Meekan's meek journal

10 min metta, sleepy going
35 mixed noting
Kind of chaos in the beginning, sadness, tension, etc.
A very short period of noticing the neck movrments, then noticeable calm.
Light, calm, some humor, joy.
Then the slow, calm continued, but darkness, loneliness came over me.
(imaging thoughts of walking alone through a dark dead forest, a la horror movie)
Sadness, disappointment, anxiety, but all from a pretty calm standpoint.
Interest when stress, tensions moving, urges to move came by. Fretting about the upcoming work week.
Pain. For a short while a little humour came by.
then basically sadness, impatience, loneliness.

I think you are in the dark night, Meekan, ripening in nanas 6-10. This can be a challenging and difficult time for a yogi, but also unbelievably rich and rewarding. This is where you really start to see not only the suffering inherent in life but also the potential for transformation and for compassion. You learn patience hear because you have no choice; you can't go forward and you can't go back, so you just have to be present in each moment, even when it's unpleasant. Have you read "The Boy Who Found the Great Ocean"? Check out the part where the hero is about to cross the 3rd river. This points to the dukkha nanas or "dark night."

Bon courage, Meekan, you are really in the thick of it now.

Kenneth

See if you can sit longer. 35 minutes may not be enough to get you over the 3rd nana hump in each sitting. You don't want to get into the habit of giving up just before the sun comes out from behind the clouds. Stretch your patience bit by bit. When you are absolutely sure it's time to get up because sitting more would be a waste of time, sit for five minutes longer.

Feel free to hit me up if you want to chat on skype (jaysonbyrne) or anything.

You'll be alright, the ball is rolling down hill now. METTA!

Thanks a lot, kenneth and mu!
I need to ask a followup question though.
Lots of stuff seem to be changing in my sits, but I don't know that the rest of my life has changed that much.
Except for maybe one thing...
I am noting more off the cushion so to speak (between sits that is).
Would this be congruent with this?
(being in the DN and it not affecting my life that is... Maybe YET it hasn't, at least)

Well, it doesn't necessarily have to have a dramatically bad impact on your life. Some of us tend to keep our stuff to ourselves, and hence we can sort of hide our pain from others. I've worked through some really nasty dukkha without any of my coworkers noticing. It has helped a lot to be able to just tell my girlfriend that the reason I'm feeling a bit down today is because of the dukkha nanas.

The main thing you may be noticing is that you feel anxious while going about your day, or perhaps very irritated or miserable.

Noting might help in keeping you from getting imbedded in some of the negativity especially if you are objectifying your thoughts and mindstates.

"I am noting more off the cushion so to speak (between sits that is).
Would this be congruent with this?"

Hi Meekan, I found this to be the case for me as well. To be hanging out in the dukkha nanas on a regular basis must mean that you've built up a good deal of momentum in your practice. I think the fact that you find yourself noting off the cushion is probably also a sign of this. I tend to think of it as a part of you that "knows" your only way out now is to let that momentum take over, so you naturally find yourself noting. This is all good news I think. At this point in my practice I made it my mission to note at every free moment (on the train, walking to the bathroom, taking a shower ,etc.) This plus the extra few minutes of sitting will work wonders and you'll be basking in the 11th nana trying to remember how hard sitting used to be.

Good luck!
Jarrod

"I think the fact that you find yourself noting off the cushion is probably also a sign of this. I tend to think of it as a part of you that "knows" your only way out now is to let that momentum take over, so you naturally find yourself noting. This is all good news I think. At this point in my practice I made it my mission to note at every free moment (on the train, walking to the bathroom, taking a shower ,etc.) This plus the extra few minutes of sitting will work wonders and you'll be basking in the 11th nana trying to remember how hard sitting used to be." -jfmatteson

Yessss!

To be honest, last week I had three days when I was really miserable, and I thought one day that the stress and anxiety was going to disintegrate me. And I was prone to verbal fights :-/
I didn't connect that at all to this though. Just felt that I was more stressed than I had been in years.
Funny, but now maybe I can see why this particular experience was sooo intense and threatening to me.
I actually said things like "I am afraid I am going to blow up and just disintegrate" to people close to me.
But that ended two days ago and I've been fine since, hence my reaction to being in the DN.

I am very grateful to you guys for your support!
Lots of metta to y'all

Also... I believe, if this has been the A&P & DN, I may have been here several times before during my (pretty long) meditation career of some 20 years, and therefore I believed that this is nothing new, and maybe not all the extreme flashes and angels singing I was expecting
But hey, the calm, joy, expansion and perception of the light as light is there, so maybe...
Well well, there still is only one way forward right now regardless where I am, I guess

Thanks again!
(Not being in a very irritated mood at all right now

Bingo!

Good stuff.

But is it the case (I know that there is supposed to be a LOT of individual variation on this) that I can crash in the DN and sort of go back into A&P territory and sort of wobble around there for a while?
(If this is where I am)
Because this calm I am in right now is as far as I reckon nowhere near equanimity anyhow.

Hmmm... The questions are just pouring out of this guy now

25 minute mixed noting (better thsn nothing?)
Chaos, excited mind, tension. Itch in ear due to some water being trapped there.
Pulses picking up speed, and after a while notably calmer.
A little light and expansion.
Then nausea and itching in ear came back into focus.
After a while of nausea I noticed very hard to keep focus. Mind rushing.
Then calm but uneasy.
Then a little joy, but back to calm with a little nausea noted.

25 minute mixed noting (better thsn nothing?)
Chaos, excited mind, tension. Itch in ear due to some water being trapped there.
Pulses picking up speed, and after a while notably calmer.
A little light and expansion.
Then nausea and itching in ear came back into focus.
After a while of nausea I noticed very hard to keep focus. Mind rushing.
Then calm but uneasy.
Then a little joy, but back to calm with a little nausea noted.

