katy steger:
... I consciously relax the brow if there is any tension there. This smoothing-of-the-muscles action often enables joining this varying lightness-to-darkness (again, these tones are not actual, but mental objects contacted by mental faculty). This joining creates, for me, the first absorption. Breathing may reduce, and this reduction in breathing becomes noticeable in instable (aparisuddho) jhana. Instable jhana may have coming-and-going of jhana at the outset.
Good tip!
katy steger:
For me, I've had only one wakeful OBE (to separate this from dreams with sense of flight) and I think it may have been
MCTB's the Arising and Passing Away Event.; it was also marked by a sense of tremendous bliss, "becoming one with light/God" and gave me several years of hoping to reproduce the same event. I gave up in my late twenties, after about a dozen years of missing/longing for that seemingly amazing event.
If you read the page linked from MCTB, what do you think?
I read the page and Daniel's new sticky thread "Diagnosing the A&P" this weekend. I think there are several events related to that stage. But I was doubtful because of Ian's comment (IIRC) regarding the link between OBE and jhanas, plus a fabulous dream I had which pointed in the same direction. ***Edit: Ven Ajahn Chah also talks about descending down a hole in deep jhanas.***
Regarding A&P, I had first horrible night paralysis (that found latter) triggered by zhang zhuang (standing meditation) practice plus short hours of sleep (due to work) that only stopped when I found the link to the energetic practice. Once I accepted it, the energy flowed through my spine and head (with a chain saw like sound) and went down to my legs, where it felt as if my legs where sky rockets! That happened twice with a few days gap. Since then (2 years), I feel some energy flow in my spine and ocasionally climbs to the head and then descends, and in very few occasions that blind OBEs I mentioned before. Nowadays I see in meditation moiré patterns (once in 3D!) just for a split second, as well as ocher colored images or childish scary images (eg. a dead rat, a broken toy,etc), plus the body vibrations and warmth at legs & lower abdomen. Regarding prior Insight Stages (which I have not practiced intentionally) I have also seen things like the candle and plate merge with the floor, or stand up from the zafu but still feel glued to it, or the kasina expand and contract with my breath or spin like a planet, or how thoughts disappear after the breath out. Summing up, there were several unusual experiences but which didn't felt like insight lessons learned.
Regarding 1st Jhana, I once had a dream that felt much like the descending OBE, where I submerged in the ocean, everything was fully dark and then I reached the ocean floor, where there was a turtle whose shell was red (like a red botton). I touched it but then I couldn't take my hand out of it... Latter I found out what nimitta is (turtles are associated with wisdom), and so felt like it was a kind of message to start concentration practices.
Best wishes,