Anthony's Practice Notes 2

And well-being and spaciousness would sometimes follow. I did notice some pulsing and strobing at my third eye and I noted 'acknowledgement' and 'surrender' and gave it the same level of importance as negative sensations.

At one point I looked at my clock to see there was 15min left. Immediately there was the familiar old '˜aversion to sitting any longer feeling' and I noted 'release' and 'allowing'. Instead of struggling with it this time, trying to motivate myself to keep going I just sat back and said 'acceptance', do your thing I will give you all the time you need to work yourself out (well, not longer than 15 min anyways, lol). Surrender, surrender, surrender, letting go'¦ I felt a deep release happen and a giant bubble of joy arose and I started laughing out loud. I never laugh out loud during meditation.

So I am sure some of my technique needs improvement and much of that will happen on its own with continued practice. During this sit I was noting about once every 3 to 5 seconds. I wanted to go slow and be clear about what I was experiencing. Also, it seems to take some time to let a sensation transform on its own.

I am interested in seeing how this will progress, how it may change from day to day, and how it will effect each aspect of my life. I will try to practice throughout the day using release, acceptance, and surrender as my '˜go to' notes and report back tomorrow how it went.

Peace.

Sounds great, Anthony.

"To me, when saying 'release' I had the sense of opening my door and saying, 'Welcome!' to this tension, 'come on in and stay as long as you would like. Tell me your story'. It took me some time to get used to it but I allowed this tension to be as it is without agenda from me. I noted acceptance, allowing, surrender. Sometimes the tension would go quickly and I would notice and note 'gratitude'. Sometimes the tension would stay for a while and I would just stay with it in return saying release, allowing, surrender, just letting it do its thing.

If I were to personify this exchange it would be as if an angry person came into my house to yell at me, complain, expel unpleasant energies, and then start to cry and let it all out. Then he would look up at me with gratitude for the opportunity and quietly leave. "

This is helpful. I have to confess that for me, saying release, release is kind of a covert invitation to the tension to go away. I keep thinking if I repeat "release" enough I'll get rid of it. I like the idea of externalizing it--thinking of it as an angry person, not me.

"...I will give you all the time you need to work yourself out (well, not longer than 15 min anyways, lol). "

LOL!

Feeling more urgency and intentness in my practice now. Not the ambitious version I have mostly felt in the past. This is more analagous to the need for relaxing your blood pressure and setttling in with a calm heartbeat. My energies have been a bit volatile lately. I am open to this. I believe it may be related to some sort of physio-energetic cleansing. All I can do is just let it flow for now and apply the gentle touch of mahamudra noting, while cultivating the brahmavihāras.

Gonna take a few days to let it settle and appreciate that I am on vacation right now.

peace

I haven't posted in a few weeks. I have been busy and I haven't felt like writing anything down. I do feel it is helpful for others and myself, however, so here I am again.

Realizing that everything is already perfect and noticing the essential nature of mind has been my main goals lately. My main tool is Mahamudra Noting (MN) and I practice concentration/noting when I need to sharpen up a bit. When I am able to connect to essential nature of mind during MN I feel a wondrous joy that seems to come from nowhere. My current sticking point is that I almost always can feel a layer of stress in my life associated with the pressure of school and work right now. I try to surrender to it, but I am not having a good time with it. At best I am able to tolerate it and stay positive that continued MN practice will help.

Today:
Noticing each moment that I can during the day.

Lunchbreak- 30min concentration/Mahamudra noting. As I did MN I became open and pleasant feeling. Sometimes a surge of joy will pop up. Having a hard time surrendering to my tensions.

