recording and learning

" I dont care anymore how much it hurts I cannot be closed off. I dont care if I live in the dark night for a thousand years, its still better to be open to it than trying to bottle it up, trying to manage it in some way."

Wow--you are brave! I am going to take your attitude as an inspiration. I'm still trying to bottle it up.

Thanks - this place helps. I don't know how anyone could get through to path without watching other people do it and knowing it can be done!

20 min noting, mostly calm, noting thoughts and some tension in the head - interrupted by work.

restarted. 55 minutes noting silently. Started off with tension in the head that turned to pain, pulsing inside the head in connected areas - noting thoughts and tension/pain, some rising and falling, some clear sounds coming in the ears. Tension loosening after a bit, more thoughts, some daydreaming noted, this sleepyness mixed with a desire to space out - hard to keep from getting lost. noting thoughts that hadn't really been disembedded from before, sense of release, joy, hot tension in the head most of the time. Deep stillness in parts, clarity. Lots of stuff to disembed from yet - note it all and let the sheriff sort it out.

1.5 day retreat in the morning - will report sunday night.

Retreaty.

15 hours noting Saturday, 10 on cushion. Had some difficulty keeping continuity but gave it my best shot.

Went from what felt like EQ in the beginning, peace, seeing thoughts, very still, all the sudden landed in sankhara city with a pit stop in dukkhaville. Fear based stuff mostly.
Lots of energy moving from neck up into head and sitting there, on face, inside head, etc.

~4 hours on cushion this AM, on and off with walks besides, tried to keep continuity. Got more vibratory, then experienced a very distinct shift, where tension in the body was attaching to fear based thoughts, tension interpreted as fear, now all the sudden flavor is nausea/sickness. Still with me now A bit if I feel into the body.

Takeaway:
Had sucky concentration, but got lots of use out of doing a mahasi style outloud noting, rising and falling only, noticing other stuff internally, outloud riiisiiing and faaaaallling, with very little gap in the words for thinking to sneak through. Worked very well - started doing it Saturday night and then into this morning. I will continue with this if it remains useful.
What I found was that when the thoughts weren't allowed to sneak through, I got to experience the underlying tensions and vibrations in the body without adding to them, and there was very little suffering in dukkhaville.

no insights at all on this retreat that I can recall, other than above.

"Dukkhaville"--I like that!

Yeah me too - I think thats Nikolai's term for it, at least thats where I saw it first.

Noticed ~about 6 hours after I stopped sitting this morning the 'tension is nausea' thing stopped and tension went back to being 'normal tension'..

so I did another 30 minutes outloud rising and falling, really trying to stick to the sensations and using the verbal to tie up the mind...

Started out with some tension in the gut, then quickly some irritating tension arose in the jawline/head and started to shake/move upwards in the head, then settled down and again the tension in the gut then shifted to being nausea - then as I tried to stay with the gut rising and falling, seeing into the detail there another tension started to rise up into the neck and head, but this time it was nauseating, I almost threw up on the cushion, and couldnt seem to muster up the focus to continue onward to see what would happen next - sounds bad but the mind didnt have space to complain. Its kind of neat actually...

I think I will start using resolutions before my sits if I can remember - something like 'may my practice be the best it can be', sort of a reminder to really put effort into it to move the ball forward.

55 minutes out loud rising and falling - watched the tone of the tensions in the body more carefully. Saw at first there was a flavor of sadness I recognize as mild depression which usually attaches itself to 'im not good enough' thoughts. I had to actually stop noting for a second to allow that to happen so I could recognize the state - I didnt think that state was anything but psychological before...No wonder it was so repeatable! Then it shifted to nausea after a small amount of tension worked its way through the head, then to a flavor of 'please I dont want this' which again I had to let up a bit to see what the mind would attach to the sensation. The sensations were not as intense as yesterday and not as distinct as well. Then there was a jumbly feeling, in the gut like a mixture of all those flavors with a sort of sense of the observer shaking somehow, discombobulating, then opening up energy rising into the middle of the head and a sense of space arising, around thoughts, around the body, some peace, stillness, but not very strong, and after no more than a minute I suddenly found myself back at the beginning of the sit sensation-wise. This whole thing repeated itself again ad above, but less intense, less distinct, at least the DN stuff. with a few minutes to go it opened up again into the space around everything, peace, stillness but this time it was stronger than the first time. Some buildup of pleasant energy started to work its way up inside the head and then it sorta fizzled, and I found myself back at the beginning of the loop again, this time even less distinctly, and the bell rang.

Interesting report. What do you make of the "found myself at the beginning of the sit sensation-wise" looping?

Not sure - like Im in that space, then it just sorta fades and I notice that Im back with tension in the gut with the flavor similar to how the sit started. Same thing happened second time too. I didnt notice anything special happening in the spaciousness part... <shrug>

45 minutes at lunch - felt like somehow I couldnt get anywhere on one object so I went back to nama/rupa and got mired in 'canting' mindstates that keep coming up strongly - noting them over and over. Had some energy rise upwards and start to move into head like before where it starts to shake and such but no shifts. Noting frustration, anger at self.

