Andy's practice journal

Catching up on some older sits:

9/6
At lunch, I sat for 30 minutes in my car, and promptly fell asleep. Still tired from my bike tour, I guess

9/7
30 minutes in the morning. Seems like it took a while to get focused on noting, and I kept getting lost in thought. The cycle seemed clear, though - a rush of pleasant body sensations a bit after starting, then fidgeting, neck stiffness, then things turned okay, and I drove in to work noting the whole way.

9/7 35 minutes at lunch. Walked and felt a sense of focus, and when I started with breath-counting, my attention was good. When I switched to noting, however, I got very sleepy in short order, and drifted in and out of sleep for the rest of the sit. Later, in the afternoon, I felt some bliss and excitement.

9/8 40 minutes

Started okay with 3x10 breath-counting, then switched to noting. Within 10 minutes I was getting head-nods from sleepiness. Tried opening my eyes and sitting with eyes open, but would find eventually that my eyes were closed.

Three hours later in the afternoon, I'm feeling very tired, but am noticing that a fair amount of bliss has come up.

I suspect this tiredness and sleepiness is likely due to a lack of sleep, rather than falling back (I hope). Over the next two nights, I hope to be able to catch up on sleep, and we'll see what happens then.

In the meantime, I'm trying to be mindful as much as possible during daily activities.

9/9

Did a 25 minute sit in my car before my morning commute and settled down pretty quickly. It seemed like I drifted in and out of High Equanimity a few times. For me, it seems to have this characteristic of sensations rapidly flowing past. In Low Equanimity, things feel okay, sensation still seem separate and easily noted, but in High Equanimity, sensations flow quite rapidly and feel much more unified, like I'm taking in a whole lot more at a time.

At the chime, I immediately started the car and got on the freeway. Noting came pretty easily and the drive became an extension of the formal meditation. (This seems to happen frequently.) Ended up with almost an hour's worth of practice.

The lunchtime sit was another matter entirely. I felt awake and energetic when I started, but within 15 minutes, my head was nodding. Fought sleep for the rest of the half-hour sit.

Interestingly, I again had a lot of bliss later in the afternoon. This seems to be tied to the sleepy session rather than being normal cycling, since it appears regularly after the lunch sits.

9/10

Four sessions today:

80 minutes
Sat for 15 minutes before driving and noting. Was quite concentrated and focused when I got on the road, and I continued noting in this state, Eventually, however, the noting started dropping off and I wasn't able to sustain it, so I stopped.

50 minutes
In the car after a meeting. Things started off okay, but began getting waves of sleepiness. Ended up with way more half-aware drifting than noting.

105 minutes
In the car on the way back from my meeting. Was able to get into a flow of noting for quite a while. Stopped at a rest stop and noted with my eyes closed for 10 minutes, and felt a lot of body tingling, fullness, sensations that felt like big energy moving from one area to another, a heavy slow body-shaking pulse around 3-5Hz. Continued driving and noting, and noting flowed pretty well.

30 minutes
Came home feeling very tired and grumpy, and tried to take a nap. Very quickly felt the heavy body pulse, had lots of leave-me-alone thoughts, anger, frustration. Sleepiness set in, and I drifted in and out of this for the rest of the session. Never did get good sleep.

9/11

40 minutes in bed right after waking
Started with noting, and when I found myself lost in thought, I'd switch to breath-counting. Went back and forth several time. Never really felt like I moved through the cycle, and never really felt like I was in jhana either. However, I certainly wasn't asleep or dreaming, and it did feel like I was meditating. A bit of a different session, it was.

35 minutes
In bed after a long, hard bike ride. Noted from the start, and it seemed like I moved through the cycle. Eventually I got to where I was drifting in and out of clarity, and suspect that eventually I would have fallen asleep if I hadn't heard family come home.

9/12

Did a short sit in the car before heading to work. Had lot of self-centered thoughts about a small disagreement, but was able to settle. Eyes changed focus on their own, body sensations became more evident. Had a short time where I was able to clearly see the process of bare sensation arriving at the sense doors (sounds mostly, but some touches) and then see the point where the thinking mind began to become involved. For a short while, I was able to stay focused on the bare sensations without getting embedded in the thinking part of the process.