Tonight:
40min. 15 concentration/ 25 MN
My mind became very neutral. I was looking around and staring at various things in my room. I wasn't very interested but yet I was content at looking at anything. Thoughts were very quiet.
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During the day: I have spent about an hour total practicing MH during my free time. I like to find a nice park bench on campus or go for a walk. I am trying to open up to the perfectness of everything as it is. At moments it makes some sense and I can feel a welling of gratitude. Most times it is frustrating and I cant see how I could ever overcome the pile of stress and responsibilities in my life right now just by listening for ships and surrendering. I try, I really do, but the stress is still there.
I guess I am having a hard time with this practice. Noting always worked with my type A personality because I felt it was very linear and objective oriented. Mahamudra seems to be a land of super subtlety.
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Practiced MN for most of the day yesterday. Not when I was at my computer working but every time I got up to go for a walk, or go down the hall to the copy room, or go to my next class. I can feel expantion as my mind searches for the ships, that which is unmanifest. I am often interrupted by my tension arising or a stressfull thought. This is where I imagine this technique could help the most but so far I am failing at it. I can look at my stress and say 'acceptance' and 'surrender' all day long but I can't get into the perspective that Kenneth talks about where everything is already done and nothing needs to change.

I am losing confidence in this technique. I have never been someone to give 100% faith in something and it seems like this perspective is asking for some. I need some sort of discovery that is my own here. Failure is not always a bad thing for progress but I am going to need a victory soon.

~40min right before bed last night.

I feel asleep right after this session so I am a little fuzzy on some of the details towards the end. I sat on my cushion and practiced concentration for 10 minutes. My focus was good and I felt calm and ready to put in some honest effort in MN. I remember thinking to myself that I don't want to give up on this until I have given it my best. I laid down and started with just listening for the ships.

I felt expansion and calm. I believe I was in the 4th Jhana at this point. My mind was ungrasping and expansive. My body was light and almost floating. When unpleasant or stressful thoughts/sensations arose I felt like I had more time to observe in this calm state. I noted 'release' and 'not it' (as in not the essential nature of mind that I am listening for) and I felt joy. To me this tiny spark of joy that I feel when doing MN has its own flavor. It is certainly not a joy that arises become of something. I often feel joy when I hear good news or I am doing something fun. This joy is different, though, like a deep relaxation. I am letting go and it feels damn good. I ask myself why do I hold onto so much tension. I am taking some liberty here with my memory of that moment but I believe that for a few seconds I was able to see directly that this world and every manifest thing in it was ok just how it is.

It doesn't make as much sense to my now as I am recalling it but last night it was very simple: everything in this world including me, my life, my experience is impermanent. It will end. It has to end. And from the view of the unmanifest it has already ended! So the more you connect with the unmanifest nature of mind, the less this real world moment seems to matter. Its already done. It just doesn't seem to look like that to us from our perspective.
cont...

I may be just cracking the surface of this thing or I may be way off. Hopefully someone who is also been training with MN can weigh in here?
The part that baffles me is how do you make this part of your everyday waking experience?

Much appreciation,
Anthony

30min MN last night.
I was able to let go more last night with Mahamudra. I started by listening for the ships and then opened my awareness to everything else. And to those sensations I said, 'this is not the essential nature of mind' and I let it go and continued to listen for the ships. I felt pleasant and spacious within my body. I felt very relaxed and at peace.

Today I continued to practice MN as often as I could. I feel more relaxed lately but also a little bit spacey, like my mind is a bit less sharp. Maybe its unrelated or maybe I should practice more concentration.

Peace

Spent much of today with direct mode. The length of time that I can hold my attention in this mode on average is not very long but I am surprised by my increased frequency of reminding myself to return to it.

I felt good today despite plenty of stressful circumstances and encounters with my aversions. I used Mahamudra noting as my go-to practice when I felt myself drifting into suffering.

I have discovered two simple things recently. 1)When I find myself cranking the wheel of suffering in my mind all I have to do is realize I am doing it and stop cranking the wheel. 2)This may or may not end that particular suffering. There is often a residual tension in the body for some time. This is ok though. My goal right now is not to directly eradicate suffering, it is to stop creating more. To me this is similar to Dave Ramsey's financial advice: The very first step to becoming debt free is to stop creating more debt!

At times I feel like I am on a balancing beam and I could fall off at any moment back to sleep. However, I also feel like I am getting better at balancing.

I felt positive yesterday. I believe it was a result of my current practice. I kept asking myself if my positive mood was a result of an external cause (looking forward to the cowboys game, something good happening to me, ect'¦) or is it because my self is fading away and allowing me to relax in the 'okay-ness' of any situation.

