John's practice

I should probably detail my emotionally painful sit from a few days ago, because it is a good representation of the other end of my cycle.

I sit and feel agitated. The kasina does nothing. I note my breath, my ears ringing, noises, sensations. Welling up without specific cause are feelings of despair, deep longing, heartbreak. Songs play in my mind, haunting and sad, causing me more emotional grief. The kasina does nothing. I am very distracted by sadness, sad thoughts arise, sad images, despair. My heart hurts. I try to note, but keep forgetting, lost in deep heartache. I start noting out loud. Ears ringing, heart hurts, car passing, pressure on back, back tense, relaxing into it, ears ringing, pain, longing, despair ... over and over. It helps the time to pass, but it goes very slowly. It is very difficult. Life seems to be nothing but tragedy, futile, empty, barren, hopeless, and the beings living it so beautiful and fragile, a real tragedy. I keep noting out loud. The desire for deliverance breaks through, very strong. A desire for all the beautiful and fragile beings that suffer life to somehow be happy, be free. The pain has kept welling up all this time. My heart hurts. I keep noting out loud, but the time is dragging. My emotions are like raw nerves, and the songs in my mind play on them. For an hour my heart breaks, and then I am finally done.

The kasina does little more than maybe split into two images a few times. No altered states. No difference when I stop.

John, you are to be commended for sitting through this misery. As I know you are aware, the practice is working, even when it feels bad (maybe even especially when it feels bad). I know you're also aware that, no matter how bad things get when we practice, they're far worse when we don't. Take care, Laruel

Wednesday was another impossible day, so I missed again. Thursday I had 2 thirty minute commuter noting sessions, followed by an hour kasina noting out loud. I mostly noted ears ringing and space. I scanned for emotions or other content, but had to note nothing. Space was the predominate theme. There was the usual feeling of detached space, awareness being outside the body. Oddly enough, it seemed pretty easy, but the time went slowly anyway.

Today I did an hour with the kasina. No noting. Nothing but space. Again, no emotions, just my mind wandering on occassion. Time went fairly quickly. Nothing is coming up. Mostly just the space. Very easy. Space. Nothing.

I used to never miss a day, but I missed Saturday. I'm really losing my motivation to practice. Sunday I did an hour with the kasina. The time passed quickly. I noted mostly space. I even tried scanning for emotions or something else, but it was just ears ringing, space, breathing in and out, space, mind wandering a bit, space. I decided to note the space in more detail. The space was soft, fuzzy, wide, expansive, detached, peaceful. Sometimes I stopped noting for a while, and just sat in the space. However pleasant, it has become unsatisfactory, for sure. The overriding feeling is that it is all a waste of time. I note my dissatisfaction.

I didn't sit Monday, but did an hour kasina yesterday. Same. Space. Nothing else coming up. Feels tedious after a while. Not difficult, just goes on too long.

Wednesday commuter sits and 45 minutes kasina. Thursday 45 minutes kasina. I cut back from an hour to keep from quitting. It's not that sitting is difficult, it just seems like a waste of time. I'm not exactly sure why it seems like such a waste of time, since it obviously hasn't been a waste of time, but very valuable and helpful. Still, that's the way I feel. I feel a very strong aversion to making the time to sit.

Are you still just doing Kasina?

"Are you still just doing Kasina?"

I look at the kasina, and I note, so I guess I do both. I didn't sit Friday or Saturday, but today I managed 45 minutes kasina, noting out loud. What I do is sit and look at the kasina. It usually splits into two images, after images arise, either one or both disappear and reappear, they split apart wider, or come back to one image. While all this happens I note. Mostly I note my ears ringing, my hands on my thighs, cars going by, the furnace blower, birds singing, and space -- the expansive feeling of space. I usually get an altered state, no big thing, just a feeling of being outside it all observing, of everything being spacious. If my mind is going to wander a lot, which it usually is, I note out loud. Sometimes I get very deep focus and stop noting. Everything is silent, and spacious.

Maybe I'm doing it all wrong, but the feedback I have received is that it sounds like I am doing well. Of course, what is progress? How do I really know. I seem to spend most of my time in some kind of equanimity, and occasionally lapse into some emotional turmoil for a few days. Most of the time my sitting isn't difficult at all. For the past week I have wanted to quit, just because it all seems like a waste of time. I know this isn't true, but that is how it feels anyway.

