Instructions for how to do absorption practice for people with mental health issues
If you have mental health issues you should avoid engaging in "dry insight." (see
http://www.vipassanadhura.com/jhana.html). The problem with this is that the DhO as well as
KFD have evolved into largely dry insight traditions. Believe it or not, there are long spaces of time in human history where people did not do dry insight and mastery of samatha was done before doing insight practices. Dry insight is popular with lay westerners because pure samatha is difficult without these conditions that westerners like to think of themselves as not having: spaces of several hours by yourself in a place with little to no external noise and distractions. If you have mental health issues and you would like to meditate then you need to figure out a way to create these conditions for yourself. EDIT: While I previously stated this was not optional, I am rephrasing this to say this is highly recommended if you find it helps you in your current circumstance and as a form of insurance.
There is an extremely dry insight attitude of "there is no such thing as a hindrance" and it can all just be noted and there is no need for attaining access concentration or any level of absorption as some level of concentration will occur naturally through noting anyways. Yes, this is (sort of) true, but if you have any mental health issues such as depression/anxiety/mania/disabling hypomania/psychosis then brute noting will generally cause more harm than good Actually, any method of noticing the three characteristics or dis-embedding from phenomena without first attaining a level of absorption will cause more harm than good. This means, if you have mental health issues and are pre-first path, then completely stop noting. Stop noting throughout your day and stop noting while you're sitting.
On the word "concentration": There are many issues with it that confuse people. One problem is that the word "concentration" implies a sense of straining and there should be no straining in samatha practice. Another problem is the fact that people use the word to describe being "concentrated" in both vipassana and samatha jhanas. This causes confusion to people who do not fully understand the difference between samatha and vipassana.
This link explains the difference:
http://kennethfolkdharma.wetpaint.com/page/Dynamic+Jhana+vs+Static+JhanaIf you have mental health issues then you need to start out more like the guy on the right than trying to immediately be the "dynamic" yogi on the left.
Dynamic jhana = vipassana jhana
samatha jhana = static jhana.
If you have mental health issues (and are pre-first path) then you should learn to do static jhana. Become a "jhana junkie" before starting insight practices. Yes, I'm serious.
Try to focus on the word "
absorption" as this word is much better at describing what to do than the vague and confusing term
concentration.
Here is a book written by a "jhana junkie" that you should purchase and put into practice:
http://www.amazon.com/Mindfulness-Bliss-Beyond-Meditators-Handbook/dp/0861712757/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1350764924&sr=8-1&keywords=mindfulness+bliss+and+beyond. Just read the practice instructions and ignore (or not take seriously) a lot of the other stuff in the book.
If you have significant clinical depression and/or anxiety problems - become a "jhana junkie."
If you have bipolar type II - become a "jhana junkie"
If you have bipolar type I and/or two or more episodes of psychosis - then it is not quite as simple as to become a "jhana junkie", though you should have some significant level of mastery of at least the first and second jhana (and should be sitting less number of hours than the above two cases), also you should be spending less time in the fourth samatha jhana (as that is the base of the psychic powers and too much time there at earlier stages in practice can lead to psychotic breaks later on). High dosages of vitamins such as niacin can prevent psychosis from occurring. See this post for detailed instructions on how to practice in this situation. I would also recommend that anyone with mental health issues read this post, regardless of what their "diagnosis" may be:
http://www.dharmaoverground.org/web/guest/discussion/-/message_boards/message/3373753I'm not saying you need to become as absorbed as B. Alan Wallace or Ajahn Brahm says you need to be absorbed in to actually be in "jhana," but the closer you can get to this ideal, the better. If it's anything but pleasant, you're not doing it right, and you should stop sitting immediately!
Once you have some
obvious significant level of mastery of the formed jhanas, then you can either do insight practices within the jhana, or you can emerge from them, come back out at access concentration and start doing insight practices from there. Light noting can now be done at this point, but no brute noting!
Also, check out this post where I describe in slightly more detail what a jhanic state should be like:
http://www.dharmaoverground.org/web/guest/discussion/-/message_boards/message/3589907EDIT:
Here is a tip: When sitting down to do samatha don't think about jhanas as numbers, actually don't think about jhana at all. When you are done with your samatha practice then you can retroactively think about what jhana might have been what, but don't do it during the sitting period. Also, set a timer and increase to several hours of completely absorbed sits. If you get really good at it you can just program a "mental" timer to come out of jhana after such and such period of time by just using your mind.