Rob's Practice Notes

Sounds like you're doing great Rob, keep it up!!

Nick- I tried the eye fluttering- immediate result was brightening in the visual field; over time,
I felt rising of exhiliration that I associate with 4th nana and a couple of spontaneous shivers,
followed later by a sort of headache with a pointed tingly-achy spot right above my right eye, later a bit of anxiety; it felt too active to ever settle into any kind of clarity (it actually often felt a bit tight and forced- my deliberate striving probably to blame). When I stopped, I felt a kind of pulsing from all over, and spontaneous slight swaying.

[continued in next post]

[continued from last]

I spent most of my evening sitting doing this practice, which I've never done so diligently or
long before. The result was a kind of tight inwardness that was clear but not altogether calm.
When the bell rang it startled me and I jumped out of my skin again, but that seemed to blow away
the "tight" aspect resulting from my effort, and leave just kind of an utter internal silence that
was not pleasant or blissful, but I wouldn't say it was unpleasant- I was very reluctant to leave
it.

Recent discussion on the "Vipassana and First Path" thread has me kind of doubting my amateur diagnosis (I am periodically experiencing headaches and quickening vibrations and senses of "something's about to happen"- sounds like those are more pre-first path). On the other hand, I sometimes experience physiological and emotional "nana"-type experiences, which may be "cycling" but they are subtle. The main thing is that I definitely have a new relationship to concentration- I seem to be able to drop into a "jhanaish" state almost at will. Kenneth, I don't know if I can just go into a jhana by inclining my mind toward it, mainly becuase I've never really mastered identifiying the signs of each individual jhana. I can't say "OK, number three please" and know that it's shown up. But I do have a rich field for exploring samatha now which I did not have before, and I am wondering if and how I should use it. Any suggestions ?

"As I mentioned above, there is a difference in practice- I settle in pretty much instantly, in fact, I never quite leave the on-the-cushion feeling- lots of vibrations and skin-tingles. And as I also mentioned, I find myself falling into a kind of concentration wherever I look."-Rob

Yes, this is another signpost we look for. During the review phase after stream entry, the yogi finds himself open and concentrated immediately upon sitting down. In other words, the warm-up period of 15 or 20 minutes is not required because the 4th nana/A&P is always available. Likewise, the A&P is available all day long just by noticing your mind and body.

"Kenneth, I don't know if I can just go into a jhana by inclining my mind toward it, mainly becuase I've never really mastered identifiying the signs of each individual jhana. I can't say "OK, number three please" and know that it's shown up. But I do have a rich field for exploring samatha now which I did not have before, and I am wondering if and how I should use it. Any suggestions ?"-Rob

Yes. Try saying "OK, number three please," even if you have no clear idea of what that would look like. You may be surprised. This is jhana jumping. Try also recalling any state you can remember from past sittings, whether pleasant or unpleasant, and see if you are not immediately transported there.

Thanks, Kenneth. Last night (before I saw your reply), I tried to do a very open and non-striving kind of sitting, since I really bore down with deliberate eye-fluttering the night before and I think I was grinding too hard. As the days go by, I am starting to experience a greater elasticity of mind, and so in my sitting last night I just enjoyed this ability to navigate in three dimensions through my head-space. It's hard to pin down just what I mean by that, although in daily life, I do find that my awareness nicely encompasses whatever reactivity, tensions and clenchings arise- they quickly turn from an anxious clench to a burning sensation in my face or head to a tingling at the top of my head, and then I can just breathe in and move on.

As part of my head-space navigation last night, I did try to "incline" to what I could recall as jhana signs. I can't say "oh yeah, that was 3 or 4" but there was a subtle shift in perspective that accompanied these inclinings. It's hard to know if that was significant, but it does feel like my comprehension of what is going on gets more solid over the days.

I have a couple of busy days now where I'm unlikely to get an extended sit, but I am looking forward to trying your suggestion, "Try also recalling any state you can remember from past sittings, whether pleasant or unpleasant, and see if you are not immediately transported there".

What's nice though, is I feel a confidence that, unlike before, the fact that I won't be sitting for a couple of days doesn't mean I will lose something or slide back. I'm actually looking forward to trying out this new, elastic perspective in a busy time.

"I have a couple of busy days now where I'm unlikely to get an extended sit, but I am looking forward to trying your suggestion...

the fact that I won't be sitting for a couple of days doesn't mean I will lose something or slide back. I'm actually looking forward to trying out this new, elastic perspective in a busy time.""

