

"
Tibetan tonglen practice is beneficial for you and those suffering. It's the practice of sending & taking (contemplative intention): breathing in (taking) their pain, sadness, anger, etc., then breathing out (sending) comfort, happiness, love, etc. It can be done for one or many people or populations.
"

While I don't want to shoot down Tina's suggestion, from the purely technical point of view of manifesting intent, I have to say that I have serious reservations about tonglen practice. This practice has all the ingredients of practical magick and the implied intent is to literally take on the suffering of others. Significantly, the Tibetan master who introduced this practice to the West was asked the question "What if you get sick?" His reply was, "That means it's working." Equally significantly, this same master contracted and died of cancer.

Now this is fine if you are an enlightened master who truly wishes to sacrifice himself for the sake of the world, but from a purely utilitarian point of view, Tim could do more good if he was healthy and able to work.

Now even if you don't believe our mind can directly impact reality, you have to concede that there is a real mind-body connection and that a practice that involves meditation may have the effect of programming the unconscious - which tends to take things literally.

Personally, I would employ serious prophylactic measures before undertaking such a practice. At the very least, I would make a verbal affirmation before and after each session to the effect of "It is my will to take on the suffering of others in order to transform it and redeem this suffering. It is my will to remain healthy both physically and psychologically, and that my family and those close to me will remain healthy and happy as well."

Just my 2 cents, from someone who has a lot of experience manifesting intent.

"...from the purely technical point of view of manifesting intent, I have to say that I have serious reservations about tonglen practice. This practice has all the ingredients of practical magick and the implied intent is to literally take on the suffering of others. Significantly, the Tibetan master who introduced this practice to the West was asked the question "What if you get sick?" His reply was, "That means it's working." Equally significantly, this same master contracted and died of cancer. "

Hi David,
You made some interesting points, albeit from a stringent stance.
I suppose if one were to practice tonglen with a purely empathetic focus, or to practice with such a high egotistical intent of thinking that they are the sacrificial lamb, then tonglen may indeed be problematic. However, to truly be practicing tonglen, one practices with the intent of compassion for self and others. Compassion is not the same as empathy or pity. Tonglen is a nondual practice, breaking down the ego view of "separateness." The intention is for all sentient beings to be happy and free of suffering and the causes of suffering. Tonglen is essentially an action relating to the Four Immeasurables (Brahma-viharas).
The practice of tonglen is similar to Christian prayer.

I think it's unusual that a Tibetan "master"(lama?) would suggest that getting sick implies that the tonglen practice is working. That reminds me of the wounded healer (shaman) syndrome. Btw, many shamans do act with the intention of absorbing the ills of the recipient. Tonglen is not a shaman practice.
Many people who practice tonglen report feeling more energized, as well as a letting go of their own psychological baggage.
What I do when ending a tonglen session, (the last breath) I breathe out whatever I may have unintentionally internalized... this I breathe out into the universe... let it go.

[edited a word]

"Hi David,
You made some interesting points, albeit from a stringent stance. "

Hi Tina,

Having been a semi-pro spiritual materialist for many years, I've suffered more unintentional consequences than I can count from my efforts. So with any practice, I find myself analyzing the intent, implicit and otherwise, and what might go wrong, among a number of other things. It's just ingrained in me.

So when I first read about tonglen, I though "Uh -oh... there could be a problem with that..." And then I read the story, and thought "Yep." I actually think I read that the master also commented that the practice had worked when he learned he had contracted cancer. I'm going to look for that story - thought it was in "A Path with a Heart."

In a certain way, by suggesting this, I've made it more dangerous for people - but if you are completely comfortable and feel completely safe on an intuitive level, I'm sure it's OK. That last breath out functions like a banishing.
D

Hi David and Tina:

i so appreciate your responses both on this thread and all of your other responses on other threads. i struggle with this issue on many levels.

David: can you expound on this: "So more accurately I feel the pain of the world - but I cannot suffer from it, as the suffering part of it is really a function of the ego identification of the beings involved, which I've transcended - otherwise I couldn't really be experiencing their pain deeply."

Tina: could you expound on "uniting compassion with emptiness":

Although i have been doing this no for 20 years, you would have thought that i ould have learned to deal with the constant suffering each patient endures...but i haven't. i am exhausted by the end of the day. There is something that you to know, and Mother Teresa knows, that i need to embrace. Just as that step between the 4th and 5th Jhana and the infamous A&P event that i need to discover.

i appreciate you both

tim

"
David: can you expound on this: "So more accurately I feel the pain of the world - but I cannot suffer from it, as the suffering part of it is really a function of the ego identification of the beings involved, which I've transcended - otherwise I couldn't really be experiencing their pain deeply."

"

Hi Tim,

I guess I don't want to overstate that case - I don't think it's any less sad for me when I hear about a difficult case, especially when children are involved. What I mean is that I don't suffer in the sense that I open myself to the emotional pain, accept it, and don't fight it. That doesn't make it any less painful though - it just means I don't "suffer" along with the pain - I'm not miserable even though I may feel deeply wounded.