Lol - I think some version of this happens every time I come off retreat, even a small one. Time to go back to ultra low gear 4 F's out loud stuff - disembed from this stuff.

Did quite a bit of mindstate noting yesterday while off the cushion...

55 minutes this AM, starting out loud... Lots of tension, tiredness, complaining, self doubt, striving, rising, falling, tension rising up a bit, into the head, some mindstates noted, switching to silent and then the tension turned into a pleasant energy, sense of selfing stopped for a second or three, rushing, pleasant/intense energy in the head, swirling around, feeling like spilling out the top?(not sure what that felt like), then fuzzy calm, peace, stillness, body almost not there, but this lasted only ~1 minute or so then some vibrations came on, indistinct, tensions, anxiety, not really tied to mindstates, then I got lost in some indistinct unpleasantness, had to go back to outloud, tiredness winning out, then Bell.

55 minutes at lunch, out loud.

On a whim mostly doubles and triples. It was ponderous but I got through it.

Tensions, contractions, tingles, vibrations, pressures, pushing, movements, swirling in the head, most vedana was unpleasant, a few different flavors of aversion, pushing away, images of suffering, despairing, trying to figure out how to make unpleasantness go away, desire to be rid of unpoleasantness, etc -

What I noticed was that the sense of self started to get 'broken up' somehow, like somehow its easy to see a combined tension/aversion as being 'me' but once I had broken up the glom into its components there was less self in it - after a bit many sensations that initially were seen automatically with vedana or aversion plastered onto them were seen more clearly, directly, seperate from the mental aspect. Even though there were lots of tensions and whatnot it was very calming over all - 'calm/neutral/curiosity' and a few others..

hmm - it seems that if I am already somewhat concentrated I move quickly and clearly through different stages, whereas after having spent a morning at work stuck in 3C's or DN (not sure which sometimes) I start the sit with no 'hitting power' behind my noting. I'm thinking of the 'access concentration' thing mentioned in the sidebar above where he talks about doing breath counting to settle down and form a bubble to work within. This seems like a good idea - I will test it out and see what it does.

I can also recall a while during retreat where I had gotten some decent concentration going and it was a very different noting experience, like noting happened very easily, the correct words came up with no hunting or getting stuck, and I could note much faster and see into thought chains more easily.

no coffee before this sit...

40 minutes, started trying the 3x10 to settle. Tiredness, mind wandering, starting over a bunch of times, got almost done with the 3x10 and switched to rising/falling, some tiredness, a few itches, frustration.

cannot resist comedy here: In coffee free land, you don't count the chickens, the chickens count YOU

Ah, the coffee thing. A dragon I have yet to slay.
Are you aiming to ditch caffeine altogether? Metta and mudita to you, my friend!

slay? Nah. Just come to some sort of agreement.

... Attention got stuck on an area of the forehead for a bit, was very solidly there, felt almost like samatha - I allowed this for a minute and then had an odd shift where something I'm not sure what, a sense of being perhaps, started to fill everything, like losing contact with the sense world almost for a second - not sure what that was... Then fell back out of that and some more repeating of seeing some more thinking and objects as not me, sort of got lost a bit near the end.

55 minutes at lunch. Did some concentration during day (I usually do something, a bit either noting or breath, when there is a lull at work)

Started out ~10 min of breath only, no words, entrance to mouth. Got somewhat settled and focused.

Noting - letting awareness pick. Started out loud but went silent at some point after a few minutes, nonverbal even for a while (I think that was a mistake cause I lost some clarity when I did that)

Started out with some mind splitting off during the concentration part, then images of failure, aversion to failure, wanting to succeed, be accepted, with corresponding tensions in stomach, neck, then moved to sensations rising up towards head and neck, some of the same thoughts but fewer, then sensations switching to more pleasant, bubbling/tingling/creeping in the head, some scalp, suddenly a strong tension rising up the neck and then moving into the face, strong, almost painful grimace breaking out, then eventually fading, more and more tingling in head, some rushes of energy, vibrations, pulsing, neutral to pleasant but still some unpleasant in there, a sense of being alive itself being unsatisfactory arising, then some stillness, thoughts quieting down a bit, some peace, then some unpleasant stuff but hard to see, except for a minute or two where nausea was again the flavor of tension in the body, thoughts hard to see, think I was nonverbally noting and slipped a bit, picked it back up and started noting some stuff that doesnt usualy get noted, like thoughts implying space in the head, thoughts of observer and centerpoint, had a number of moments where everything seemed ok, not me, had some thoughts arise that normally take me for a ride and was able to note them and somehow lose interest in them. Senses got clearer, still lots of thoughts running but more subtle, harder to see. (cont)