I felt detached yesterday. It was hard to say if it was a good day or a bad day. It was certainly a busy day, I had a ton of work to do and I didn't get home to watch Monday Night Football until about half-time. The main point is that I didn't look back at any of it with resentment, attachment, or 'should have done this' or 'wish I could have done that'. I was always looking at the current moment and forgetting that previous moments happened. Letting go and moving on seemed to be my default mode yesterday. I wasn't specifically trying to do this, it was almost natural. I kept finding myself resisting this good nature and wondering when I will fall back into dark territory. I need to stay mindful and let go of those habits as well.

It's very subtle but I keep sensing an undercurrent of magic in the air, so to speak. I will be listening for the ships, or looking around in direct mode and I will feel a zap of excited energy. It feels like a magical wave of possibility and positive outlook on life. Does this sound familiar to anyone?
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30min 4C noting last night.

Noted several points of tension in the body. Became more subtle but still noticed some light tension/tightness in the chest when a thought about work arose. Noted once per second coolness, itch, tingling, tension, aching, memory, speculation thought, pressure... Started to feel expansion in my head and some pulsing. The body started to feel more stable and pleasant. Continued to note these sensations and noticed a floating/expansive feeling. Noted equanimity and the patience to just sit and listen to sensations.

I have been having a good amount of pulsing at the forehead lately when I do noting practice or Mahamudra noting but tonight it feels like the pulsing is moving upwards to my crown. I put my attention on this pulsing. Experienced some poping/zooming/juming. There was some disorientation with my body. I felt like I was fully in my head and didn't even notice the rest of the body. From time to time I would ask myself Who am I? or Who is experiencing this? and I would investigate the sensations that arise as a 'self'. I moved into in a state of sleepy/dreaminess for about 10min. I stopped noting and just observed the pulsing/flickering and wavy-ness of the vision behind my eyelids.

Timer went off and I lay down to continue observing until I fell asleep.

Looking back over the past few weeks it seems like I have going through a nana cycle once per week. I was feeling very free last Thursday/Friday with enjoyable levels of equanimity and ease of meditation. I felt like I had made it to a permanent place and I couldn't possibly fall back to sleep again. lol On Sunday I began to feel agitation again. Most importantly I began to get caught up mentally in my agitation. My mind felt too rigid and upset. It was so easy for me to sidestep being caught up in my cravings and aversions just a few days previous but then I started to feel like I was on a unstable frequency again.

Yesterday I was very tired and had very little patience for practice. Today I went on a 30min Mahamudra noting walk and cleared my head enough to notice that I have been cycling like this for the past few weeks. I must be in some dark night territory again. Luckily I have been here before and it isn't as scary anymore. My plan is to just surrender to it and continue to practice. It will take as long as it will take and resistance will just cause more suffering.

I wonder if I am heading into the stage of practice where you continuously cycle and start to get a little crazy from it?
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Recent notes:
This week I have been practicing Mahamudra Noting, Direct mode, and a new practice that Kenneth has shown me called Thought Counting. When things become difficult and far from subtle I will down shift to 4C noting. As a result I have been encountering the present moment more and more.

I am reminded of the phrase 'seeing like an artist' and this week it has become more and more frequent for me. Often I will make a connection with reality and everything will become sharper and in focus. It is like I am seeing reality in HD. Ordinary things are actually pleasant to look at. My vision become sharper, colors are more vivid, and it just feels pleasant. My mind will then jump in and start to chatter and interrupt the moment but I am getting better at just surrendering to what is happening.

I don't know if seeing like an artist is a sign that I am improving or just a mild side-effect of the practice but I feel motivated by it and despite feeling gloomy earlier this week things are again making more sense to me. I still feel like I am riding a cycle and nana territory is becoming more and more familiar as I pass over it over and over again. I have to wonder if I may be 3rd path by now. I understand that Nirodha is a very sure sign that you are 3rd path but I have invested very little time to concentration practices so who knows.

Peace

-Anthony

Hi Anthony,

I'm curious about the Thought Counting practice you mention. Can you describe it in more detail?

Good stuff Anthony. Sounds like you've got a good thing going.

