Just organizing what I've done so far and creating a practice thread.
Okay I've been doing many different practices: Noting "arising of thoughts", "gone", staying as "shinkantanza" (do nothing), "viewing all senses at the same time", "jhana jogging", "no-self" 2nd gear KFD concentration practices. They all work in their own way.
I started off with horrible concentration and after months of practice with audiodharma.org audio streams and in 2008 I got a first jhana. I started insight practice after that but it was weak and more like concentration instead. I started noticing that 2nd and 3rd jhanas with piti and sukkha while I was attempting vipassana. Once I got to noting more consistently (after being recommended to this site:grin

, I could just let go of the noting in the later part of the mediation sittings and hook up with the vibrations of the senses. Once that happened there was a shift where I thought my head would explode (probably A & P). Continuing to note I still didn't feel any dark night symptoms until I noted more accurately the 3 characteristics. The noting was too much focused on impermanence and ignoring not-self, and especially dissatisfaction. Once I started noting dissatisfaction after every mental striving a lot of my habitual enjoyments and negative mental habits were appearing obsolete due to the obvious dissatisfaction. This dissatisfaction lasted at least 3 weeks earlier this year. Once I started noting at work more, shifts happened and there was a gradual feeling that I could get relief while noting the most unpleasant emotional arisings. This became more confident even when dealing with difficult people (Cluster B types

).
This site helped with understanding no-self along with 2nd gear practices:
AnattaOnce equanimity started appearing it was like bursting for air in a sunny ocean after being down in the murky depths. The feeling of sanity was very encouraging. It was so encouraging that I started getting lazy. The equanimity was literally vibrating in my skull and the reactive part of the mind loved to go dormant giving the senses more vibrancy. The equanimity left me satisfied before, during and after fun activities. Yet this equanimity fades and has to be regenerated. I fell into reobservation which was 10 times worse than the dark-night experiences I had before. Thankfully they only lasted a couple of nights and equanimity would return again and again feeling more natural. Reobservation still happens but it's more like a vague unease or restlessness that reappears but with less force than before.
Now more recently looking at Nick's blog and some of his comments plus Tommy's experiment and I was getting a little confused while using Shinzen Young's instructions for Shinkantanza "just sitting" (which are similar but slightly different in approach) to just staying with all your senses at the same time. Both of these practices have been a help. With Shinkantanza I can let habitual thoughts go where they please and I ended up concentrating up to equanimity instead. I knew that wasn't really the practice because there's still too much habitual concentration intention. Now with applying the same practice but allowing all the senses to appear as they are at the same time it's easier to see the meditative striving for meditative states being similarly stressful as any other mental striving.
So yesterday I decided to return to basic noting (despite wanting to avoid it as too much striving) with the knowledge in the prior paragraph. Before I noted I just easily let go of any striving and stayed with all the senses (including taste) and then started noting. As I started noting I could tell when a new thought was arising but as the thought started it was very weak and then I noticed that the senses were still clear in awareness during this arising. When the thoughts made more thoughts and got more intense then they would start obscuring some of the senses. While noting the arising and the passing away a sense of elation started coming back again. So my practice now will be focused on staying with the senses first and then noting cessations or allowing shinkantanza. The noting nudges me in the right direction despite some interference with awareness.