In the car on the highway, noting flowed very quickly, almost effortlessly, and I moved to simply noticing. Sometimes when I note, it feels like I'm way behind, but this time it felt like I was very close to the moment, noting/noticing almost instantly as sensations arose. A few times, I was able to watch in real-time as the focus of my attention narrowed (for example, when a car pulled out right in front of me) and then see it widen back out to be more panoramic when the situation became less involving.

9/12 (continued)

40 minutes
Had been feeling some excitement and some bliss during the morning. Started with some walking/noting to get warmed up, then drove to my meditation spot, closed my eyes and started noting. Immediately the freeway sounds took on a characteristic, well, sound -- this sort of long drawn out swooshing as the cars went by on the freeway. Some body twitching arose, and my eyes focused in and up on their own. Soon, dream-like thinking showed up, alternating with clarity. Eventually, head-nods started happening. After a few of these, I opened my eyes and tried noting with eyes open. It was really hard to keep my eyes open, but I gradually grew more awake. Had one strong body shake, then full clarity, before drifting off again. By the time the chime went off, I was focused pretty well on noting.

30 minutes
Noted on the drive home. Was able to stay focused on noting the whole way.

55 minutes
Had been noting on the drive home. When I got home, I stayed focused, and immediately lay down on the bed and kept noting. Continued to watch phenomena (primarily body sensations and thoughts) passing by. Drifted in and out of sleepiness for probably 30 minutes, and then gradually grew more awake as time went on. Eventually, I started yawning, and ended the session. Felt "out of it" for an hour after.

9/13, 45 minutes before work

Started noting immediately, and within 10 seconds felt a quick body rush of pleasure, then within a minute after that, sounds in the distance became noticeable along with body sensations. Neither the sounds outside nor the body sensations seemed any more important than the other. Both sets of sensations were felt as part of a wide three-dimensional field of awareness. There was still the vague sensation of an observer.

After 15 minutes, started the car and drove. The various sensations of driving seemed very detailed and interesting. Driving felt like it was happening in slow motion. Noting felt heavy, so I simply noticed. Noticing was very, very fast, and attention was panoramic. Occasionally there was a noticealbe sense of newness and freshness about various features of the landscape I was driving past (I drive this way every workday). At times, I would find myself lost in thought, but not very often. In fact, it felt like thinking was down in the mix of sense doors, and it wasn't very prominent. When thinking would come up, I would focus on the senses, and it would quiet down. I was still in this state when I got to work, and in fact, throughout the morning.

9/13 cont, 55 minutes at lunch

Started again with walking and noting. Felt at least one shift while walking, and watching sensations was easy.

Drove to my meditation spot, noting the whole way. I was still concentrated when I got there. Closed my eyes, and my body felt good, felt stable, like I could sit forever. It was pretty easy to sit back and let sensations come to me. I noted/noticed for a while, maybe 20 minutes and then felt a sudden buildup of strong pressure, like every molecule in my body was suddenly squeezed. My body felt like it rippled for a second, then the sensations was gone. I ended up some peripheral tingling immediately after, and a change in the general feel of experience. It reminded me of some fruitions, but the entrance seemed longer and different than what I've experienced before.

There was no bliss wave after, but as I continued to sit, I felt like a lot of energy had built up. I had some eye movement and was various big muscle groups felt like they wanted to twitch. Sitting was very easy, and I had virtually none of the neck pain and stiffness that I've had over the last month or so.

When the chime went off, I decided to see if jhanas were available to me. I concentrated on my breath for 3x10 counts (which felt easy) and to my surprise, I could walk myself down to first, then back up to 4th, then up to 8th and back down. I still wonder if the arupa jhanas are real for me and not scripted, since I've not had hard experiences of them, but I could definitely tell a difference between them today.

The total sit ended up being 55 minutes.

9/14

I was running short on time, so I only had time for about 5 minutes of meditation in the commuter lot before getting on the road. Even so, within a minute of starting, a quick rush of body bliss came up and then very shortly, thoughts faded, sensations became obvious, and I was just observing all this stuff happening in and around me. I felt like I could have hung out all day, but the chime went off and I got on the highway.