Seems like it's time to attempt "catching" the 'waste of time' sensation/thought right when it arises. (?)

"Seems like it's time to attempt "catching" the 'waste of time' sensation/thought right when it arises. (?)"

It doesn't seem to come up when I am sitting, but I will work on catching it when it does come up. Right now I just feel this aversion, like a physical sensation, disgust.

Mondays are busy for me, but I found time for 20 minutes yesterday. I will try to do more today.

1 hour kasina. Did some noting, but most of it was just sitting silently in the space. There was a lot of space. Not too much came up, and my mind didn't wander so much. Noting consisted mostly of my ears ringing, birds singing outside, breathing in and out, and noting the space, the detached openness ... hard to describe.

Hey there John.

The space / distant sounds makes me think of this

www.dharmaoverground.org/web/guest/dharm...B%2011.%20Equanimity

"Hey there John.

The space / distant sounds makes me think of this

www.dharmaoverground.org/web/guest/dharm...B%2011.%20Equanimity "

It seems that I cycle every few weeks, spending most of the time in equanimity but falling back into the misery, disgust, and emotional pain for a few days. I guess there is progress because the equanimity is becoming more stable and the emotional turmoil less frequent and less painful. I do have lots of vibrations when things are going well. Guess I just keep on with what I'm doing.

Sounds good to me, at least

Review these if you haven't already:

kennethfolkdharma.wetpaint.com/page/Case+Studies

"It seems that I cycle every few weeks, spending most of the time in equanimity but falling back into the misery, disgust, and emotional pain for a few days. I guess there is progress because the equanimity is becoming more stable and the emotional turmoil less frequent and less painful. I do have lots of vibrations when things are going well. Guess I just keep on with what I'm doing."

Some good advice that was given to me was to remember 'Right Effort.' It seems a lot of us pragmatic folk advance quickly because we have that intense 'do it' attitude, but that can be counter productive when in EQ. What would happen to me, is when I got into High EQ, I would drop noting and almost go back to concentration practice, focusing on the tingling in my 3rd eye area while still having open-awareness of everything that was arising in the background.

However, what would happen when I focused too hard is I would shift back down into Lower EQ. Vibrating would stop, etc... So, remember 'Right Effort' Not too hard, not too little...just riiiiight.

The advice was very helpful. I read the case studies, and in one Kenneth advised making the jhana the meditation, instead of noting. So that is what I did today. I started as usual, looking at the kasina, and very quickly it split into two images and I started feeling the sense of spaciousness. I meditated on the jhana, and it deepened quickly. As I focused on the state itself, I noticed that the edge of the kasina seemed to be fizzing. The outer edge of the circle was not stable, but made of bubbling or boiling particles appearing and disappearing. This continued a while, and when it went away I remembered "right effort" -- my face and neck were very tense. I realized that I was too intently focused, and relaxed. This was better, and the edges again were boiling. At times, everything was vibrating, or sometimes just light patches on the wall were vibrating, but any time I focused exclusively on the edges of the kasina it would become unstable and start fizzing.

It was easy for a while, probably the first half hour, but for the second half it seemed like a lot of effort to keep up enough focus, while staying relaxed, to keep the vibrations going, and to keep my meditation focused on the spacious state. It wasn't physical effort, just the effort to stay that focused without tensing up.

Remember that the quality of focus will change in the different jhanas, the spacious state isn't always desirable. The third jhana can be kinda difuse/unfocused and if you fight that, you're taking away momentum. Right effort means just enough to be there for what arises, not seeking a particular arising/state. (These words sound preachy to me as I type them, sorry about that!)

"Remember that the quality of focus will change in the different jhanas, the spacious state isn't always desirable. The third jhana can be kinda difuse/unfocused and if you fight that, you're taking away momentum. Right effort means just enough to be there for what arises, not seeking a particular arising/state. (These words sound preachy to me as I type them, sorry about that!) "

I know that the jhanas are supposed to be distinct, and in the beginning they seemed to be, but now when I sit I just go straight to the detached, spacious, panoramic awareness almost immediately. When I cycle through fear, misery, disgust, etc ... they go by in a blur as well, and I have to be very alert to notice them at all. I think I might similarly move through the jhanas quickly to whichever one I am stuck on now. I'll have to go back and review the jhana descriptions to see if I can notice them if I stay very alert.

