Thitatto's practice blog

[thitatto]

Getting back into noting again. No paths so far. Been building up my practice again for the last 2 weeks. Thought it was time to make use of the opportunity to start a practice blog. Today I've meditated for 1,5 hour. Been getting into a lot of tingling throughout my whole body, most intensely at my hands and feet. Feeling comfortable, energized and at ease. Putting my attention on the strobing of the dim light behind my closed eye-lids, and also seeing trying to see that strobing rythm in the totality of my being, but with the main focus on my visual field.

[thitatto]

Meditated 3x30 min today. At the first sit I sort of rushed to get back to where I left off yesterday, but instead I was sleepy, aversive and full of doubt about everything. Then at the last sit things started to clear up, and I was again effortlessly staying with the strobing light behind my closed eyelids.

[thitatto]

Meditated 1h and 20m. Been tired and strange today. Got into some pretty peaceful states, but became sleepy and indifferent. Don't know what is going on, and feels like I don't care at all.

[thitatto]

Meditated 1h and 30 min today. Made mostly use of noting out aloud, a technique I've had a lot of resistance towards before. I'll provide some background information. I've primarily explored 3rd gear practice for these last 4 years because discovering that approach was such a huge relief from having been a chronich dark night yogi for so many years. So along with this 3rd gear practice I've been doing Just Sitting meditation whenever I felt like. However, I keep returning to wanting to go for stream entry over and over again, and that impulse doesn't seem to stop "bothering" me. I've had a lot of resistance towards having meditation projects like this again, and also towards the added mental activity of noting. However I can clearly see that my concentration gets stronger with that sort of focus, so this is my new attempt at that sort of focused approach, and noting out aloud seems like a very useful technique in that regard.

[kennethfolk]

Welcome back, Thitatto.

[thitatto]

Thanks, Kenneth! Glad to be back. This practice feels like both a blessing and a curse, but I'm glad to have found a set of teachings that I have faith in. Meditated for 1,5 hour today. Starting to feel that I'm getting into the groove with noting loud. Feels very good to know that not one moment of my cushion time is wasted.

[kennethfolk]

Starting to feel that I'm getting into the groove with noting loud. Feels very good to know that not one moment of my cushion time is wasted.

Yes, that's one of the real benefits of noting, and especially noting aloud; it turbocharges the efficiency of your formal practice. If there is a note every second or two, none of your precious cushion time is wasted. Bill Hamilton used to say that people sometimes spent years with no progress because, although they believed they were meditating, they were really just jelling out in a pleasant hypnogogic state. Noting cures that.

[thitatto]

That's exactly what you told me two years ago towards the end of our skype sessions. It seems like finally I'm ready to apply it Noted aloud for 30 min in the morning, and 40 min partner noting in the evening with Duncan. I could see that through-out today my ability to remember to "listen for the ships in the harbor" was much more available. There are certainly things happening now. With the partner noting I think I was hitting Equanimity / 4th Jhana harder than ever before (haven't really had much experience of being hard into it, more like unsteady or yo-yo in and out a few times accidentally) This time I was just really in it, even though I was describing my meditation to Duncan at the same time. A really wide tender beautiful chilled-out space opened up, and the main focus became Metta towards my noting partner as he was reporting a rougher terrain. Seemed like I could have stayed in that state forever, but strangely enough, when our session was over, it was like, ok, time to do something else.

I like to extend a wish for myself. I'm fed up of fooling around, and I have a bad pattern with this in and out of teachings. Please, dear Universe, my I stay with it this time!

Gratitude & surrender.

[thitatto]

Meditated for 2 hours today, divided into two periods, one after school and one in the evening. After school was crap, but in the evening I was getting into the same space as yesterday. My working hypothesis is that it is the 4th Jhana. Today during and after the sit there was a new tendency to just wanting to be as normal and ordinary about it, not making it into any fuzz, and that seemed to incline my mind even more towards stillness. Both mind, body and emotions feels pretty calm and balanced now.

Most interesting thing happening today though was that I woke up this morning in a lot of anxiety and self-consciousness. Through-out the day I had a lot of old fears saying stuff like "oh no, this meditation project is going to eat up all of my life again", but also there was a lot of enthusiasm about last night results. More than before I was able to just stay with the body sensations of these fears, not indulging in these fear-based scenarios about what kind of life I wanted to create for myself that meditation was going to hinder

[thitatto]

Meditated 1,5 hours today. Noting aloud and partner noting on skype. Seems like the pattern is I get into high equanimity for the last 30 min of meditation in the evening. Staying with light vibrations in my visual field, having my eye gaze towards the eye brow center, and feeling pulsing sensations in the eye brow center. Wanting to include as much of my total of my experience into this. Some tensions going on about trying to make that happen VS. letting it happen.

I'm surprised at how quickly energy for the practice was building up again. One month ago I told a friend I wasn't able to do more spiritual practice then 10 sun salutations with 10 minutes lying on my back afterwards each morning, and I had sort of accepted the fact that that was how my life was for now and would probably continue to be for an indefinite period of time.

No doubts about the practice today. I'm also surprised at how quickly they went away. I think I'm experiencing more of a total willingness to "throw everything into the hopper" than before. No hidden agendas, like I'm going to become enlightened AND also good at playing guitar, hang out with cool people, or whatever.

Strange thing but I've had all sort of really fragmented strategies for what kind of person I'm going to become. Like, they last for perhaps one day, then the next day my social strategy is going to become a guitar player, then the next day again I'm going to become a visual artist, then the next day I'm just going to settle down being a social worker, and just on and on and on, to the point where it became absolutely hilarious.

So finally I think I can just throw all that into the hopper, and the willingness to do that I think came because there was just not any end to it.