Hi, I just did a 1 hour and 15 minute sit and then, I wasn't timing but I could have sat for another hour or possible a half. My ass only got sore in the second half of the untimed sit. Got out of low equanimity into and through early and high mastery, alot of that formlessness going on, seemed to but might have come down into the mellower vibe of high equanimity. There was that spaciousness in the body and the mind, a full 360 mind and the clarity, I wasn't exactly in formlessness cause I kept and awareness of the the body as a vibrational presence, which is clearer than that out there Jhana quality of the formlessness of equanimity. But this really clear state would oscillate back out and into high mastery and sometimes low mastery.
I was acutely aware of all the constant struggling and the letting go as I either 'strove to or relaxed to' allow that clarity and beautiful, pervasive, spacious, vibrational simplicity to stay or return. The High equanimity if that's what it is, allows you to see with extreme clarity the movements of the intentions, attachments & aversions -(and the subtle reactions to thoughts and sensation)- so then, I try to let go the interfering and noting mind -(that is striving to see the empitness/no self and impermanence of everything so it can get stream entry)- and allow choiceless awareness to just experience this. But it seems the mind never stops trying to trick you into pushing through/holding on to a state or letting go of some some subtle sense of self with aversion/striving ect. So I'm like what do I do, there was nothing as obvious as the last time and still has been but maybe a hint of something that might be starting to let go but doesn't, obviously cause I'm not in a choiceless awareness/ letting go kind of state, but more over noting every thing- and thought I didn't really get this noting thing and now it seems like I can stop being aware of that within or alternating between the choiceless awareness.
Fuck I think this is a bit self indulgent, an I should probably just go back to the choiceless awareness thing which is working cause I'm becoming very aware of the natural noting part of the vipassana mind and this is the way I can let go and relax into equanimity, without striving to maintain high eq.
Or, cause there is a fair amount of applying the three characteristic in a noting kind of way, stuff like emptiness/no-self or impermanence in response to subtle striving and aversion and un-satisfactoriness for mild discomforts. I could ignore, this and let the state of equanimity do the work, or integrate and dissolve all that arises and passes away into awareness.
Though the later one might take a bit more practice, learning to allow the self that is the noting mind flow through the choiceless awareness.
How to put this into practice? Well, following Hokai's descriptions on the "getting it done" Hurricane Ranch discussion, I'd push really hard and as far as I could go, into 4th jhana, into equanimity - then I'd drop the state (like really, stop it, cut it off, exit the jhana, or do something jarring such as note gross sensations), renounce it, or think of Hokais image of ranks upon ranks of Buddhas watching my "feeble attempts" graciously - and then I'd just see what happened, what the "other side" would do with it, or "let it ring", as Daniel put it in that recording, as I understood him. It takes equanimity to do that, to let the nice refined state crash and fall apart, to give it away like that, renounce it, stop the conservation and maintenance of it.
Slightly poetically, I'd push against that wall with all I had, noting, jhana, synching up, whatever, then release all that effort and let the wall push back until, one day, balance emerged. Notice that in this image, there is no knack to balancing against the wall, it's kind of self-evident once it happens.
So you reckon just stick with former advice. This is the first thing that presented it self to me, when I was thinking lets get on line and start some practice journal for people to comment on.
Mostly I've been thinking, just plod along until my retreat over the Christmas break, and stabilise my centre of gravity in equanimity or mastery, you know really put the dark night out of range, sometime its been working. Been doing between an hour to two hours on average a day mostly I guess, not much of journal keeper or a counter of mantra/hours.
Anyway, rambling; not lost, confused or content in equanimity, wondering whether I should be, mostly would just like to allow it to 'Be', in equanimity cause I think that's where it happens of it's own accord. But worried I'll turn it into a jhana, maybe that's why the noting mind is so active?