"Hi Anthony,

I'm curious about the Thought Counting practice you mention. Can you describe it in more detail?

"

Oops. Sorry Andy I didn't see that.

For the Thought Counting practice I have been simply counting my thoughts. This works best once my mind has settled first by doing some 1st gear practice. Then I will rest my attention on my vision and body and keep it there on autopilot while I just observe. Once a thought pops up I will say "One" and continue to rest in awareness of my body. I don't count recognition of things as a thought. For example, if my dog walks by I recognize that I am seeing my dog but I wont count it as a thought unless I start to think something, "Maybe she needs to go outside....oh right, Two"

I dont think the goal is to stop your thoughts. I believe it is a method to keep your attention sharp on right now.

I have been doing this as soon as I wake up. My mind tends to start thinking a million miles per hour about everything I have to do that day when I wake up so this practice has been nice.

Recent notes:
Practice has slowed down as my workload has increased. I have been taking every chance throughout the day to practice when I can. I had this realization the other night as I lay in bed counting my thoughts: These thoughts are not me, they are just an automatic response based on brain processes, memories, and habits. My thoughts felt very unpersonal then and I felt the sense of a self start to slip away.
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I've actually been fooling around with thought counting. I found that once I got it going, I started to find some fairly subtle thoughts that were way more in the background . I had a couple good sessions with it earlier this week during some walking meditation, and found that after a while it seemed to put me into this open, calm, spacious, quiet state, and the thoughts that did occur were few and far in between.

I also ran into this post:

thehamiltonproject.blogspot.com/2011/10/...pes-of-thoughts.html

I've often spent a lot of time trying to classify thoughts (was it a judging thought?, a remembering thought?, an anticipating thought? a combination?, etc.) which seemed to break the flow of noting. Noting only three types of thoughts helps me get around that quite handily.

thats really cool - another one for the toolbox. Thanks guys.

10/23/11

Going through a pretty rough dukka nana ride yesterday and today.

Experiencing solid unpleasant tension (especially throat muscles), aggravation, anger, aversion to the future, and very much a desire for deliverance. Food doesn't taste good and I can't think of anything that would be fun to do or relieving.

I have been doing 4 foundation noting to work with the tension. I noted all day yesterday and had a few good formal sits. Investigating vedana has given me a better understanding of emotions and thoughts. Being aware of body sensation and vedana is helping to keep too many negative thoughts from arising. The negative thoughts that are already there seem to keep popping up though. Where is all this body tension coming from? It seems endless!

I have also been listening for the ships in the harbor. This seems to bring some ease but it is hard to stay with it for very long.

I don't know whether to keep trying different tools or stick with one thing. One thing I do know from experience is to stay with it and ride it out. If I investigate the hell out of it it's more likely to work itself out quicker. Unfortunately I can't go on retreat today and I have guests coming over later. This certainly feels like a challenge. I will try to post again this evening.

Feeling like absolute hell today. Everything is annoying. The slightest setback at work makes me want to throw my keyboard through my monitor. I feel tense and thinking about practice makes me feel a ton of anxiousness and frustration. I wish I had a week off to just practice like crazy and get this over with but this is a pretty damn busy week for me. Why now! I feel like nothing about enlightenment makes sense or is even possible. I know this is normal and things will eventually change but right now is really intense and I want to just escape from the world and sedate myself heavily.

I really hope I can get some quiet time tonight to process all of this but I won't get home until late and I have people staying at my house. Damn!!!

I wish my "self" would just end already. Just stop becoming, stop thinking, stop suffering, stop everything...

Just got in 45 min sit. Focused on noting 4 foundations. Very unpleasant energies and tensions arose. I almost gave up several times. Stuck with it and the body and mind began to relax. I switched to Mahamudra noting and further relaxed and became calm and clear. Noted gratitude and relief in abundance. Mind became sharp and I felt very absorbed in concentration.

Got to go back to work for a few hours. My plan is to practice some more as soon as I can to get as far away from that last dark night as possible.

You have my sympathies. This working for a living stuff is a real pain the neck, isn't it! I'm glad you had a better session later today. Metta.