That doesn't mean that I don't feel exhausted or emotionally drained sometimes when I get home at the end of the day. But I can say that I don't get depressed or really hung up on the individual cases. I can sleep at night.

I really do think this is a lot like physical pain. Now in the same way, I really don't suffer from physical pain, generally speaking. I mentioned in another thread that I sustained second degree burns to my face earlier this year, and had to have the wounds debrided without anaesthetic. Very intense sensation, but I really did do fine with it. I mean, if given the choice, I'd definitely do without pain, but as long as that's all I have to focus on, then I'm Ok. Where I will suffer is if I want to do something else other than focus on the physical pain - like have a conversation or watch a movie. Then I'll fight the pain, which never works, and I'll get all pissed off that I'm in pain and I can't do anything but be in pain, etc. (That's the worst part about physical pain from my point of view - it's just all absorbing) cont.

So this fighting the pain - that's suffering.

Now it should be noted that if you are in physical pain all day, by the end of the day, you're tired. It's exhausting whether you suffer or not.

Likewise, just doing the job you have would be emotionally exhausting, whether or not you suffer from it. Period. So know that that is normal.

As doctors, we are committed to trying to save every life possible, and to pretty much go to the mat on every case. The unpleasant fact of the matter is that you win some, and you lose some - and in some scenarios, you lose more than you win - I'm thinking yours is just such a scenario. What you have to remember is that on an ultimate level, this isn't a fight we can win. Everyone will eventually succumb to death, disease, or injury - it's just a matter of when. Any remission is a great triumph - but ultimately even the cures are temporary, and even if you cured the patient in your example he could walk out of your office with the news and be hit by a bus.

That's life, and that's impermanence. It's just the way it is - and when you can truly accept that in your bones, there's something beautiful about it. Because what little life we have is so delicate and frail - every moment we have is precious.

Fight hard for your patients! But do so as the samaurai fenced - already accepting their eventual mortality - focused on the process rather than the outcome. Be the best doctor you can be - but don't let individual outcomes suggest either personal failure or success - you should deal with either situation with equanamity. Provide the best treatment and advice that you can, and don't be attached to outcomes. When you've done everything you can for a patient, and they fail to respond to treatment - it is ok to feel disappointed - but you should open yourself up to that too. Then you simply have to let it go...

I think the hardest part for me with patients I knew were going to die (soon), was that I'd get attached to them. I almost universally like my patients (even when they are unsavory) - and with children I'd grieve not only the loss of a beautiful child (I don't know why all the really *really* cute ones seem to have a higher mortality rate) - but also all of the possibilities that that person could have had, and the possibilities for the parents (having grandchildren, etc.) You never really know if it would have worked out the way we fantasize though...

And in terms of simply liking (being attached in a non-Buddhist sense) to a patient, you have to think - if they were cured, then presumably we wouldn't see much of them in the future either.

The grace with which we handle a patient's mortality is a measure of the grace with which we handle ours...

You *have* read Elizabeth Kubler Ross, M.D.'s "On Death and Dying," haven't you? If not, I recommend reading it immediately. Consider that you go through the same grieving process described in the book for every patient - and that the stages are not linear, come in waves, you can go back and forth between stages, etc. Identifying the stage you are in is helpful for a difficult case.

With regards,
David

As i read note your quote "That's the worst part about physical pain from my point of view - it's just all absorbing" is poignant on so many levels. On a societal level, maybe all the patients wants is, not prolongation of life to do thier activities of daily living, but a time to put thier affairs in order to decrease the misery of thier family, but they can't partition out the mental and physical pain to allow them to do that. On a personal level they can't make peace with thier "self" because of this distraction. It seemed to me (granted i am the least skilled of all the participants in KFD and DhU) when reading the Tibeten Book of Living and Dying, that the Tibeten Bardos and the hindrances to the path are so confusing that the trying to navigate the thought processes during pain would be extraordinary difficult. What do you think? One of the many things i so admire about you all, is this uncanny ability to talk about, then deconstruct the objective sensations, catagorize/map them, form a plan to accomplish the end goal in a rational approach. i think this is missing in medicine dealing with any disease process. i lack the insight but driven by the compasssion to learn this.

tim

Very nice discussion, IMHO. Thanks,

Neither of you need to answer my question. It's rhetorical and way, way off topic but.... why do people who seem to have so little compassion or empathy go to medical school and become MDs? This is an issue for me right now as I struggle through the recent diagnosis and (attempted) treatment of my mother's Alzheimers, the resulting visits to numerous doctors of various kinds and the amazing variation I've encountered in what's often called "Bedside Manner." My parents are way into their 80s and I go to almost all their appointments. Buddhist practice comes in very handy when you're dealing with this stuff. Very handy.

Just sayin'