Well, equanimity tends to ripen over time (you'll often talk hear talk about high equanimity vs. low equanimity for example). A&P doesn't tends to have a sort of high to it while equanimity can be quite boring.

If you sit for 45 minutes do you tend to go through DN symptoms and emerge into a wide relaxed space?

You might want to have a look at this (it lists several stages of equanimity):
www.interactivebuddha.com/Nanas%20and%20jhanas%20tablep1.pdf

What seems to have happened is I get to a pretty calm slow state where I notice how much light there is, and where noting gets slower and I experience expanses, like I get images of the open sky, or the ocean (if you see what I mean) and THEN I experience the fear, and things sort of get dark, sometimes images of a dark vortex spinning. Then I get calm about it but still a little uneasy. Then joy and such have popped up very briefly. But in the final moments I am calm about the uneasiness, and itches and things seem to reappear.
So you see if I am confused about the sequencing...

So your cutting edge may be the beginnings of equanimity. It starts off as an okayness, mostly centered around the head in some way with lingering negative sensations from the dukkha nanas. The way this works is that you'll work up to your cutting edge in each sit and then descend back down through everything again. You go up and down. The descent is generally much quicker and often more subtle. See if the pleasant state after dukkha develops more with each sit. It's also possible that you are hitting some, but not all, of the dukkha nanas and going down through dissolution (calm) a&p (joy) and three characteristics again (itches)

45 minutes
I can feel my heartbeat quite well, and it was markedly elevated the entire sit.
Excited, chaos in the beginning. Very much pulsibg in head noted.
This went on for some time.
Lots of hoping thoughts (that nice expanse would come soon)
Then I got lots of monster itches, no more pulses.
They ended for a while, and new hoping thoughts, and fell back to itches.
Disappointment, imaging thoughts, judging thoughts.
Then after leaving the fretting about it not going to happen after a while, a veil was lifted and noted light.
Also expanse, but, note! Not the joy from before.
There was a sort of joyous backtone, but it was very subtle.
Then back to itchong again.
But never had any fear feelings or falling or dark heavy imaging.
A

"So your cutting edge may be the beginnings of equanimity. It starts off as an okayness, mostly centered around the head in some way with lingering negative sensations from the dukkha nanas. The way this works is that you'll work up to your cutting edge in each sit and then descend back down through everything again. You go up and down. The descent is generally much quicker and often more subtle. See if the pleasant state after dukkha develops more with each sit. It's also possible that you are hitting some, but not all, of the dukkha nanas and going down through dissolution (calm) a&p (joy) and three characteristics again (itches)"

Hmmm... This could fit what happened in my recent sits.
But for instance today's sit would mean I descended earlier?
Thanks for helping me make sense of it all!

Kenneth's reply in nadav's log:"This is good, Nadav. See if you can keep up the momentum. The two-steps-forward-one-step-back phenomenon is common and can be aggravated by uneven practice. If you keep the momentum high, you can get up to the cutting edge of your practice each day and start to stabilize there."
Just made sense in my own practice...
Also funny, all this map talk made me react as if I had a new toy. Back to the practice!

45 minutes
Stressed as heck sitting down. All revved up. Lots of pulsing in head and visual.
Judging thoughts, imaging thoughts, not believing this sit will lead anywhere.
Pulses increasing. Some pains.
After what seemed as a looong while, suddenly, poof.
Perception of light and tingling in body.
But not that blissful and joy, but marked change.
Still a little unpleasant sensations noted.
After a while heavy itches.
New sensation of seeing the light, this time with a lityle joy and laughter attached to it.
After a while, a little strange imaging thoughts of walking in an empty house, fear.
But very brief. Then calm, then a little nausea.
Again (3rd time) perception of light, but neutral, and calm.
After a while heavy itching.

This session seems to me like a sampler of different sensations in different order...
Hm?

And now my log entry got lost?!
(haha! It happened again)

Seems like you are bouncing up and down there for sure. The anxiety and nausea definitley sound like dukkha nana territory.

The first pleasant state was likely to be mind and body, then you'll hit a rough patch (nanas 2 and 3 - 3 being the real itchy one). A&P is another pleasant one with joy and light as you said. There should be a calm nice patch after that as well followed by anxiety, misery, disgust, desire for deliverance, and then reobservation. Looks like you're leading edge is up in the dukkha nanas.

The more you sit the more you'll progress up there.

Looks like you are really hitting your stride.

"Seems like you are bouncing up and down there for sure. The anxiety and nausea definitley sound like dukkha nana territory.

The first pleasant state was likely to be mind and body, then you'll hit a rough patch (nanas 2 and 3 - 3 being the real itchy one). A&P is another pleasant one with joy and light as you said. There should be a calm nice patch after that as well followed by anxiety, misery, disgust, desire for deliverance, and then reobservation. Looks like you're leading edge is up in the dukkha nanas.

The more you sit the more you'll progress up there.

Looks like you are really hitting your stride."

Hi, Mu! It all makes sense when you put it like that (and here I go around thinking I'm all special and off the maps .
Funny though, if that was the case. Entry into mind and body was much more pronounced than A&P this time around.

I interject with some personal notes on life off the cushion.
After having a couple of calm days after that "fear of blowing up" from stress and anxiety, now I've had maybe 2 days of an ongoing uneasiness. Feeling stressed, annoyed, urges to verbally fight, and a couple of times almost as if from the blue attacks of worry.
This would rhyme well with what you've all told me (hanging out in the DN, that is, but the calm days made no sense at the time). It's funny how different it is reading about it and experiencing it

On the other side, it could just be fatigue and stress, but fits well...
Thank you, Kenneth, Mumu, and Jarrod!