I was feeling a sense of excitement, joy, happiness, energy. Like yesterday morning, it again felt like I everything was happening in slow motion. Driving itself was fun and engaging, and I could see all kinds of detail in the road itself, the grass lining the roadbed, branches on the trees. Normally, it can take me a while develope noting speed, but today, it flowed very, very quickly and accurately. One of the ways I can tell if I'm noting well is by how detailed the notes are and today I had no lack of detail, and in fact, a huge abundance of it.

There was also a big difference in my experience between when I was lost in thought (which was happening rarely), and when I was absorbed in the flow of sensations. When I noticed I was embedded in thoughts, I simply looked at the details of anything around me and it would bring me back to the sensory world. I'm curious if this is what AF refers to as sensuous experiencing of the world.

9/14 continued...

There was a subtle sense of wonder and joy about this experience, and a sense of freshness to it. Driving past a long line of construction barrels, I was struck by the juxtaposition of the orange against a background of green grass and gray asphalt. Even the random placement of them on the side of the road looked interesting.

This didn't go away when I got to work and got out of my car, and is still happening as I sit and type this. Concentration is easy, and objects on my desk are interesting, and if I concentrate a bit, I can get a sense of fascination to come up. Walking down the hallway, I can see the difference in the focus through my glasses and around the periphery of the lenses. The hallways of this building look like big 3-D, boxy, bright tunnels with art on the walls.

I can go on and on and on, but I'll keep paying attention to this, and see what changes.

Nice!

9/14, 15 minutes at lunch

Only had time for a quick lunch sit today. Split it up into 5 of breath-counting and 10 of noting. Breath-counting started off well, but I realized I had lost count several times by the time I got over 4x10. Kept counting until the 5 minutes mark, at which point I started noting. After 5 more minutes I was feeling sleepy and tired and started to drift a bit. Suddenly I had a body jerk, and clarity returned, but eventually, I got sleepy again. This repeated one more time. When the chime rang, I opened my eyes and felt some unpleasant body buzzing and a general fogginess.

In the afternoon, I had bliss return, then later I noticed the bliss had turned a bit unpleasant, almost overwhelming, then later, more bliss that felt really nice. I still felt like I had a more mindful awareness of sensations all afternoon, but it almost felt like some rapid cycling going on. As of 6:00 pm, I'm feeling a bit out of it, tired, hungry, and ready to be home.

9/14, 50 minutes after work

Sat in the car for 20 minutes before the drive home. Noted and got concentrated very quickly. Noticed the move through A&P and into Equanimity, and then Equanimity got deeper. I started feeling a lot of energy (if I had been doing chores, I would have gotten them done in half the time). Little twitchy sensations came up in my eyes, and I had some muscle twitches all over. It felt like there were lots of little tiny fireworks continuously going off in me. Each burst was accompanied by a little internal thump and a tiny, tiny pulse of bliss. Outside sensations faded away and this was all that was in my attention for maybe 15 minutes.

Got on the freeway and drove home. The sense of wonder and fascination was not as pronounced as in the morning drives, but was definitely there. Cloud formations were interesting, the low sun made a lot of contrast, and the fields of corn and soybeans were cool to look at.

9/15, 60 minutes before work and on drive in

Sat for 15 minutes in the car before getting on the highway. Noticed a fair amount of thinking going on, but still felt a quick body rush of pleasure and then outside sounds became noticeable. Thinking was still coming up through this, but didn't seem to matter that much.

Got on the road, and the same thing happened as in post 280, 282, 284. Sensations became interesting, joy, bliss, concentration, wonder all came up within 5 minutes. Watching the road flow past in my peripheral vision was fascinating, as was pretty much everything about the drive. This went on and on until I stopped in a traffic jam. People were driving past on the shoulder, and I seemed to have a hard time just watching that happen. I found myself embedded in the feelings of indignation, frustration, lack of fairness. After about five minutes of this, the state I was in slowly started to evaporate, and by the time the jam was over, so was the state.

