Eelco's practice

[catsquotl]

this morning
38 minutes. I had set the bels for 20,10,10,5 minutes.
Last night I sat with relative ease althoughI did change posture once I sat through all of it with relative ease.
I even recal some feeling of profound insight. Although I cannot remember it now.

Anyway this recent morning sit was a struglle. Thoughts all the way through. filled with intentions to get up and do outher things. Which I gave into at 38 minutes.
So for the moment this will be my practise. Sit and focus on the breath.

I get the feeling that the noting practise I did somehow kept my mind busy enough maybe even sepparated enough to not mind the just sitting, but now that I let go of noting my mind frantically jumps around to get me to let it do something.

WIth Love
Eelco

[MuMuWu]

Eelco, you aren't trying to control the mind with this practice. I find it most fruitful to let it jump around - that's what it does. Your job is to note what it is jumping to. You aren't aiming to look at particular things, or really force it onto an object - noting is all about seeing attention move about on it's own and the nanas are all about how that attention is moving and how that changes.

Let it move and each time it moves label what it moves to. Let that dictate the pace of your noting. You'll get to a point where it moves so fast you cant' keep up, but until then, try to get a feel of it moving from one thing to another (without directing it in any way).

It does help, to start out with some object so you can catch the first few movements, then just follow them.

All the best,
Jayson

[catsquotl]

So last night and this morning I enforced the resolution to sit until the 45 minutes were up.
And as suspected I made it, but it felt forced/enforced. I was all over the place. struggling between just clear awareness of all the sensations to periods where I would get cought up in pain, restlessness and the like.
Both sits ended with the last 5 to 10 minutes changing my posture from burmese to seiza.. Thought were on a rampage within, I wasn't very goog at just letting them be but even in ssing myself struggling through them they arose and passed away. Giving rise to new hardships...

What I did notice was that after the sit this morning, smoking my first sigaret and closing my eyes for a bit how much more at ease I felt. I was able then to notice the colours and predominant blackness behind my eyelids which expanded in some peacefull black spaciousness.. Odd how those few minutes felt so much more like I imagine meditation to feel like then the actual sits..

And so it continues....
WIth Love
Eelco

[catsquotl]

Feel like I am back at square 1.
Blew out my back saturday. sat saturday evening, but broke my meditation short dua to fatigue and some backpain.
Skipped yesterday monings meditations. Then figured going back to what I had been able to do. 30 minutes sitting then walking. The sit went ok, and I felt I was able to note pretty consistently throughout the meditation, with just a few side tracks into story territory. Then walking caused me to become extremely aware of the pain in my back, even though it had felt like it was loosening up and dissepating before a little. Anyway broke of my walking after 11 minutes.

Set my timer for 45 minutes this morning. but broke off after just 38 minutes...
Grmbl.

I know I should just stay put.
I'll try to keep from giving rise to too much disapointment.

WIth Love
Eelco

[MuMuWu]

The sit went ok, and I felt I was able to note pretty consistently throughout the meditation, with just a few side tracks into story territory.

Have you ever devoted a sit to simply allowing whatever thoughts and stories that would arise to arise - the only caveat being that you would note them?

An example (I'm going to just write whatever I see in the next minute or so - thoughtwise) - practice thought, image thought, future thought, practice thought, image thought, image thought, uncertainty, future thought, planning thought, practice thought, planning thought, work thought, self thought, practice thought, rest, rest, rest, practice thought, planning thought, image thought).

As you can see, I've come up with some simple categories and simply allowed whatever thoughts that would arise to arise and labelled them. It can be really fun, especially if you get more detailed with it, noting imagery, such as: skeleton, phone, moon, desert, telephone, keypad, phonecord, dinner plate, television, car, sky, woman, cat, clouds, fan, clouds, moon, tree, etc.

Pretty neat stuff. Kind of a free association/noting game that will really help you dis-embed from thoughts.

[catsquotl]

Thank you MuMuWu,

I have, Not all of them but some..
After my first small succes though I have sort of tried different vieuws when "trying" to meditate.

What is strange though that the breaking of from a meditation before time seems to take place without much control..
I sit relatively comfortably for a while, then restlessness or boredom comes up and I note it for a moment. note the breath, note it again and somehow a feeling of uneasyness takes hold and intensiviesand relaxes and then at some point i see my body just waking up my eyes open, I move pick up my timer and just stop..

Its strange how i see this unfolding, but am not yet able to stop this..
Anyway.. I'll keep at it for a while..

With Love
Eelco