Rob, for what it's worth (from a pre-path yogi!), I would recommend trying to get at least 10 minutes of sitting in, no matter what. Since there is an outside chance that you are in high EQ and you don't want to lose that, even a short sit will help maintain it. Heck, you can find 10 minutes, right?

I know what it's like to have really busy stretches, so I'm a little worried about saying something so forward -- feel free to ignore!!

Not at all! That is quite sound advice, and I am going to try to follow it.

It's not so much that I am busy, as that there are going to be lots of other people around in my open-concept apartment That's a good chance to try out an 'elastic perspective'.

The key word in that last sentence was "I *feel* a confidence...". By my standard, "confidence" means "For a fleeting second, I can ignore the voice that says 'ah, shaddup with your mystical faffle- you're just in a good mood, it'll pass soon enough!' "

If it's High EQ (or even just a good mood) I certainly plan to keep milking it for all it's worth.

Thanks for the comment

I had a call with Kenneth yesterday to discuss what to do in the 'Review' stage. He took me through the subtle cycling of the stages, with the phenomena subtly manifesting sequentially- go up to Equanimity, wait in the wide awareness, watch for the burst of euphoria that signals the return to 4th nana, then watch the stages present- euphoria / calm / anxiety / sadness / abrasive, annoying anxiety / physical aches and pains / more abrasiveness with lots of light in the visual field / all this ebbing away into the calm and clarity of EQ again / wait / pop- back to 4th again... I saw this go by about 3 times in 20 minutes.

Looks like this is a window of opportunity to (1) practice concentration with a lot of extra flexibility to do so- become a "jhana expert"; (2) sit back and watch the review cycles, and get to know the stages as they present.

Eventually, it seems that this easy access to subtle awareness will end- and that will be the signal to go back to noting, and to tackle the next full cycle.

I will also probably take a bit of a break from posting. I'm really happy to have a little vacation from being the neurotic perennial seeker. Sounds like I'll be back there soon enough!

"pop- "

Cool! Contratulations!!!

Way to go Rob!

Antero.

Thank you!

A short entry after a 20-minute sit at lunch-hour:

Trying for the first time to reproduce "watching the cycles" as I did yesterday with Kenneth.

I'm thinking I have to let Equanimity mellow for a bit before I can see a cycle start- spent about 10 minutes watching purple lights swarm in from the sides of my vision, thinking I was in EQ and expecting at any moment for the "cycle" to start, It didn't at first, but I think everything had to mature (or, I had to wait for a previous cycle, possibly begun on my walk to the park, to end first?)

Eventually, I noticed I was zoning out of the visuals and more with the layers of ambient sound more prominent- about then, I felt a cycle began, with a bit of a A&P type shiver, and there was a distinct progression.

"
I will also probably take a bit of a break from posting. I'm really happy to have a little vacation from being the neurotic perennial seeker. Sounds like I'll be back there soon enough!"

Hey Rob,

Congrats!!!! Good idea to take it easy for a bit and have a break from striving. The review period is a wonderful time. It will end of course and you may well cycle through some difficult dark night again on your way to 2nd path. Enjoy the review while it lasts. Learn all you can if possible. Calling up a fruition (although it gets easier at 2nd path), easy jhana access, get to know each nana. Don't forget...noting is your best friend still. Don't drop that practice. And up your jhana skills. They will come in handy for the possible future dark nights.

Well done!

Nick

Congratulations!!

My practice these days: I use walks and quiet times to watch cycles and speculate about jhanas and nanas; but in my formal daily sit, I am trying to be as unstructured and unjudgemental as possible, and avoid trying to assign names to an experience as it happens. Just letting go.

If I had to sum up what I've learned post-SE, it's a certain humility about what I'm trying to accomplish-

Old paradigm for seeking: Work to find or create a warm, quiet, comfortable place in my mind, and hopefully I can inhabit it forever.

New paradigm for seeking: Stuff happens; pleasant follows unpleasant follows pleasant more or less out of my control. Don't try to make this comfortable- the trying is the painful part. Don't make the passing discomforts into a problem.

The thing is, pre-SE, if somebody told me this, I simply would not have understood it the way I understand it now. I would have gone "Right. OK. Out of my control. Of course, I see. OK, so- JUST TRY TO BE GOOD WITH THAT" (*starts to strain like he was trying to pass something large through his intestine*).

Still enjoying the Review after 2 weeks. I don't feel the incredible malleability and waves of sensation of a couple of weeks ago, but I am taking full advantage of being able to practice with no manipulation, no agendas, no preferences, no speculation. The only goal is in the moment: note, experience, let go.