9/15

40 minutes at lunch
Started with 5x10 breath-counting, and my body was buzzing and tingling when I finished. Started noting, and pretty quickly I started getting sleepy. Spent the rest of the time drifting in and out of sleep. When the chime went off, my body was still very buzzy and tingly.

In the afternoon, I was feeling a lot of bliss, and this came and went all afternoon. There doesn't seem to be anything else that comes up, just bliss. I'm getting a bit tired of it.

40 minutes
Sat in the car for a bit before heading home. I was tired, things felt a bit foggy, and it was unclear to me what (if any) nyana I ended up in. The drive home was unspectacular. I did have a few moments of wonder, but they were mild and fleeting.

30 minutes walking
Had an interesting experience later in the evening. I had been feeling unsettled -- some loneliness, tiredness, insecurity, wanting to eat -- so I went for a walk, paying attention to my breathing and my feet. Halfway through, I sat and noted on a park bench. It was colder, so I sat with my hands in my pockets, and when I watched the sensations of my hands, they were just hands. It felt pretty neat - there were sensations of hands in pockets, but they felt disconnected from any me/mine ownership. I marveled for a bit, watching the hands for a while, then listened to the sounds of a train crossing town, then walked home. The emptiness faded pretty quickly once I started walking again.

9/16

55 minutes
Had taken some meds for sleep last night, and was still feeling the effects in the morning. Sat for 25 minutes prior to driving in, and never felt like I really was concentrated. In the car, managed to note/notice all the way to work, but did not have the wonder, joy, etc.. of the last four days. Noted disappointment.

60 minutes, lunchtime sit.
I Started with walking and could tell right away that I had a hard time keeping my attention on my breath and on my feet. Noting wasn't much better. Within 10 minutes of starting closed-eye meditation, I started getting dropouts and confusion from sleepiness. The rest of the time was spent either sleeping, or coming awake, starting to note, and then coming awake, starting to note, etc...

Such a big change from earlier in the week, and feelings of disappointment, frustration, searching, doubt are coming up. I want to sit more to resolve this, but suspect I'll just get sleepy again.

Thanks for these great reports, Andy. Impressive that you sat two hours today despite the tough stuff coming up. I've struggled with insomnia a bit of late as well. I used to buy a magnesium supplement called NaturalCalm. S'posed to help, and seems to, but with the placebo effect, who knows? Anyway, have a great weekend...

Hey, thanks, Joel! I actually managed to get another sit in later after work -- see my next post. I do find that upping the dose of sitting helps me make progress. To be honest, a chunk of the practice I do is not on the cushion, so to speak, unless you consider the driver's seat a cushion.

I've found that if I sit even for five minutes before my commute, I can then practice noting pretty much all the way to work. This adds about five hours of practice on to my week.

The sleepiness is curious and frustrating to me. It seems to occur mostly at lunchtime, but other than speculating that it's somehow related to the stage of practice I'm at, I'm at a loss about what might cause it. I've thought that it might be Dark Night related, but I don't get it in the mornings, but sometimes get it after work.

Probably what's more important is for me to look at my reactions to it, and use that as grist for the practice mill, but usually I'm too sleepy to actually do that. But, as the saying goes, "this too shall pass."

9/16, 30 minutes in the car, 30 driving

Had drifted in and out of sleep in the last session, so wasn't expecting too much out of this one. That's not the way this turned out to be.

Earlier in the day, I had the realization that the experiences this week on my morning sit and commute matched up with Direct Mode. Several months ago, I had played with Direct Mode, but never really "got it." Now, I'm finding that it makes sense.

(See kennethfolkdharma.wetpaint.com/thread/47...ect+Mode+Experiences )

So I played with Direct Mode for a bit, having never really done it before. I found that the act of placing and holding attention on tension seemed to bring up some sensations very similar to what I feel in first Jhana - some bliss, excitement, one-pointed focus. With a small bit of practice, I was able to lock on to the body tension and hold attention on it. Eventually, that tension would release, and I got a little A&P-like head rush, and it seemed to take me deeper into Direct Mode.

After about ten minutes, I switched to noting, and found that I was already in Equanimity. In a short while things got a little dreamy, and suddenly I had this fluttering sensation, and was back in A&P with body tingling. I sat for a while after this, but it did not reoccur.