55 minutes tonight - had been very concentrated all day after the lunch sit, kept noting and going back to breath to keep a fire lit. Had some pleasant, tingling energetic wildness a short while before the sit, sat down and did 10 min of breath only samatha, got pleasant and breath got solid, then started noting silently. Aversion was noticeably very absent almost the whole sit. There was some there but it slipped away quickly, there were still thoughts and tensions but I was able to note the thoughts and the tensions attached, the whole body vibrating very very quickly as a whole, with a neutral to pleasant tone, senses somewhat clear, some lazy aversion noted at some point, some wandering, didnt notice any big shifts in state really, although did get a tension in the middle that rose up the neck and made a grimace in the face for a minute before fading, very little suffering though. Very noticeable this sit was that I noted thoughts that have been occuring in me for years, and they were clearly just images of a face, feeling tone, implications of emotional state, arising simultaneously as raw tension or vibration in the body, then just drifting off. Was sort of half verbal half non verbal noting/noticing as there was lots of stuff going on. Tone of the sit was calm and peaceful, mildly pleasant though all kinds of negative stuff came and went.

Last night after sitting whole body was very buzzy, pleasant, woke up in the night feeling like re-ob maybe, shaking observer, discordant vibes all over body but no real emotions, just sensations.


45 min noting this AM..

Started with a few minutes of samatha on breath, mind wanted to note so switched t out loud, letting it choose objects. Vibrations, tingling, some fearful images, desires to succeed, fear of being a failure, typical stuff, noting the thoughts and the tensions, finding some tensions and breaking them down, vibrations, heat, tingling, had a moment or two or three of more space, mind as not self, peaceful, again feeling less stuck on stuff arising as I was a few days back, some striving self images, lots of pulses and tingles, images of being a failure noted, less aversion to that stuff. Had some tension around eyes, in a ring from brows around face and lower jaw line. Tone mostly neutral during sit, noticing lots of desire to get somewhere, to achieve something coming up.

55 minutes noting at lunch. Started with samatha on breath but switched to noting pretty quickly, didnt feel right to concentrate.

noting silently, quickly.

Started out with some fearful thoughts, low frequency vibrations in core of body (4-5hz?), then just 'stuff' , thoughts and tensions, nothing really stood out, body still vibrating, but less, then a tension rising up the neck through jaw and mouth, mouth almost grimacing, then more thoughts, trying to be better thoughts, tensions, lots of little pinpricks and whatnot, at some point I saw something I hadn't seen clearly before and there was a rush of tingling up through the head and body for a few seconds, then energy moving up into the head, back of neck pleasant but intense, top/back of head also pleasant and intense tingling, rushing and pulsing. Body shifted at some point into those high frequency neutral vibrations that have been happening lately, Rushing and tingling somewhat calmed down and then energy rose in the head hgher and I seemed to get really big somehow, filling everything, thinking almost stopped at the same time, then fell back, had some warm sensations running down the spine, the whole time lots of small tingles and tensions/vibrations . A minute or two later there was some fear again, then another tension running up the neck and almost making face scrunch up as it moved through the face, then another less strong moment of energy moving higher in the head and this sense of filling everything while thinking got quieter. Bell.

Im not sure about the when/order of some of this stuff I feel a bit fuzzy headed, memory may be unclear.

experiment, based on endinsight's log -
55 minutes noting:

started out with the intent to note very fast, etc, had a difficult time with it for a while, lots of sensations but no clear shifts and didnt feel like I was disembedding from things at all. About 10 minutes into it something struck me as better and I shifted noting to 'it' for everything.
Tension in the stomach was an 'it' - thoughts and half formed images were an 'it' sensation of an observer was an 'it'
Seemed to work very very well. After a few minutes of random tensions and thoughts, a tremendous amount of space around everything was there, one I haven't had this strongly before. Daydreams, anxiety, fear, tension , space, everything was just an 'it' and noted as such. The mind became calmer and calmer and senses became clearer (after going through a spot for a few minutes where nothing but daydreams was arising and was noted as 'it') - the sense of energy filling the head and pressurizing the head as if trying to pop it open was there, lots of space and stillness.
The head filled up with buzzing tingling pressurized energy and it felt like something was about to happen, but then it faded, and suddenly I went through a full round of re-observation in about 1-2 minutes. It was almost clear this time, sudden fear, then painful tensions running up causing mouth to contort, then some vague sickness and a sudden pang of 'i dont want this' feeling deep in the gut, some jumbly of all of them and then back to space, energy filling up the head again, this time moving up the exact center. Effort started to peter out at that point and the bell rang. -edit- also this sit had periods where I was calmer than I can ever remember being.

Interesting.

edit - really intense tensions in the body. Feels like eletricity running amok. Good thing its not "me"

I can relate--I've been having some of the same stuff, although I don't know whether it's for the same reason or at the same point on the path. Keep it up!