Sometimes I do spend some time 'striving' with this practice: to observe, second by second, the dropping and forgetting of an idea of "myself" that is being tangibly constructed moment by moment. Asking over and over, "that cluster of sensations, feelings, ideas, and mood that was 'who you are' and 'how you are' one second ago- is it still operating?" (Hint: it never is).

I suspect that I am in "Review Phase B" that Kenneth described to me in our last talk. I don't jump right into A&P on sitting down- I think I am going through nanas 1-3 as well.

Either through inclination or lack of uninterrupted practice opportunities, I don't feel myself becoming a jhana-master or a whiz at diagnosing nanas. I have a vague idea of jhanas 1-4, and none at all about 5 onward. But that doesn't bother me right now. I have a strong sense that I am doing precision work in the moment, and I'm reluctant to give that up to chase after systems. Perhaps I'll get my comeuppance in the second big cycle...!

Last night, for the first time in a while, I did out-loud noting practice very intensively for the first 15 minutes of the sitting. The tone of this "review" phase is definitely morphing. For one thing, distinctions between "nanas" seem to be getting coarser. The progression was very tangible last night. There were distinct episodes of itching breaking out all over for a couple of minutes, followed by mild exhiliration and shakes, so I think I am definitely passing through nanas 1-3 before hitting A&P, rather than dropping right back to A&P. I think I went up to equanimity, but then in the last few minutes I got quite sucked in by watching for a "pop" (which never came). I made a mental note to watch for and note that desire in the next session, if it comes up again.

After the session I had a couple of mild episodes that resembled the physiological effects of DN nanas, which made me think of what Kenneth said about going backwards through the nanas.

On the other hand, I have an alternate hypothesis: maybe I'm actually in the second full cycle already, and I did not actually go up to Equanimity but spent most of the sitting in A&P, with a couple of DN "hangovers" (The "advance scouts" of Kenneth's army metaphor). During my first cycle, I felt like insight stages had a tendency to keep rolling onward for a while, even after a formal sitting ended, but until last night, I hadn't experienced that feeling for nearly a month.

I love to speculate, but the fact is, unlike the first time round, none of this affects my clear sense of what to do. My favourite thing about post-SE is that I don't seem to spend a lot of time vacillating and filling my head with options. As far as practice is concerned, it's clear that my only job is to keep noting.

[Part 1 of 2]

Over the weekend, I became more convinced that I'm experiencing a new cycle, rather than "Review". The 2 reasons why I feel this are:

(1) There's no longer a sense of "cycling". I seem to progress quickly to, then stay in, something that most resembles the A&P of my first cycle- exhiliration, shudders, and leaking a bit past that, late in the sitting, into a more anxious and abrasive state. Also, that sense of having attacks of anxiety about an hour after my sitting has come back. However, the "symptoms" are milder than before.

Paradoxically, that's made it a little tricker for me than it was the first time out to understand that I'm having a "hangover", and should not blame my sudden bad mood on the present external circumstances. I'll have to watch out for that in the coming days. If I'm attentive, I can usually isolate the cluster of "vibrations" that are chafing, and the sense of aversion that they're engendering, and move on. If I'm not careful, though, I can get a bit pissy.

(2) The content and quality of insight feels new. Something else is opening up- something that has to do with perceiving all these bodily sensations, reactions, likings and aversions, thoughts, thoughts about the thoughts, and observations of the fading out of all of the above, as each being separate and located "somewhere" apart from each other; as being finite in number, but uncountable because they keep coming in and fading out. This is very very clear, but there is also a sense of something wanting to pull all these together and make them "one", but that just refuses to happen.

[continued]

[Part 2 of 2]

I'm still blown away by the fact that meditation is so easy and fun now. There's no Hassle in my head about whether what I'm doing is right or wrong. Maybe this is a bit of A&P exuberance talking, but I do feel like a lifelong instinct to kvetch, second-guess, and bargain over every effort I make has just broken up and vanished. For pre-first-pathers out there: anything you think is a problem right now is not a problem. It really isn't. You cannot trip, move backwards, or fail. Just give in- Resistance is futile! From this perspective, I can now see just how many times over the years I might have been seconds away from a "pop", if I only knew better.

It's good to hear how well your practice is progressing. And, thanks very much for the advice, it sounds like it was written specifically for me, those thoughts are with me a lot lately. I'm sure others will feel the same about it.

"For pre-first-pathers out there: anything you think is a problem right now is not a problem. It really isn't. You cannot trip, move backwards, or fail. Just give in- Resistance is futile! From this perspective, I can now see just how many times over the years I might have been seconds away from a "pop", if I only knew better."