I'll remember to let my "right effort" be with whatever comes instead of deciding what I should be experiencing. I get impatient and try to hurry things along, wanting the vibrations that to me signify progress, based on what little I know.

Right, it's funny how on one hand we'll want the jhanas to be distinct (showing us that we're doing good "up and down the arc" practice) and othertimes we want to get to the spaciousness of EQ quickly (which means all the early stages are a blur and we're making fast progress)... no big deal, it seems like your practice is totally in the zone now, you are essentially "being practiced" by the meditation itself, so no need to judge or manipulate. (Judgement and Manipulation can be good things to note lightheartedly.)

A rather unfocused hour with the kasina on Friday. Truly uneventful. Did 45 minutes Saturday, but I could barely keep my eyes open. It was in the morning after I woke up. Don't know what was up with that. It was extremely irritating. Right afterward I went to lie down, and of course did NOT go to sleep. Fortunately, I had a session with my meditation instructor, Ron Crouch, and so I told him about all the extreme boredom, not wanting to practice, and just how dull and uneventful things have been for weeks.

So, today I started with something new, which is just using the kasina to get a good focus and then switching to eyes closed noting. I was going to wait until I could see the bubbling motion at the edges of the kasina, but that didn't come, so I just switched to eyes closed noting anyway. It felt different. I noted everything. There was a lot of noise in the house, so plenty to note. I only had 45 minutes, and in that time I switched back to the kasina a few times, which also had a different feel coming from eyes closed. I don't know exactly what to make of it yet, but at least is wasn't so boring.

Monday is my busy day, but I found 45 minutes for my mixed kasina and eyes-closed noting. The idea here is to move from lower equanimity, where I am almost all the time, up to higher equanimity, which I have only reached on occassion. The thought was that my concentration practice was a little too strong doing the entire session while locked in to the kasina, so now I'm switching to eyes-closed noting.

I start as usual, looking at the kasina, and get a good lock right away. I can feel the spaciousness and detachment very quickly. I turn my focus to the very edges of the kasina, and notice that the edge is not solid, but unstable, often made of little bubbles are particles. If I focus in even more closely, they will seem to be boiling or fizzing at the edges of the kasina. At that point I close my eyes and note.

The first thing I will note is a nice green circle, which persists for a very long time, several minutes, before finally fading. This is obviously some after image of the kasina. Just like when I'm looking at the kasina eyes-open, there is a swirling purple cloud often enveloping the green after image, like a thick fog. I am noting now, so I note all of this action. After the green circle has faded away, I'm left with a pretty dull brown or grey to look at. I note that. I note that the space I felt with my eyes open is gone. I don't feel that space anymore. Visually and spatially, it is pretty dull, but a few feeling find their way up, some pain in the heart, some sadness, some desire for deliverance. Also, some physical symptoms appear: and ear itch, a throbbing ankle, a twing on my cheek, scalp itch ... very minor. I note feeling a little short of breath quite frequently. As always, I note my ears ringing, my fingers resting on my thighs, my feet burning or tingling. After a long while of this, I open my eyes again, and the kasina seems more alive than ever. I get a hard lock, lots of space.

It goes on like for a few cycles, and my time is up. In the end, when I realize time is running out, I note a lot of frustration, feeling that I am not making progress, wishing that I was seeing more vibrations, and wondering why I don't progress to higher equanimity.

If anyone knows and good methods from moving from lower to higher equanimity, please let me know!

It might help to not assume you know where you are.

Why no vibes? Perhaps you aren't crossing the A&P.

The physical symptoms you describe in your last post sound far more 3 characteristics-ish even though you threw the term "desire for deliverance" in the mix.

I have never done kasina practice but I do feel like EQ is all about concentration, at least for me it was (some will argue differently). But I would always start with noting and it seems as though the noting would get slower and uncessesary as the vibrations ramped up. As soon as the vibrations were strong enough in a certain area (usually 3rd eye, crown, or hands) I would move my focus to that as doing concentration practice, sometime I would automatically shift to 2nd gear, like a watcher was watching these vibrations from a distance. Obviously my periphary would still catch vibrations all over, but my main focus was the certain area where the strong vibrations were concentrated.

Now remember, like I said in my previous post about right effort. If I focused too hard on that spot, the vibrations would almost disperse and I would downshift into lower EQ. So just keep that in mind.