Yadid dee:
Definitely sounds like A&P my friend.
When I first crossed A&P while doing Noting - this felt exactly as your description:
Richard B:
I felt like my brain was speeding up and increasing energy to the point I was frightened I was going to blow my brains out.
It tends to fade quite quickly and turn into the DN which you probably read about, so just continue your practice and try to bring more and more acceptance and precision to whatever you experience.
Is this your first time crossing it?
This is the first experience just like this. Everything I thought was A & P before was probably just nice jhanas with some slow noting. What helped the insight was the dependent origination thread.
http://www.dharmaoverground.org/web/guest/discussion/-/message_boards/message/401038
Especially this article:
http://www.dhammasukha.org/Study/Articles/anatta.htm
Once I felt like my ego/self/mind was twitching in my head with craving with intention and clinging with thoughts I felt I understood what I was supposed to be doing. The self feels like a reactive animal in my head. By relaxing my body and facial muscles every time I noticed tension from "contact" thoughts it allowed me to look at slow noting as a prepratory exercise but then I needed to drop the labeling and just hook up like an electrical wire to all vibratory sensations and then I put extra effort to it and that's when it happened. It was important that I kept noting faster but it was super quick "unhuhs and grunting". No words. The most important note before the event was noting my ego trying to evaluate and own my meditation practice. By noting "evaluation" I could rest in awareness and hook up without mouthing words.
I was pretty much leaning forwards afterwards and exhausted. It's like going through a brickwall after that A & P. The only difference is that it wasn't a seizure (yay!) and I felt like I wasn't permenently damaged and just okay. I'm assuming that the crossing the A & P will get easier as those neuropathways get more exercise. The difference between before and after is that I had some doubt that noting pleasant experiences would be bad but I don't doubt that anymore. Noting pleasant, neutral and unpleasant are all helpful. Work today was a little different in that I feel a little disassociative but not dangerously so. My habits still run towards narrative but it's not a big deal anymore and some light noting of "self referencing" "past" and "future" bring me back without a sense of failure. Once you understand the reactive brain you don't have to hit yourself with the "second arrow". It's just something about thought (including typing this email) that is more painful than resting in awareness. That wasn't so clear before I read Bhante Vimalaramsi.
Yeah I was worried about the Dark Night after reading so much about it and having some headache symptoms and slight malaise today but I just kept noting which still works great. No hallucinations and no depression. After the A & P it was almost instantly harder to note the sensations and I was tired. When the mental explosion was occurring my eyelids started fluttering unintentionally. The experience was more scary than I thought it was going to be.

Now I know what heavy lifting you DN'ers are going through. At least I know the next instructions. "Don't stop noting".
Bagpuss The Gnome:
Is the dark night basically staying in the present moment and tolerating unpleasantness without aversion?
Swap "tolerating" for "accepting" and you're pretty much there.
Keep up the good work!
Yeah I see what you mean. Thanks!