At the 30 minute mark, I started the car and got on the freeway. I was feeling extremely relaxed and peaceful, and was getting into the feeling of driving. Some of the cloud formations looked pretty interesting, and I had this feeling of calm acceptance.

This sense of peace faded away by the time I got home, but I did decide not to push myself with a bike ride in the cold weather. I was able to relax and enjoy a couple of beers, and a Robert B. Parker novel.

Catch-up on journaling:

9/17, 45 minutes in bed right after waking up
Playing with direct mode, touring the jhanas, and attempted to tour the nyanas

9/18, 75 minutes
Sat in park, and pretty soon had a small fruition, then walked/sat, noted, did mindfulness of breath, DM practice the rest of the time, working on bringing up a sense of wonder freshness, and joy.

9/19, 50 minutes
Lunch sit started with a drive, then sat for 20, fell asleep, drove again and noted/noticed. Definitely felt more useful to not fight sleepiness, but to drive/note/notice.

9/20

60 minutes
20 minutes of noting before commute to get into Equanimity, then noted on the way to work through the fog, paying attention to freshness, wonder, joy, bliss.

50 minutes
Started with walking, but got lost in thought a number of times. In closed-eye sit, started with 10x10 breath-counting. Shifted to noting, and pretty soon I started having transitions from dreamy state to clarity and tingling. However, this turned to sleepiness, and repeated over and over and over. I finally woke when I realized the chime had not rung the end of the session (software failure).

9/20 (cont.)

So I finally figured a practice I can do on the bike... I spent about 25 total minutes doing HAIETMOBA during a ride last night. I'd ask the question, then examine my experience. After doing this for about 15 minutes, I got to where the experience was coming up clean and pure for a few seconds at a time, before thinking would kick in. From there, I worked on lengthening the time it stuck around, and got it to where it was happening regularly for 5-10 seconds at a time.

That night, after I stretched out after the ride, I realized I was feeling very, very relaxed, with a warm, slightly blissful body "glow" centered mainly in my core. It was hard to fall asleep, and the body sensations were pretty obvious. I slept very poorly with a lot of tossing and turning. One time I woke up with pure fear sensations that didn't seem to be associated with a dream or any thinking. I got goosebumps all over and chills down my back. All of these came across as vibrations somewhere around 10Hz. I fell back asleep shortly after that.

I woke up tired, but the bliss was still there in the morning. The morning sit floundered a bit until I did 3x10 breath-counting, at which point thinking settled down. I was able to note smoothly, quickly and continuously on the drive in, and the bliss and mindfulness were still there at lunchtime.

9/21, 55 minutes

For my lunchtime sit, I played with several techniques. First, I started with HAIETMOBA. The focus on the experience immediately following the question was pretty strong, and the experience itself got longer and longer. I made it to high Equanimity pretty quickly and felt very solidly in it. Next, I noted, and found myself drifting a bit, but that seems to happen to me in Equanimity anyway. After that, I tried touring the jhanic arc, but I don't think I moved out of fourth jhana at all.

Finally, I just sat, and ended up with a very mild, barely noticeable frution. So I played with fruitions a bit. I'd feel the tingle of the jump down to A&P, then the tingles would turn to prickliness, then things would get dreamy. At that point, I'd make a resolution to have a frution, and shortly thereafter, I'd feel the entrance, then I'd be back in A&P. I was able to get these to be stronger and strong, and I finally had one where the entrance lasted over a second, and the bliss that came up after was very noticeable.

I tried to resolve to have a fruition through one of the other doors, but nothing came of it. Eventually, I had a bit of a body shake, and ended up in A&P, but I really couldn't tell if the fruition door was any different.

The bliss from that fruition practice is still with me, hours later, and mindfullness also seems to be ramped up.

I went from the previous sit to this:

9/22, 40 minutes
Tried to work on samatha jhanas, and started with breath-counting. Got sleepy (slept poorly last night) and couldn't count past three without losing count and drifting. After about 10 minutes of this, I started the car and went for a freeway drive. I practiced a wide-open awareness, HAIETMOBA, and noting when I was getting lost in thought during the other two practices.