Yes, this is great to read as a pre-pather just aching to land path (aching, aching). It's encouraging and inspiring and also helpful to keep in mind when I start obsessing over whether I'm "doing it right" or not. Thanks for this!

"For pre-first-pathers out there: anything you think is a problem right now is not a problem. It really isn't. You cannot trip, move backwards, or fail. Just give in- Resistance is futile! From this perspective, I can now see just how many times over the years I might have been seconds away from a "pop", if I only knew better."

Advice taken!

I'm really glad people found value in my comments. I have this desperate desire these days to make this experience useful to others, but I just get blank looks at dinner parties

My notes for today: still feeling a sense of progressing through a full-on cycle. Last night's sitting was one of the most fascinating sittings I have experienced- thoughts and ideas and emotions vanished over and over with a palpable sudden sense of relief, and I had this sense that that burst of relief *was* the very passing-away of that formation. The whole body was just crawling with popping champagne bubbles. Knowing my penchant for post-sitting "hangovers", I expected that at some point, about an hour after, I would be hit with a bit of an anxiety surge. That didn't come- the whole evening was quite pleasant and "chill". But then at about 3am I woke up with heart thumping and an absolute wall of objectless anxiety. I lay awake for the next hour and a half, watching really insistent flickering in the visual field, with buzzing sensations across the body at a similar rhythm. I still have a bit of a clenching in my gut this morning.

If there's anyone reading this who's been through the first- to second-path zone, I would be interested to hear any opinions on whether this seems like a Big Cycle, or if it could still be just a particularly harsh and long review cycle (most of which, for me, have only lasted minutes to an hour maybe, for the full rotation, as far as I know).

I haven't "journalled" for about 2 weeks now, but I've been keeping up a steady rhythm. I have no real doubt now that I was / am progressing through a Big Cycle. In fact, I find that it is tracking the pace of my first cycle with eerie precision. I felt the dukkha nanas go by with enough detachment to not feel too disrupted. About 5 or 6 days ago, I ceased to "top out" in painful states, and moved into what I am pretty sure is equanimity. The sessions have increasingly ended with steady waves of shuddering.

In my 1h05 sitting this evening, I got to equanimity after about 15 minutes- I got settled pretty quickly, the shakes and delight of A&P passed through after not more than a couple of minutes, and there were a couple of minutes of whispers of anxiousness and ripples and faint ratatat vibrations with a flavour of harshness. I settled in for quite a while just constantly turning my focus to whatever arose in whatever place.

The last 10 or 15 minutes, though, were quite full of activity- flashes, bright lights, and a sense that I was twisting more and more inward. That "twisting" is both a mental thing and a physical thing- spontaneous shudders started up again, but it was like each one made me tense up more and more (in a not-disagreeable way, though). About a minute before the bell, I had a VERY violent shake, then it all seemed to settle down.

I also feel as though, starting a couple of minutes into what I am thinking of as equanimity, there's a growing sort of roar-of-ocean-waves sound, that is, it's experienced as sound but is not an actual ambient sound.

I am not sure what to make of all this- I feel like I might be close to a Path (there's a strong sense of impending Something), but my last one kind of crept in while I was feeling almost sleepy. This time, I'm either misdiagnosing completely, or this one is walking toward me with clumsy-elephant steps.

A question for post-pathers: what I just described above- can it be that I am "riding" up AND down the Progress, and re-passing A&P on the way down? I don't *think* so, but Kenneth did say that that was something one could do, voluntarily, in "Review, phase B" post-SE. I have never tried it, though. Can it also happen spontaneously?

"@RobMtl: A question for post-pathers: what I just described above- can it be that I am "riding" up AND down the Progress, and re-passing A&P on the way down? I don't *think* so, but Kenneth did say that that was something one could do, voluntarily, in "Review, phase B" post-SE. I have never tried it, though. Can it also happen spontaneously?"

Hi Rob,

Yes, this is how it happens to everyone at every stage, whether they notice it or not. You are always up and down through the strata of mind that are available to you. The analogy of climbing a hill works well here. The base of the hill is the default, so that is normally where you start each session and it's where you end up when the effects of concentration have worn off. In order to visit more subtle strata of mind (further up the hill), you must pass through the grosser strata at the base. And what goes up must come down because there is a powerful gravity that pulls you back down to earth. If this were not the case, you would be walking around in exquisitely concentrated states of jhana all day long. The ability to notice that you are rising up what I have dubbed the "jhanic arc" is not nearly as rare as the ability to notice the descent in realtime, but both are high level skills worth cultivating. And as you point out, it is easer to see the movement up and down while in a review phase, although at times it can also be seen during developmental stages.

Kenneth